Clean Energy Investments Could Halve Carbon Emissions By 2040: Energy Transitions Commission

If governments, investors and businesses around the world work together, starting immediately, to hasten the pace of transitioning to clean energy, it is possible to halve the planet’s carbon emissions by 2040, according to a report released Tuesday by the Energy Transitions Commission. Titled “Better energy, Greater prosperity,” the ETC report “sets out achievable pathways to limit global warming to well below 2˚C while stimulating economic development and social progress.”

“We are ambitious but realistic. Despite the scale of the challenges facing us, we firmly believe the required transition is technically and economically achievable if immediate action is taken,” Adair Turner, chair of the ETC, said in a statement.

The aim of limiting the rise in global temperature to below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) is one of the prime targets of the Paris climate agreement, which came into effect in November, and which President Donald Trump has threatened to derail by pulling the United States out of it. Recently, the amount of carbon dioxide in Earth’s atmosphere crossed 410 parts per million, which is more than there has been in millions of years.

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And while Trump and his administration picks are talking big on reviving the fossil fuel industry, the ETC said falling costs of producing energy from clean and renewable sources should propel governments and businesses to decarbonize power generation almost entirely by 2040. The report called on governments to support efforts of electrifying a large set of activities to cut emissions further.

It also called specifically for rapid reduction in the use of coal, and for a total drop of 30 percent in consumption of fossil fuels by 2040. One of the ways of achieving these goals would be to develop other technologies, such as bioenergy, hydrogen, and forms of carbon capture and sequestration. Another suggestion is to improve the efficiency of current energy production, which could provide growth of 3 percent annually to the industry.

“This is not just another plan; it’s a better plan. We show how the world can remove barriers to transform challenges into opportunities, not only in advanced economies, but also in emerging countries,” Ajay Mathur, co-chair of the ETC, said in the statement.

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While acknowledging that there are sectors, like heavy industry, that will continue to depend on fossil fuels, the report lists four specific steps toward low-carbon energy systems. These include clean electrification, decarbonization of “hard-to-electrify” sectors, speeding up the pace of improvement in energy production and optimizing the use of Earth’s remaining fossil fuels.

The transition to clean energy will come at a cost, however. The report foresees a reduction of about $3.7 trillion in investment in the fossil fuel industry over the next 15 years, following its recommendations, compared to what it would be under a business-as-usual scenario. On the other hand, investments in clean energy and energy-efficient infrastructure would go up by $15 trillion in the same time period.

At between $300-600 billion in annual investments, ETC said the money could be spent by world governments which together save and invest about $20 trillion every year. But that could only happen in governments decided to work together toward a common agenda.

ETC, initially funded by oil giant Shell, works toward promoting better economic growth along with safeguarding the climate.