Bonn, Nov 14 – The World Business
Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) has launched below50 initiative
hubs in North America, South America and Australia to create much bigger demand
and markets for sustainable fuels.
The initiative is a new
technology industrial revolution that will provide a major boost to speed up
climate action but only if business commits to it and governments back it with
stable policy and new incentives, delegates at the COP23 Innovation Day said on
Tuesday.
This was done at the ongoing
COP23 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Bonn.
Getting ideas into action is a
major theme of this Global Climate Action day where representatives from
business, government and civil society are delving into technological and
policy innovation and new ways of collaborating to get the world on track to achieve
the goals of the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement.
Mr John Danilovich, Secretary
General of the International Chamber of Commerce, said “faced with the growing
problem of climate change, the instinct of companies is not to be passive but
to take action and find solutions.
Global climate policy must
provide the framework necessary to encourage the private sector to increase
investment and spur innovation to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement,”
The central goal of the Paris
Agreement is to keep the average global temperature rise well below 2 degrees
Celsius and as close as possible to 1.5 degrees.
About one degree of that rise has
already happened, underlining the urgency to progress much further and faster
with the global clean energy transformation.
Meeting the Paris goal is also
inextricably linked to the success of the 2030 Agenda’s 17 Sustainable
Development Goals, in this case particularly Goal 9 – to build resilient
infrastructure, promote sustainable industrialisation and foster innovation.
The below50 initiative is a
global collaboration that brings together the entire value-chain for
sustainable fuels – that is, fuels that produce at least 50 per cent less CO2
emissions than conventional fossil fuels. The goal is to create the demand and
market for these fuels to scale up deployment.
The below50 hubs allow companies
to engage with the below50 global campaign at the local level. Each hub works
on solutions tailored for their regions - including local policy, awareness
raising and financing. Every hub is led by a below50 partner and welcomes
companies with an interest in the regional low-carbon fuel market.
Transport accounts for nearly 18
per cent of all emissions worldwide, and over 90 per cent of the sector is
still dependent on carbon intensive fossil-fuels. To date, only 3 per cent of
transport fuels are low-carbon. According to the International Energy Agency,
if we are to satisfy economic growth and limit global warming to below 2°C, 10
per cent of all transport fuels must be low carbon by 2030 and 30 per cent by
2050.
“We are standing at the cusp of a
new industrial revolution. Forward-looking businesses are exceeding their
climate targets by using innovation to help them reduce their carbon footprint.
This is happening now as carbon smart technologies are disrupting the fuels and
chemicals supply chain, and initiatives like below50 are turning this approach
into a global movement,” said Freya Burton, Chief Sustainability and People
Officer at LanzaTech.
This kind of innovation,
partnership and united drive towards low-carbon must be replicated across the
globe.
“We need innovation across
policies, technologies and methods of collaboration,” said Rasmus Valanko,
Director of Climate and Energy at WBCSD.
He said “we’re not going to solve
the climate challenge with existing technology only. We need to invest in the
technologies and the partnerships we’ll need when de-carbonisation gets even
harder.”
Below50 does not only represent
innovative technology, but also innovative ways of partnering with governments
to create enabling policies that will bring low-carbon solutions to local
markets.
Moving towards low-carbon
requires identifying clearly which policies work and where they can be
replicated in other parts of the globe. For example, through below50, WBCSD is
working with the Brazilian government to adopt low-carbon fuel policies from California.
The idea is to create systems
that reward and encourage sustainable investment.
“The Paris Agreement has
delivered a shared ambition on climate change, and based on that, there needs
to be clear national and local action plans which include; innovation. That’s
where the actual emissions reductions happen,” Mr. Valanko said.
GNA
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