Climate Change

Food Waste is the New Green Energy

Southeast Asia’s economy is set to lose trillions over the next 50 years if it does not significantly reduce its carbon emissions, a Deloitte report found. Also, the region’s services industry is predicted to lose $9 trillion by 2070, followed by $7 trillion of losses in manufacturing, while retail and tourism could collectively lose $5 trillion. They need to pivot from seeing global warming efforts as an optional cost to seeing it as an investment in a climate-driven transformation to a better future.

Methane is the second most abundant human-caused greenhouse gas (GHG), and is 86 times more powerful than carbon dioxide over 20 years in the atmosphere (34 times more powerful over 100 years). Because it exists for a relatively short time in the atmosphere, cutting methane provides a quick benefit in terms of limiting near-term temperature rise. Studies estimate that ambitious actions to reduce methane can avoid 0.3 degrees C of warming by 2050.

Analysis of the total carbon dioxide emissions of countries since 1850 has revealed the nations with the greatest historical responsibility for the climate emergency. But six of the top 10 have yet to make ambitious new pledges to cut their emissions before the crucial UN COP 26 climate summit in Glasgow in November.
The six include China, Russia and Brazil, which come only behind the US as the biggest cumulative polluters.

In addition to COP26 in Glasgow at the end of October, today, world leaders are gathering in Kunming, China and virtually for the first phase of the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP15). Here's a quick recap of what you need to know about this Conference and what to expect from it.

The most influential climate science paper of all time

After the second world war, many of Japan’s smartest scientists found jobs in North American laboratories. Syukuro (Suki) Manabe, a 27-year-old physicist, was part of this brain drain. He was working on weather forecasting but left Japan in 1958 to join a new research project by the US Weather Service to develop a numerical model that could be used to study the climate.

Google Maps is to offer drivers the lowest carbon route for their chosen journey as part of the search company’s new environmentally friendly policies.
Motorists will be able to select the route with the lowest carbon emissions once factors such as traffic and road inclines are taken into account. The new product launches in the US on Wednesday and in Europe next year. Where the comparable journey times are broadly the same, Google Maps will default to the lowest carbon option.

One of the issues for discussion at COP26 is global pricing mechanism for carbon dioxide emissions. Is carbon pricing an effective tool to reduce emissions and tackle climate change? What are the critical elements that determine its effectiveness?

Carbon pricing shows serious promise as a tool in the fight against climate change.

Deterring the use of fossil fuels, such as coal, fuel oil, and gasoline, is crucial to reducing the buildup of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Carbon pricing provides across-the-board incentives to reduce energy use and shift to cleaner fuels and is an essential price signal for redirecting new investment to clean technologies.

Less than one month to COP26. My colleagues at Earth Negotiations Bulletin will be reporting from Glasgow and have thoughts on what to expect, based on covering the UNFCCC talks in June 2021.