German activists protesting the opening of the new coal power plant in Datteln ©Ende Gelände Hamburg

June 2020

Germany's coal exit law, or the politics of inertia

Bill Hare

While it is positive that Germany is moving to legislate a coal exit, the draft law threatens to undermine its place in history as a climate policy leader, as it would allow highly polluting lignite to burn until 2038, well beyond the Paris Agreement compliant 2030 deadline for OECD countries.

Burrup Peninsula LNG port ©The Greens MPs

May 2020

A single mega-project exposes the Morrison government’s gas plan as staggering folly

Bill Hare

Every few years, the idea that gas will help Australia transition to a zero-emissions economy seems to re-emerge, as if no one had thought of it before. Federal energy minister Angus Taylor is the latest politician to jump on the gas bandwagon.

Delegates before the informal consultation on loss and damage ©Kiara Worth, IISD

December 2019

Loss and Damage at COP25 – a hard fought step in the right direction

The Review of the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage (WIM), undertaken at COP25, was an opportunity for a stronger commitment for action and support, including new and additional finance, capacity building and technical support. Long intense negotiations and a united position among developing countries of G77 and China, lead to an acceptable outcome.

According to reports, around 270,000 people joined the climate strike in Berlin on 20 Sept 2019.

October 2019

Not even the bare minimum: unpacking Germany's 2030 climate package

Dr Robert Brecha, Bill Hare, Dr Carl-Friedrich Schleussner

On 20 September, the German government released its long-awaited climate package. It is nowhere near ambitious enough to meet the objective of the Paris Agreement to limit warming to 1.5°C.

Solar farm, Región de Antofagasta, Chile

April 2019

Centred on science – how the IPCC can guide mitigation action

Prof Dr Michiel Schaeffer, Dr Robert Brecha, Bill Hare

The IPCC Special Report on 1.5°C contains the best available science to guide the development of Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategies (LT-LEDS), which are due to be submitted in 2020 under the Paris Agreement. One essential function of LT-LEDS is to provide a long-term 1.5°C consistent trajectory as an essential guide for increasing the level of mitigation ambition in the updating of NDCs, also due in 2020. Coupling the process of developing full LT-LEDS and submitting these by 2020 will make the process of further ramping up NDCs more coherent in the years to come.

March 2019

A Green New Deal in the United States – fantasy or necessity?

Dr Robert Brecha

The Green New Deal (GND) is currently only in the form of a “resolution” introduced by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey; any actual legislation that results from the resolution will be taken up by the respective chambers of Congress – and likely will not be done as a whole package. Having said that, the GND is a rare example of proposing how to tackle a societal-scale set of challenges not by looking at individual components but by presenting a vision for the whole system.

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Decarbonisation targets and 1.5℃ pathways

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