IMF head urges COP26 leaders to ramp up climate ambition

IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva on Sunday urged world leaders gathered at the COP26 summit in Glasgow to show greater policy ambition, calling climate change a "grave threat to macroeconomic and financial stability."

Georgieva published a blog post titled "Climate Threat Demands More Ambitious Global Action" before heading to Glasgow, where she will take part in the climate talks according to an IMF spokesperson.

If unchanged, "global policies will leave 2030 carbon emissions far higher than needed" to keep alive the goal of limiting global warming to only 1.5 degrees Celsius, wrote the International Monetary Fund's managing director.

"To achieve these cuts, policymakers attending COP26 must address two critical gaps: in ambition and in policy."

Georgieva urged advanced economies to reduce emissions "for reasons of equity and historical responsibility."

"Even if current commitments for 2030 were met, this would only amount to between one- and two-thirds of the reductions needed for temperature goals," she said. "Regardless of how cuts are spread across country groups, everyone has to do more."

The IMF head called on advanced economies to stick to their commitment to provide $100 billion per year in financing to low-income countries, starting in 2020, to offset the cost of moving away from fossil fuels.

She warned that the latest figures show "we remain short of that target."

Georgieva also argued that widespread carbon pricing should play a "central role" in climate policy, and could help "jump-start emissions reductions."

"A global carbon price exceeding $75 per ton would be needed by 2030, to keep warming below 2 degrees" Celsius, she wrote.

UK's Johnson urges Xi to take climate action ahead of COP26
London (AFP) Oct 29, 2021 - British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Friday urged China's President Xi Jinping and other world leaders to take "concrete action" on climate change as they spoke by phone ahead of the upcoming COP26 talks.

The pair discussed "a range of issues, including action to address the climate crisis ahead of COP26, global trade and economic cooperation, and security and human rights", according to a press release from Johnson's Downing Street office.

Johnson's government is hosting the two-week UN summit in Glasgow from Sunday, but Xi will not be attending.

China did, however, on Thursday renew its emissions cutting plan with a promise that its carbon pollution would peak before 2030.

"The prime minister acknowledged China's new Nationally Determined Contribution and welcomed their work on the COP15 Biodiversity Summit," said Johnson's office.

"He emphasised the importance of all countries stepping up their ambition on climate change at COP26 and taking concrete action to cut emissions and expedite the transition to renewable energy, including phasing out coal."

As part of the 2015 Paris Agreement, all countries agreed to slash emissions to limit temperature rises, and to submit ambitious plans for further cuts every five years.

Beijing's new submission to the UN confirmed its goal to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060 and slash emissions intensity -- or emissions per unit of economic output -- by more than 65 percent.

But there is little detail of how China, the world's biggest polluter, will achieve its goals.

Many had hoped for China to wean itself off coal and peak emissions much earlier than 2030, and reduce pollution from heavy industries such as cement, steel and aluminium over the next five years.

Israeli PM commits to carbon neutrality by 2050
Jerusalem (AFP) Oct 29, 2021 - Israel said Friday it was committed to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050, two days before the United Nations' COP26 climate conference opens in Glasgow.

The Israeli government had in July announced a plan to reduce its carbon emissions by 85 percent by 2050, against a 2015 baseline.

Carbon neutrality is a balance between emitting carbon and absorbing it from the atmosphere and the topic is high on the agenda of the upcoming climate meeting in the Scottish capital.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Energy Minister Karine Elharrar "have agreed on raising the threshold for reducing greenhouse gas emissions so that by 2050, Israel will reach zero emissions," said a statement released by the premier's office.

"With the new goal, Israel is lining up alongside the developed countries that are already taking action to attain the goal of zero emissions, and is redoubling its commitment to... international agreements on the issue," Bennett was quoted as saying.

Israel will develop seasonal energy storage facilities, carbon trapping and green infrastructure, among other things, in order to help it achieve its revised goal, his office said.

Thousands of people demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Friday to demand the government adopt a more ambitious climate policy.

Israel invests less per capita in public transport than many other developed nations, and it remains highly dependent on carbon intensive energy sources, notably natural gas.

A report by the State Comptroller this week found that Israeli government policy falls short of the actions needed to address the climate crisis.

Canadians, Dutch to push for climate pledge: Trudeau
The Hague (AFP) Oct 29, 2021 - Canada and the Netherlands will head to the G20 and COP26 meetings with a joint strategy to ensure countries "stepped up" to pledges made to tackle climate change, Justin Trudeau said Friday.

The Canadian prime minister was in The Hague where he met Dutch counterpart Mark Rutte, ahead of the weekend's G20 gathering in Rome and the UN's climate summit in Glasgow, which starts next week.

Speaking at a press conference after meeting Rutte for an hour at the Dutch leader's offices at the historic parliament buildings, Trudeau said "it was a meeting of like-minded friends."

The meeting "has allowed us to strategise about how we can continue to put pressure to make sure the world is stepping up to these huge challenges," Trudeau said.

"We are working with like-minded allies including Germany and others to ensure that the world does hit its 100 billion dollar pledge very rapidly and goes beyond that," the Canadian leader added.

Both climate change activists and the UN wants G20 countries to meet a $100 billion a year target to help developing nations curb their carbon pollution and adapt to devastating climate impacts.

The target was meant to have been reached last year, and the failure of developed nations to do so has become a key point of contention heading into the COP26 summit.

Rutte said he remained "fairly optimistic" for a good outcome of the upcoming COP26 talks which starts Sunday and will not be attended by Russia and China, two of the world's largest polluters.

"I'm really positive, our teams are working tonight and tomorrow on how we can also as Canada and The Netherlands work on this," Rutte said.

"So I'm fairly optimistic that we can still achieve a good outcome. But... if we don't work hard we could be in trouble," Rutte said.

Promises, power plants and politics: China's position ahead of COP26
Beijing (AFP) Oct 29, 2021
Days before the United Nations COP26 summit in Glasgow, China has submitted a renewed emissions-cutting plan that failed to include substantial new commitments to drastically reduce carbon output in the near future from the world's biggest polluter. As part of the 2015 Paris Agreement, all countries agreed to slash emissions to limit temperature rises, and to submit ambitious plans for further cuts every five years. Ahead of the summit, which begins Sunday, we look at China's position. What ... read more