The great powers put the green recovery in the background

World political leaders are putting the green recovery on the back burner as a way out of the global Covid-19 crisis. Several global organizations, grouped around the Climate Action Network (CAN), have censured the expansion of fossil fuels and _{CO2-intensive} sectors thanks to public sector aid. They argue that opportunities to face “a just and lasting recovery to this crisis” are being wasted.

Its assessment comes after the dissemination of the strong results of the Energy Policy Tracker project (led by Ivetta Gerasimchuk, from the International Institute for Sustainable Development).

The result of this work indicates that governments are spending much more on support of fossil fuels than on clean, low-carbon energy, according to an analysis of rescue plans pushed by the coronavirus crisis.

The idea of a green recovery may remain mere rhetoric in many countries, they say.

Data from the Energy Policy Tracker project shows that the world’s 20 richest countries, which together account for 80% of global greenhouse gas emissions, have committed to earmarking more than $150.81 billion of public money (€132 billion) to support fossil fuels since the start of the Covid-19 crisis this year.

Tough warning to G20 finance ministers, who will meet this weekend

Only about a fifth of this expenditure (specifically, 30,250 million dollars: 26,450 million euros) is conditioned to environmental requirements such as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions or the cleaning of pollution.

Instead, G20 countries are allocating only about $88.63 billion (€77.5 billion) to clean energy stimulus spending, even though most of those governments are publicly committed to the Paris agreement on climate change.

In the US, at least $58.12 billion of stimulus (€50.8 billion) will go to the fossil fuel industry, equivalent to about $177 per capita (€155).

Spending on clean energy is 25.11 billion dollars (22 billion euros), or 76.50 dollars per capita (66 euros).

Avoiding bankruptcies

Resources earmarked for fossil fuels are being designed to avoid the bankruptcy of crisis-hit industries, preserve jobs and avoid an even worse recession. For example, the figures include spending on airlines that have had fleets grounded or that their flights have been drastically reduced. Oil price crash has threatened millions of jobs

Environmental organizations are concerned that much of the money is flowing to companies that have not been put under conditions to force them to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or fight pollution.

“Political and financial support for fossil fuels in the coming months is not only a disaster for the climate, but it is also increasing poverty and inequality,” the CAN network organizations note.

This assessment comes in a context in which the planet is facing a health emergency, an imminent recession is expected and evidence of the climate crisis is evident.

“The G20 finance ministers, who will meet this weekend, must lead the action, and not just words, and take advantage of this year to drastically change the course of the economy to move it away from the dangerous dependence on fossil fuels and channel investments that are in line with ambitious and updated climate objectives,” these entities gathered by the CAN said in a statement.

Rising emissions

Greenhouse gas emissions have already recovered sharply after their sharp declines earlier this year.

When lockdowns were harshest around the world, in April, global daily carbon emissions declined by about 17%.

But they are now only 5% below last year’s levels, raising fears that emissions will recover to higher levels than before the start of lockdowns, especially if they are fuelled by rescue packages for fossil fuel industries and a decline in public transport.

The EU has decided to go ahead with its recovery agreement that would reduce emissions, but some aspects of its plan remain to be defined. France, Germany and Britain have announced plans in this field.

While promises of a green recovery have yet to come to fruition, activists hope the urgency shown to prop up fossil fuel companies will fade and be replaced by low-carbon plans, as governments address their plans in the next steps.

“The Covid-19 crisis and government responses are intensifying trends that already existed before the pandemic. National and subnational administrations, which heavily subsidized the production and consumption of fossil fuels in previous years, have once again been swept up in oil, gas, coal and fossil fuel-powered electricity,” says Ivetta Gerasimchuk, leader of the Energy Policy Tracker project and member of the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD.

“For their part, economies that had already begun a transition to clean energy are now using stimulus and recovery packages to make this happen even faster.”

“The EU is throwing fuel on the fire while presenting itself as a champion of climate action and human rights. It is injecting billions of euros of public money and political support into dangerous projects such as the Eastmed-Poseidon gas pipeline, which would transport gas between Israel and Cyprus, via Greece, to Italy. This would exacerbate geopolitical tensions, strengthen oppressive regimes, destroy the local environment and the livelihoods of communities and, of course, be a climate disaster,” says Naomi Kreitman, a member of a Gastivists Network.

Ongoing projects

Gulf Coast communities in the United States are mobilizing to halt the construction of three shale gas export terminals (obtained with the hydraulic fracturing method) that would yield climate-altering emissions. “They would destroy sacred indigenous lands and threaten the health and safety of marginalized people,” says Bekah Hinojosa, a representative for the Gulf Coast campaign (Sierra Club, in the US).

This proposed expansion would also increase the drilling of oil and gas wells in the Permian Basin of West Texas, and force the region “to become a fossil fuel extraction colony for foreign markets,” Hinojosa says. Years of public opposition, divestment campaigns targeting banks and legal action have delayed gas export projects (fracking) next year. “We will not stop fighting until these projects are definitively canceled,” he concludes.

Source: The Vanguard