Speaker 1: I'm Dana Perkins and you're listening to Switch It on
Speaker 1: the b n F podcast. So last week on the
Speaker 1: two and April, U S President Joe Biden invited forty
Speaker 1: world leaders to a summit to discuss the climate crisis.
Speaker 1: So on today's show, we've asked BNF's Global Head of
Speaker 1: Policy Research, Victoria coming to join us alongside Ali Zadi Najafabadi,
Speaker 1: head of Asia Pacific Research for b n EF. Vicky's
Speaker 1: with me here in London and Ali isn't soul, so
Speaker 1: we're trying to bring some different perspectives from different parts
Speaker 1: of the world. They're going to give us a summary
Speaker 1: of some of the main things that happened at the
Speaker 1: summit and put it into context during what is looking
Speaker 1: like a big year for dialogue and commitments on climate
Speaker 1: with the UN Climate Change Conference or COPY approaching this
Speaker 1: upcoming November in Glasgow. Among the reiteration of some existing commitments,
Speaker 1: there were a few new commitments and a few statements
Speaker 1: that bring us a step closer to understanding what some
Speaker 1: countries will actually be doing. And remember the five w's, who, what, when,
Speaker 1: where and why? Those are increasingly well trodden territory when
Speaker 1: we're talking about climate, but it's really the how that
Speaker 1: last question that doesn't fit with the five ws that
Speaker 1: is turning out to be the really tricky part. As
Speaker 1: a reminder, b n EF does not provide investment or
Speaker 1: strategy advice, and you can hear a more complete disclaimer
Speaker 1: at the end of the show. But now let's talk
Speaker 1: about the Biden Climate Summit from last week. Vicky Ali,
Speaker 1: thank you for joining today, Thank you for having us,
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. So we're here today to talk
Speaker 1: about the climate summit that took place at the end
Speaker 1: of last week. So it was a two day summit
Speaker 1: that the United States facilitated. There's a notable climate summit
Speaker 1: already happening this year, so copy is coming up just
Speaker 1: in November. And I really got me thinking when they
Speaker 1: announced that the summit was going to be taking place,
Speaker 1: what were they hoping to achieve? And what did they achieve?
Speaker 1: Potentially we'll get to that. What were they hoping to
Speaker 1: achieve at this summit that wasn't already going to be
Speaker 1: happening at copp in November. I think we can say
Speaker 1: that there are like were two main aims of the event.
Speaker 1: So the first one is that the US is back
Speaker 1: in Paris, is back in the Paris Agreement. So it
Speaker 1: was a chance for the US to re establish itself
Speaker 1: to say here we are, we are committed to tackling
Speaker 1: climate change, and we're raising our climate ambition. And then
Speaker 1: at the same time so we do indeed have COP
Speaker 1: twenty at the end of this year. One of the
Speaker 1: reasons why it is an important COP is that it's
Speaker 1: the beginning of this cycle that was this kind of
Speaker 1: reporting pledging cycle that was agreed in the Paris Agreement,
Speaker 1: where countries or parties they make their pledges, then there's
Speaker 1: a kind of comparison of all the targets together known
Speaker 1: as the Global stock take, and then on the basis
Speaker 1: of that assessment, parties are meant to increase their ambition.
Speaker 1: And so this summit was an opportunity for countries to
Speaker 1: make more ambitious pledges. That was the aim was to
Speaker 1: kind of galvanize efforts towards a tackling climate change. So
Speaker 1: those were the main goals of the summit, but yes,
Speaker 1: it may be a different matter as to whether they
Speaker 1: were actually realized. There's some pre COP energy here and
Speaker 1: trying to get everybody really ready for what will hopefully
Speaker 1: be a year very much focused on these issues. Were
Speaker 1: there any countries noticeably absent from the Biden Climate Summit
Speaker 1: from my perspective, Actually, it was noticeable about how many
Speaker 1: countries did attend. So even countries or leaders that have
Speaker 1: been less than ambitious about tackling climate change or vocal
Speaker 1: about the need to tackle climate change, say Saudi Arabia
Speaker 1: or Russia or Turkey, they were all there. So we
Speaker 1: had peuty In, Bosonaro, Rdigan, Amblo, Mexico was there. They
Speaker 1: weren't necessarily making more ambitious pledges, but there were certainly
Speaker 1: in the room. I think the only country among top
Speaker 1: ten emitters I was missing was Iran, and that's naturally
Speaker 1: expected why it wasn't invited. The only other major economy
Speaker 1: that was not the head of state was not invited
Speaker 1: was Thailand for the obvious political reasons, but Thailand did
Speaker 1: have representation at the event with having a minister attending.
Speaker 1: So we have a tremendous turnout. Not a ton of
Speaker 1: new commitments, but definitely everybody thinking about the yearhead but
Speaker 1: a few new commitments that were definitely notable, So why
Speaker 1: don't we go through those? Sure? Absolutely so, probably the
Speaker 1: one at the top of that. This would be the
Speaker 1: US is and your emission reduction target for thirty So
Speaker 1: this is as part of its NDC, that's its nationally
Speaker 1: determined Climate plan. So all parties have to put together
Speaker 1: these climate plans, covering them in the next decade or so.
Speaker 1: And they announced their new target, which was a certain
Speaker 1: amount of step in the right direction. We estimated that
Speaker 1: if the US had, say, maintained the same level and
Speaker 1: ambition as its five target, and it just extended it
Speaker 1: out thirty, then the target would have been in a
Speaker 1: thirty something about thirty eight percent reduction below two thousand
Speaker 1: five levels, whereas what they actually proposed was fifty to
Speaker 1: fifty two. So it is a step in the right direction, yes,
Speaker 1: But then which we may want to talk about later,
Speaker 1: there's a question markus to it's actually achievability. So another
Speaker 1: one that actually put forward a new target was Japan,
Speaker 1: but i'll hand that over Alley, thank you, Vickie. So
Speaker 1: in the case of Japan, the original target was to
Speaker 1: decrease emissions by twenty six percent in twenty thirty relatively
Speaker 1: to the two thousand thirteen basis, And this time around
Speaker 1: a prime minister just in the run up to the summit,
Speaker 1: announced that they would increase the target to fort sent
Speaker 1: emission reduction by twenty relatively to two thousand thirteen. There
Speaker 1: have been a bit of a debate in Japan around
Speaker 1: what to set the new target at the Ministry Environment
Speaker 1: apparently wanted to increase it by reduced emissions by whereas
Speaker 1: the Ministry of the Industry had been arguing for thirty
Speaker 1: nine percent and they were expecting data. Anything beyond that
Speaker 1: would be to challenging, and it appears that the Prime
Speaker 1: Minister has basically gone with the average of the two
Speaker 1: to keep both sides happy. Well, and then we've got
Speaker 1: one more country. So as we're listening here, you know,
Speaker 1: Ali is representing a pack as head of a research
Speaker 1: for APACK for US. But also you are a Canadian.
Speaker 1: So what is it that the Canadians committed to? Well, actually,
Speaker 1: maybe i'll first let Ricky explain that, and anology very
Speaker 1: happy to comment on the Canadian target. Okay, let's see. Well,
Speaker 1: so Canada, yes, it wasn't a big surprise that it
Speaker 1: announced to hire target because it has historically aligned itself
Speaker 1: with the US. So we Biden having announced its fifty
Speaker 1: target on two thousand five levels. Trudeau announced that Canada
Speaker 1: was increasing its target from reduction on two thousand and
Speaker 1: five levels too. Now, in comparison with say Japan and
Speaker 1: the US, we would say that this was a less
Speaker 1: ambitious move. We've recently published a report that compared the
Speaker 1: G twenty countries NDC targets based on four metrics. So
Speaker 1: it's it's really tricky to compare these targets because countries
Speaker 1: use different deadlines and different baselines. So we use four
Speaker 1: different metrics, say the reduction in absolute volumes, reduction in
Speaker 1: emissions per capita, and we also looked at emission intensity.
Speaker 1: And on this basis, the new Canada target is not
Speaker 1: that bold. In particular, if we compare what emissions would
Speaker 1: be with the target and without the target, we actually
Speaker 1: found that Canada will be able to substantially increases emissions
Speaker 1: and still achieve its twenty thirty target. So on that
Speaker 1: basis it was slightly disappointing. But I understand that Ali
Speaker 1: may have a different view. Well, this is how we
Speaker 1: measure emissions keeps coming up again and again because not
Speaker 1: only is it very much relevant to the targets that
Speaker 1: we're setting in whether or not we can compare Apple
Speaker 1: staffles across countries, but you see it across countries and
Speaker 1: how they're reporting previous podcast. But we've talked about the
Speaker 1: EU taxonomy and how they're trying to standardize this here.
Speaker 1: So this is definitely a challenging space and it does
Speaker 1: depend on how you look at it. So Ali, how
Speaker 1: are you looking at the commitments that Canada made to
Speaker 1: be for all these countries are looking at greenhouse gas
Speaker 1: emissions as a whole. They try to do a very
Speaker 1: good job of accounting for different types of greenhouse gasses
Speaker 1: and the convergent factors that they use are fairly consistent.
Speaker 1: So from that perspective, when they're talking about these emission
Speaker 1: reduction targets, they are talking about the same thing. Where
Speaker 1: I think it's important to recognize is what do they
Speaker 1: need to do? So what where is the emissions is
Speaker 1: coming from and what exactly how do they have to
Speaker 1: do to be able to reduce this. And where US
Speaker 1: is today is very different than where Canada is and
Speaker 1: where Japan is. In the case of Canada, a significant
Speaker 1: portion of the emissions is coming from its oil and
Speaker 1: gas sector. So if you look at regionally, the province
Speaker 1: of Alberta alone accounts for over a third of Canada's emissions,
Speaker 1: and if you ignored Alberta, Canada's emissions are already actually
Speaker 1: declining at a rapid pace. So the challenge that Canada
Speaker 1: is going to have with reducing its emissions aggressively is
Speaker 1: how does it get under controlled emissions associated with oil
Speaker 1: and gas production. Unlike Japan and the US, Canada's power
Speaker 1: sector is already fairly clean. Over eight percent of the
Speaker 1: electricities erated from zero emission sources, dominated by hydro, so
Speaker 1: that opportunity of reducing emissions in the power sector is
Speaker 1: no longer available to Canada because they've already mostly done it.
Speaker 1: In the case of Japan, actually most of the opportunity
Speaker 1: is still in the power sector, So the emission factor
Speaker 1: for the Japan's power generation is still relatively higher compared
Speaker 1: to Europe, US and Canada. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: work that they could do to be able to get
Speaker 1: emission reduction from there. A different way of looking at
Speaker 1: this is what's the cost of abatement and so how
Speaker 1: much does it cost you to be able to reduce
Speaker 1: that emissions? If you're talking about the power sector, the
Speaker 1: technologies are fairly known, and the cost of abatement and
Speaker 1: the power sector is actually fairly low. In some cases
Speaker 1: it can be even positive. So if you're a country
Speaker 1: like Japan where you have a very high import dependence
Speaker 1: on energy, you can potentially by relying on domestic renewables
Speaker 1: we can actually end up having a positive conomic impact.
Speaker 1: But if you have to actually abate exists think economic
Speaker 1: activity such as oil and gas production, that can be
Speaker 1: very expensive, particularly given that today we still don't have
Speaker 1: a commercial, available, liable carbon capture and storage technology. So
Speaker 1: Ali was impressed Vicky. So I would just say, I'm
Speaker 1: not disagreeing at all with what Ali says. It will
Speaker 1: be tough. We're tough for all three countries to to decarbonize,
Speaker 1: and for different reasons, but purely on the basis of
Speaker 1: level of ambition, I think the Canada's step up was
Speaker 1: slightly lower than say the US in Japan. So I mean,
Speaker 1: if we are looking at achievability, the US target is
Speaker 1: going to be very very challenging to actually achieve. As
Speaker 1: you say, in theory, the power system will be decarbonized
Speaker 1: by five so Buying has announced a separate target for that.
Speaker 1: But then in terms of looking at how to decarbonize
Speaker 1: building heating is very challenge as its industry, and it
Speaker 1: really does lack the policy support both at federal and
Speaker 1: state level for that to happen. Let's talk about that
Speaker 1: for a second. The US's role in this. So they're
Speaker 1: making much bigger commitments to climate during this administration as
Speaker 1: compared to the last administration. So the last administration saw
Speaker 1: the United States pull out of the Paris Climate Agreement,
Speaker 1: and now we have the US back in. How are
Speaker 1: the other countries making commitments or perhaps not making commitments,
Speaker 1: Viewing the US's role in the commitments are making now,
Speaker 1: given that they may very well be reversed in less
Speaker 1: than four years time, it's a fair point. The OS
Speaker 1: was in some ways successful in rebuilding some of its
Speaker 1: credibility with this summit and with the announcements it made,
Speaker 1: but that target hasn't been passed through into legislation paths
Speaker 1: through Congress, and really it won't be able to kind
Speaker 1: of solidify its credibility fully until it's put in place
Speaker 1: the concrete policy measure to achieve those targets and actually
Speaker 1: taken steps towards meeting that target. So I mean one
Speaker 1: of the reasons why it was so simple for Trump
Speaker 1: to exits the paras groute was because it hadn't been
Speaker 1: enshrined in legislation. So it would be interesting to see
Speaker 1: if and what a steps Biden takes to to change that.
Speaker 1: One other area that's notable is the amount of money
Speaker 1: that was committed or maybe not committed to tackling climate
Speaker 1: change in countries outside of the US and specifically some
Speaker 1: developing countries. Can we talk a little bit about how
Speaker 1: much was raised and whether or not that was impressive
Speaker 1: or not impressive. The final amounts is not super clear.
Speaker 1: So so the US did make a pledge to to
Speaker 1: increase more than five billion, but if you want to
Speaker 1: tell you up all the announcements during the summing, it's
Speaker 1: a little bit unclear. There were a couple of bilateral
Speaker 1: new partnerships also announced, for example between US and India
Speaker 1: and US in Japan and the U S and Japan.
Speaker 1: Was interesting because they also said that they would focus
Speaker 1: the on the Indo Pacific region. So it wasn't completely clear.
Speaker 1: If you go back to climate change negotiations, developed economies
Speaker 1: had already made the pledge that by twenty twenty they
Speaker 1: would increase climate finance support to developing economies two hundred
Speaker 1: billion dollars. It doesn't appear that they have met that
Speaker 1: target unless you start counting private investment as well, which
Speaker 1: is something that's was not supposed to be countered towards
Speaker 1: and so this is supposed to be coming from governments
Speaker 1: and multilateral entities. The other issues that there's a bit
Speaker 1: of a mismatch between countries who have been recipients of
Speaker 1: this funding whereas the ones that have asked for the funding.
Speaker 1: So places like India and some parts of Southeast Asia
Speaker 1: have done relatively well, but on the hotter hand, a
Speaker 1: lot of the lower developing economies, for example parts of
Speaker 1: Africa I have not done as much in attracting the
Speaker 1: financing that they had requested. The summit it may have
Speaker 1: been a positive, small step towards that issue, but it
Speaker 1: didn't see into bridge the gap. We did have several
Speaker 1: countries during the summit, starting with the biggest one, China,
Speaker 1: pointing out the fundamental principle of common but differentiated responsibilities
Speaker 1: in climate change negotiation. So this is the whole idea
Speaker 1: that if you look at the challenge of emissions, we
Speaker 1: have to look at who has emitted since the Industrial
Speaker 1: Revolution and since European countries as well as North America
Speaker 1: and Japan, so basically mostly oly City members, they have
Speaker 1: been more responsible for emissions. Historically, they bear the responsibility
Speaker 1: of helping a non annex one countries reduce their emissions
Speaker 1: and they have to sort of carry the load at
Speaker 1: the beginning. This is a tricky one because while yes,
Speaker 1: if you look at commulative emissions, it's through that those
Speaker 1: countries very responsibilities, but if you look at who's emitting
Speaker 1: more these days and who's on a growing trajectory, and
Speaker 1: a lot of these non annex one countries are becoming
Speaker 1: an issue. And this has been a debate for some
Speaker 1: time as to how we go about figuring out who
Speaker 1: needs to do what and when and back and forth.
Speaker 1: Yet so it's this is a bit a bit retro
Speaker 1: in terms of the emissions discussion, but it's back again
Speaker 1: and they are making strides. So actually, well, China didn't
Speaker 1: create a new target that they committed to during this summit.
Speaker 1: What was it that they did outline and make a
Speaker 1: little more transparent positive announcement from Prisoner was omitting to
Speaker 1: achieve coal peak consumption within the fifteen five year planned
Speaker 1: period that refers to. Previously China have talked about that
Speaker 1: the peak would be what he has now alluded to
Speaker 1: is that they will be achieving that earlier than that.
Speaker 1: And we saw an immediate reaction where a lot of
Speaker 1: the coal companies, those that were publicly listed, actually there
Speaker 1: was a real negative reaction to their prices. And there's
Speaker 1: now a lot more talk by state owned entities in
Speaker 1: China around how they can achieve peak coal earlier and
Speaker 1: I try to reduce him aasitions for um whole generator.
Speaker 1: So that was definitely a positive step. We're going to
Speaker 1: take a quick break. Stay with us. Let's talk about
Speaker 1: some of the other interesting things that came from some
Speaker 1: of the statements that were made by other countries that
Speaker 1: have a particularly big role to play in the climate discussion,
Speaker 1: so namely Brazil and Russia. What were their statements at
Speaker 1: this summit. One of the interesting ones was came from
Speaker 1: a Bosnar from Brazil. So he reiterated that the country
Speaker 1: would be willing to reach the next zero emissions and
Speaker 1: he actually brought forward the deadline for that from which
Speaker 1: has been previously mentioned to, but he made it clear
Speaker 1: that that would rest on substantial support from other countries,
Speaker 1: specifically developed countries UM, so where my about half of
Speaker 1: that reaching next zero would be achieved through reducing emissions itself,
Speaker 1: that the other half would be through some kind of
Speaker 1: forestry offset um to make use of its natural resources.
Speaker 1: And this is one of the first times that a
Speaker 1: major economy has announcement at zero target but put it
Speaker 1: up conditional on support from from elsewhere, and as yet
Speaker 1: there have not been any kind of concrete responses from
Speaker 1: developed countries that they would be willing to do that.
Speaker 1: The other one may be interesting was Russia. We're President
Speaker 1: Putting actually talked about getting methane emissions under control, which
Speaker 1: was rather surprising given Russia's significant oil and gas operations
Speaker 1: and and unlikely challenges with with controlling methane emissions. Methane
Speaker 1: is a bit tricky because it's actually it's impact on
Speaker 1: warming is much more significant than CEO two, although it
Speaker 1: doesn't last as long as you two in the atmosphere.
Speaker 1: So there's been a lot of discussions around getting better
Speaker 1: control around methane leaks, and it was quite positive to
Speaker 1: actually see President Putting bring that up and talk about
Speaker 1: in a positive manner around how there should be international
Speaker 1: cooperation on getting that under control. So there's a sense
Speaker 1: here that there is some momentum in these discussions and
Speaker 1: that maybe we will see some really very interesting things
Speaker 1: take place at cop later in this year as we
Speaker 1: look ahead to that. I think one of the things
Speaker 1: that really has stood out to me over the course
Speaker 1: of this past year, with Project light Speed and with
Speaker 1: the advancements that we've made in vaccine technology, is that sciences,
Speaker 1: when they really put their mind and quite a bit
Speaker 1: of money behind advancing something, we make incredible strides. Now
Speaker 1: in the climate space, there is money being committed, there
Speaker 1: are targets and years and momentum, And my question is,
Speaker 1: you know, what does this all mean? What do you
Speaker 1: anticipate in particular for the spaces that then EF covers
Speaker 1: very closely. So let's say, for example, clean energy and transportation,
Speaker 1: you know, what do we expect might happen in the
Speaker 1: nearer term in these areas. As a result of some
Speaker 1: of the announcements at the summit last week, one of
Speaker 1: the kind of less covered results from last week's summit
Speaker 1: was the fact not these kind of emission reduction targets
Speaker 1: made by likes of US and Japan, but the announcements
Speaker 1: made by other countries of these more concrete projects, all
Speaker 1: the kind of partnerships or initiatives for example between US
Speaker 1: and India with regard to clean energy. What I would
Speaker 1: anticipate coming out of the copy is more progress made
Speaker 1: on say these concrete initiatives around for the energy transition,
Speaker 1: moving towards clean power and clean road transport. Those are
Speaker 1: two of the priorities for the UK government which is
Speaker 1: hosting COP and we could see more announcements come out
Speaker 1: centering around initiatives that already exists, for example the powering
Speaker 1: Past whole alliance or the electric vehicle alliances. That is
Speaker 1: one of my kind of expectations from the COPS. But
Speaker 1: the other one is also finance. So while that was
Speaker 1: saying somewhat disappointing outcome of the summit last week, the
Speaker 1: UK government is committed to discussing there's a hundred billion
Speaker 1: a year target when it comes to the Glasgow events
Speaker 1: and maybe making more commitments from developed countries for five
Speaker 1: So we would anticipate more progress being made on that side.
Speaker 1: And Ali, what would you say that perspective is regarding
Speaker 1: the Asia Pacific region specifically EPOCH side. If you look
Speaker 1: at power sector the carbonization, it's still relative to North
Speaker 1: America and Europe, the region is relatively behind, even though
Speaker 1: of course a park which China, it is the largest
Speaker 1: market for deployment of renewables as well as they're manufacturing.
Speaker 1: But still in terms of the emission intensity of power generation,
Speaker 1: the region needs to accelerate. And I think all in
Speaker 1: all of what we heard at the summit, even though
Speaker 1: some of it was not new, it was a good
Speaker 1: sign that this has happened in so hopefully way before
Speaker 1: twenty third we're gonna see emissions from the power sector
Speaker 1: in the region to reach its peak, which would be
Speaker 1: a positive development. When we go beyond these sectors though,
Speaker 1: this is where your vaccine analogy becomes really important. So
Speaker 1: there are areas um such as carbon capture and storage
Speaker 1: or hydrogen in general. When we talk about industry de carbonization,
Speaker 1: these are areas that significant more R and D needs
Speaker 1: to happen, but also significant more regulation needs to come
Speaker 1: into place to signal to investors and companies that at
Speaker 1: some point these sectors will be covered by significant restrictions.
Speaker 1: We are seeing those signals primarily in Europe today, we're
Speaker 1: starting to see those signals elsewhere. So Canada, for example,
Speaker 1: does now have a fairly strange and carbon price in
Speaker 1: mechanism in place, but many other economies, particularly when you
Speaker 1: look at US, China in DA, those signals are still
Speaker 1: not there and this is where it will be interesting
Speaker 1: to see whether the US will follow through with with
Speaker 1: some type of a current pricing mechanisms. China has started
Speaker 1: this older, so they have a carbon trading mechanism operational
Speaker 1: starting from this year, but the prices are not allowed
Speaker 1: right now. There's too much free allowances. Essentially, enterprices are
Speaker 1: not rising, so it will be interesting to see whether
Speaker 1: we see more policy direction that Yeah by twenty thirty,
Speaker 1: for example, we're looking at covering emissions from petrochemicals steal
Speaker 1: and aviation as an example. These are what we need
Speaker 1: to see happened within this decade so that there's enough
Speaker 1: investment going in uh these new new areas for technology
Speaker 1: development as well as gender deployment in the twenty thirties. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's play the acronym game, since it seems like
Speaker 1: there are a lot of them. We actually wrote a
Speaker 1: research note I believe at one point that was called
Speaker 1: making Sense of the Sustainability alphabet soup or something along
Speaker 1: those lines. So, Vicky, what is an NDC so NDCU
Speaker 1: if you don't know, because if nothing else, the climate
Speaker 1: talks really like acronyms. So NDC is one to remember.
Speaker 1: It means nationally determined contribution. So it's essentially a party's
Speaker 1: plan for how it intends to reduce emissions or promote
Speaker 1: climate adaptation over the next tent fifteen years. There's also
Speaker 1: a longer term version which is called a long term strategy,
Speaker 1: and that goes out to stay and is where some
Speaker 1: countries have put in place net szero emission goals. So
Speaker 1: Ali in relation to Asia Pacific, were there any other
Speaker 1: statements that were made that you found particularly interesting? A
Speaker 1: few other interesting comments from our leaders are the summit
Speaker 1: or one of those where from Indonesia's President of Kobe.
Speaker 1: For the most part, he took a positive tone, but
Speaker 1: but towards the and he did comments that countries should
Speaker 1: not be throwing trade barriers and negatively commenting on other
Speaker 1: countries policies. And this was an indirect reference to EU
Speaker 1: regulations on restrictions of palm oil exports or palm oil
Speaker 1: imports from Sciency Stag into the Europe because there are
Speaker 1: concerns that the palm plantations are essentially causing additional emissions
Speaker 1: because they're usually done by clearing virgin forest um and
Speaker 1: planting in his place palm trees. The other one that
Speaker 1: was interesting was Australia. Probably for me personally it was
Speaker 1: the most entertaining speech, but in terms of substantive commitment
Speaker 1: towards the climate change, it was also probably the one
Speaker 1: that was lacking any substance. Prime Minister Morrison had a
Speaker 1: couple of good lines, saying through technology not taxation, and
Speaker 1: also he finished with the line that I'm probably gonna
Speaker 1: mangle here saying that the future gener rations will judge
Speaker 1: us not by our plans but by our actual actions,
Speaker 1: and he was essentially trying to say that there is
Speaker 1: an Australia is not announcing any additional more ambitious goals
Speaker 1: is because it feels like it would be empty boards
Speaker 1: and it's rather focused on fulfilling its existing goals, which
Speaker 1: by the way, right now they're not on the trajector
Speaker 1: to fulfill and they haven't passed any policy framework to
Speaker 1: actually make sure that they would meet those twenty thirty goals.
Speaker 1: Vicky in regard to North America and Europe. What did
Speaker 1: you find that was some stand out? But other than
Speaker 1: for the countries that we have already discussed well in
Speaker 1: some ways, in terms of Europe that it was the
Speaker 1: least interesting. And that's principally because they have already made
Speaker 1: the kind of their big headline grabbing climate announcements. So
Speaker 1: one thing they could say was that on the day
Speaker 1: before the summit began, the European Commission, Parliament and Council,
Speaker 1: so those are the three big EU institutions, had reached
Speaker 1: an informal agreement on its climate law. And then this
Speaker 1: climate law it includes its emission reduction target, which is
Speaker 1: reduction on levels and the net zero goal. For now,
Speaker 1: how about companies. I my understanding was that there were
Speaker 1: several large, important companies that were also invited to join
Speaker 1: these talks. What was their role to play there? Isn't
Speaker 1: Those companies were there were primarily as a supportive signal
Speaker 1: for the domestic U S audience. So one thing I
Speaker 1: would give them really high marksis that they designed this
Speaker 1: summit very carefully with two audiences in mind. Who won
Speaker 1: the international audience and the other one the domestic audience. Particularly,
Speaker 1: how do they emphasize the jobs as well as the
Speaker 1: security and the national security angle of climate change, so
Speaker 1: that they can overcome Republican position that even if they
Speaker 1: don't get enough Republican support, they can still go ahead
Speaker 1: and read what they want to do and the public
Speaker 1: would be on their side. And I think they generally
Speaker 1: did a good job of trying to do this. So
Speaker 1: there were three new announcements at this summit, and then
Speaker 1: some other interesting things that we've already discussed on the
Speaker 1: show today. My final question to both of you, so
Speaker 1: we're maybe we're going to a betting shop and we're
Speaker 1: going to put our money where our mouth is. You know,
Speaker 1: who are you betting on? And which of the three
Speaker 1: countries so US, Japan, Canada do you think are going
Speaker 1: to meet the targets that they've outlined. I am going
Speaker 1: to say Canada, and that is because it's not as
Speaker 1: ambitious as the other targe the other targets. Yes, it's
Speaker 1: already got a fairly decarbonized power system, but the federal
Speaker 1: government and some of the provincial governments are showing intention
Speaker 1: of actually reducing emissions and putting in place policy measures
Speaker 1: to actually realize the mission targets and that's the most
Speaker 1: important thing that governments now need to do. It's all
Speaker 1: very well coming out with these big announcements of goals
Speaker 1: which kind of indicate the direction of travel, but the
Speaker 1: next and equally important step is to actually implement policy
Speaker 1: measures to spur this change in in real life. I
Speaker 1: actually would think both Canada and Japan will meet their targets.
Speaker 1: For Canada, yeah, yeah, I still disagree with Rickie, that's easy,
Speaker 1: but I agree that they've done more in terms of
Speaker 1: introducing a policy framework, particularly on carbon pricing, which recently
Speaker 1: the federal government one at the Supreme Court as well,
Speaker 1: so it's fairly secure legislation now in place. So I
Speaker 1: think they have a good opportunity to meet their target
Speaker 1: because that policy framework is already in place. And in
Speaker 1: the case of Japan, compared to both Canada and US,
Speaker 1: the central government of Japan is much more powerful, so
Speaker 1: unlike US and Canada, the local governments in Japan don't
Speaker 1: have as much power. Now this could be a good
Speaker 1: thing or a bad thing in this case. Particular challenge
Speaker 1: that both US and Canada have encountered, particularly in the
Speaker 1: case of Canada, where a lot of energy policies at
Speaker 1: the provincial level. If federal government has a specific national plan,
Speaker 1: it can run into challenges of constitutional jurisdiction around whether
Speaker 1: it can implement it or not. In the case of Japan,
Speaker 1: the central government has all that power, and also because
Speaker 1: Japan still has these areas such as the power sector
Speaker 1: where if they really wanted to technology already exists, it's
Speaker 1: more of a motivation too for implementation, they could actually
Speaker 1: do it. In the case of the US, I think
Speaker 1: the challenge is that if you look at where the
Speaker 1: emissions have trended now, transportation is the largest sector. The
Speaker 1: carbonizing that for road vehicles will require introducing new field
Speaker 1: economy standards, as well as potentially ramp revamping and expanding
Speaker 1: the the California ZEV mandate Nationally, these are topics that
Speaker 1: are definitely Republican states will oppose and will try to
Speaker 1: fight the federal government. On the power sector, the challenge
Speaker 1: for the US is that you have to go beyond
Speaker 1: just reliance on natural gas. While renewables have accelerated, If
Speaker 1: the Biden regition really wants to meet its net zero
Speaker 1: power goal, then we're talking about phasing out or limiting
Speaker 1: the role of natural gas in the power sector. Which
Speaker 1: is going to be politically very challenging. UM. That's why
Speaker 1: I think the US target is actually the most challenging
Speaker 1: politically to be met compared to Canada's and the Japanese one.
Speaker 1: Vicky and Ali, thank you very much for joining. I
Speaker 1: think it would be great to have you back in
Speaker 1: the run up and maybe the post cup to see
Speaker 1: where we got to in this next year. Today's episode
Speaker 1: Switched On was edited by Rex Warner The Gray Stoak Media.
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