Tag: Bunkers

Aviation Sector Emissions and Impacts on South Asia

Submitted by MBrockley on June 12, 2013 - 5:55am

Vositha Wijenayake
Outreach and Advocacy Coordinator
CAN South Asia

The emissions from aviation have become a key concern for most states currently, including those of South Asia as they contribute to around 2.0-2.5% of the current total annual global CO2 emissions.

Emissions from aviation in developed countries (domestic and international) account for approximately 3.5% of their total emissions. A rough estimate indicates that 62% of the total emissions from the aviation sector are generated from international flights. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) reported that international aviation emissions from developed countries rose by 65.8% between 1990 and 2005 (based on inventory data reported by countries). Although the growth in the aviation sector in developing countries will continue to increase, the demand for aviation will be especially strong in China, India and the Middle East.

Given the above data, it is obvious that we cannot remain ignorant of that is happening in the aviation sector. As India plays a key role in the regional emission reduction, as well as the regional politics in terms of climate change action, it is important to reach agreement on how to move forward in promoting aviation emission caps that would not be adverse to developing states, as well as beneficial in solving the issue of harmful emissions.

Furthermore it is known that to limit the increase in temperature to 2 ˚C would require reductions in all sectors, including aviation. While capping pollution from the aviation sector is important and urgent, reductions in other sectors too need to be scaled up significantly.

The two key principles that could be considered to be at the heart of discussion on finding a way forward to address GHG emissions from international aviation are:

(i) UNFCCC principle of common but differentiated responsibility and respective capability (CBDR & RC); and,

(ii) The laws and regulations for the operation of aircrafts as well as airports and other charges should be applied without distinction amongst national and foreign aircrafts. This is commonly referred as the non-discriminatory principle.

Furthermore, “rather than focusing on the importance of finding the appropriate forum to address emissions from international aviation, it is important to address the key concern of developing countries on the following aspects, to find a solution irrespective of the forum.*”

To facilitate outcome under the ICAO, the UNFCCC should adopt a decision requesting ICAO to develop measures to address GHG emissions from the aviation sector and reiterate that any approach used under ICAO will not prejudice outcomes under the Ad hoc Durban Platform on a new agreement for the post-2020 regime. It should also be reassuring that countries will not resort to unilateral trade measures.

*Reference to speech made by Mr. Sudhir Sharma at the side event on Aviation Emissions organized by Bread for the World during the UNFCCC session in Bonn, June 2013.

Tags:

aviation

international aviation

Topics:

Bunkers

Region:

South Asia

Related Campaign:

Leadership Development Program

Related Member Organization:

CAN South Asia (CANSA)

We Saw Success for Warsaw

Submitted by MBrockley on June 10, 2013 - 1:32am

ECO was impressed by the creative moves of the delegates on the dance floor Saturday night. Now, with only 16 meeting days left this year, ECO expects to see an increasing amount of creative and ambitious Party moves inside the negotiation rooms too, to make the COP in Warsaw a success. (It is worth clarifying that this does not mean wiggling out of commitments!)

2014 - the year of ambition - is just around the corner. The foreseen KP Parties' revision of their targets next spring offers a timely moment for all countries to revise their near term targets, while Ban Ki-Moon’s leaders meeting in the autumn of 2014 presents a great opportunity for tabling new 2025 targets.

In Warsaw, Parties will need to commit to both strengthening their current targets (to bridge the 2020 gigatonne gap), as well as to putting forward new, post-2020 targets in 2014 that are fair and adequate. To ensure that the 2014 pledges will be transparent, quantified and comparable, Parties will need to agree on some guidelines in Warsaw. Equally, the Warsaw Decisions will need to give further clarity on the nature and scope of commitments for countries at different levels of responsibility, capability and development. Commitments should include mitigation and finance and be guided by an Equity Reference Framework (ERF), for which a formal process needs to be established.

While Parties have already agreed to deliver a negotiating text on the 2015 agreement before May 2015, Parties will need to adopt a work plan and milestones for producing this text in Warsaw. Specifically, Parties must agree on key elements for a structure of the 2015 deal so that subsequent sessions can build on them to move steadily towards a comprehensive final agreement, and not leave all decisions to be resolved at Paris. We all know where that leads…

All developed countries must set out – in a comparable manner - what climate finance they will be providing over 2013-2015, as part of doubling fast start funding levels for this period, and commit to a roadmap for scaling-up global public climate finance and reaching $100bn per year by 2020.

ECO would like to extend a formal invitation to Finance Ministers to take part in the Warsaw COP so that the “high-level ministerial dialogue” (yes, parties in Doha wanted it to be THAT special) actually delivers the decisions we need so urgently on finance. Parties must also pledge specific amounts of finance to the Green Climate Fund, which must be operationalised in Warsaw, and to the Adaptation Fund.

Parties must also agree on a way to ensure that international aviation and maritime transport, which are not included in national emissions targets, make a fair contribution to emissions reductions, and to financing climate actions in developing countries. These are the fastest growing emissions sectors worldwide, and their fuels are currently not taxed, unlike domestic transport sectors, which means they are not paying for their climate impacts, and have an unfair advantage over other sectors.

As should be clear by this point, dear ECO reader, there is much to do in Warsaw and afterwards. This week, the ADP should focus on its work plan from now until the COP. As time is short and ECO is completely fed up with procedural nonsense (SBI anyone?), this does not mean spending the week discussing whether to suspend or conclude the ADP (as ECO can only imagine the potential mess of trying to open another ADP session and the agenda discussion that would ensue). Rather, Parties must set a deadline for the next round of submissions and clarify the content sought. Here, views on the decisions from Warsaw including guidance on a deadline for initial pledges (2014), information on the details of those pledges and the process for review (i.e. the ERF process), as well as initial thoughts on the overall structure of the 2015 agreement, are a minimum.

Finally, you can’t spend all of your time planning. You’ve got to also be doing. So, in addition to the ADP work programme forward, ECO urges Parties to take time preparing the actual tangible outcomes for Warsaw, including in terms of 2013-2015 finance pledges, loss and damage mechanism and near-term ambition. Here’s to a productive week!

Tags:

adaptation fund

Green Climate Fund

2015 Deal

Equity Reference Framework

Warsaw

Topics:

Adaptation

Bunkers

Equity/effort-sharing

Finance

MBrockley's blog

The Solution is Plane to See

Submitted by MBrockley on June 5, 2013 - 1:59am

A question to delegates: How will you ensure that the two fastest growing sectors in terms of emissions – international aviation and maritime transport – contribute their fair share to global efforts to reduce emissions?

In Monday’s reports to SBSTA by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the news was not good. The IMO has suspended discussions of market based measures (MBMs) to some undefined date in the future, and with it the chance to set emissions targets for the shipping sector, which accounts for around 3% of global emissions.

On the aviation front the news isn’t quite as bad, at least not yet. The ICAO Council will discuss MBMs for aviation later this month, and MBMs are still on the table. There is some encouraging news from the aviation industry itself this week – the International Air Transport Association (IATA), which represents most airlines globally, has called on ICAO to adopt a global MBM this year. Although the specifics of their proposal leave a lot to be desired – only offsetting growth in the sector after the year 2020 – IATA’s decision puts the spotlight on ICAO.

Measures for these sectors, which would internalise the environmental externalities by putting a price on emissions and generating finance that could be used to respond to the climate crisis, are facing fierce resistance in both the IMO and ICAO. These bodies need to get serious and adopt adequate measures to control their pollution – in September (ICAO) and by 2015 (IMO). They still have a chance to prove that they can take the necessary steps, but the clock is ticking on these organisations to deliver.

Topics:

Bunkers

MBrockley's blog

From Bonn to Berlin: Ministers At the Petersberg Dialogue Take Over

Submitted by rvoorhaar on May 3, 2013 - 12:29am

When the climate policy train leaves the ADP2 station in Bonn today, it moves on to Berlin at the Petersberg Dialogue. Germany and the next COP host, Poland, will serve as the conductors for this next stop. Three dozen ministers from around the world have been invited to this informal exchange of views to complement the UNFCCC process. ECO is happy to hear that ministers are finally getting together to work on the next steps after Doha. We encourage ministers to put more details to key challenges identified in the past week here in Bonn.

ECO identifies the following tasks for ministers to work on during the Petersberg Dialogue:

1. Make further progress on developing a shared understanding of how to assess individual countries’ contributions to an equitable sharing of the global mitigation effort. This should include discussions on the provision of climate finance to developing countries. A 2015 deal cannot be agreed unless the concerns around equity are resolved.

2. If you are truly serious about the 2°C commitment, you’ll need to re-double your efforts to increase ambition before 2020. Ministers at the Petersberg Dialogue should explicitly recognize that developed countries must increase their woefully inadequate mitigation pledges during 2014. Opportunities such as the KP review cannot be missed.

3. Ministers should engage in discussions on how developed and developing countries can create an upward spiral of increasing climate finance and increasing ambition in developing countries.

4. Ministers should engage in discussions on complementary measures. Warsaw could make significant progress in closing the gigatonne gap by seeing various types of complementary measures launched – such as phasing out HFCs under the Montreal Protocol or a dedicated agenda item within Workstream 2 to develop options to phase out fossil fuel subsidies.

5. Ministers should identify milestones to achieve major progress on climate finance at Warsaw. Demonstrable progress on climate finance will be an essential pre-condition for the 2015 outcome. Developed country ministers need to ensure that they can present a track record of year-by-year climate finance increases in 2015. This would lend much needed credibility to further plans for scaling up finance towards the 2020 commitment. Ministers also need to ensure that public climate finance is allocated equitably between adaptation and mitigation.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ECO has learned that German chancellor Angela Merkel will open the Petersberg Dialogue. Attending Ministers may wish to use this opportunity to ask her about Germany’s psychological state. ECO finds it difficult to understand how Germany can claim the limelight through the proclaimed Energiewende (energy transformation) to renewable energies while at the same time failing to support recent attempts to reform the EU Emission Trading System. Does the German government realise that it is starting to look schizophrenic? Strengthening the ETS is crucial for the Energiewende and more.

Tags:

Topics:

Equity/effort-sharing

Finance

Flexible Mechanisms

Region:

Europe

Related Event:

ADP Second Session 2013

rvoorhaar's blog

Closing the Gap On Aviation and Shipping

Submitted by rvoorhaar on May 2, 2013 - 12:38am

This is the year for a fresh start in addressing emissions from aviation and maritime transport – those uniquely international sectors that have generated so much discussion and so little action over the years.

This year, the Assemblies, the highest bodies of both the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) are meeting for the last time before 2015. This will be their chance to make progress on these fast-growing sectors in the pre-2020 period, including by putting a price on emissions from ships and aircraft.

These sectors can make an important contribution to closing the gigatonne gap, both in the period up to 2020 and beyond. These sectors, which account for around 5% of global CO2 emissions, can contribute reductions of up to 0.5 GtCO2e. But perhaps more importantly, decisive progress in addressing these emissions can restore confidence in our multilateral institutions and demonstrate the collective global political will needed to make the transformative steps necessary to prevent a climate disaster.

What’s more, we cannot pass up the chance to use carbon pricing from these sectors as an innovative source of reliable and stable public climate finance for actions in developing countries, and in the sectors themselves, to supplement contributions from the budgets of developed countries.

A decision on a global approach to carbon pricing on aviation this year is critical. The ICAO Council has created a High Level Group on Climate Change to unlock progress and give political impetus to this discussion, in advance of the September ICAO Assembly. The Council meeting coming up later this month will be the best opportunity to assess progress in the High Level Group and find agreement on a comprehensive global approach that includes carbon pricing for international aviation emissions.

On maritime transport, the IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee will also meet later this month and is likely to resume discussions of options to put a price on emissions. Decisions need to be taken that create a clear roadmap to reach an agreement on carbon pricing.

Finally, to ensure these sectors make their fair contribution to global mitigation and financing efforts, the ADP needs to put emissions from international transport firmly on its agenda in both Workstreams, and send the signal to the IMO and ICAO that action is expected in 2013.

In all of these fora, the key to progress is finding creative ways of addressing equity and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in workable ways appropriate to these inherently international sectors. Concerns from both developed and developing countries about setting precedents for other sectors can and should be addressed. After all, the uniquely international nature of maritime transport and aviation requires approaches tailor-made to these sectors, which cannot be seen as precedents for other sectors where emissions occur entirely on national territory.

Tags:

bunkers

ADP2

Topics:

Bunkers

Related Event:

ADP Second Session 2013

rvoorhaar's blog

Raise The Bar or Stay Home

Submitted by rvoorhaar on April 30, 2013 - 12:47am

Even as CO2 concentrations are about to break the 400ppm threshold, fresh climate disasters are announced all over the planet, and carbon prices are collapsing because of lax targets on par with BAU, countries have apparently come to the UNFCCC ADP meeting in Bonn with nothing to offer.

Developed countries seem to be looking off in the distance beyond 2020, with images of universal participation and bottom-up national pledges dancing in their heads. Mundane issues like what has to change in the next 6 years and 8 months to stay below 2 degrees are apparently the farthest thing from their minds.

Parties are in Bonn to get down to work on two tasks – raise pre-2020 ambition and craft the next legally binding agreement to reduce greenhouse gas pollution – potentially the most significant global treaty that will ever be negotiated. Delegates should be mindful of the fact that that your work this week and over the next few years will secure you a place in the history books.

Whether the legacy you leave behind is positive or abysmal depends on your creativity, commitment, negotiating skills and sheer hard craft. In short, you will have to be prepared to pull out all the stops. Our planet deserves no less.

Although negotiating a fresh climate deal for a new decade and beyond, Parties also need to address the less sexy issue of the yawning gap between the pledges that are currently on the table and the effort required to limit global temperature rise to 2°C above pre-industrial levels. Neither objective should be ignored to the detriment of the other.

Take heart from the fact that the more we achieve in terms of closing the gap over the next 6 or so years, the lighter that workload will be. And it would augur badly indeed if Parties entered into a new climate agreement with a huge ambition deficit.

One place parties can start making progress this year is on international transport. After failing to get any text in discussions under the Bali Action Plan, this year Parties can make a fresh start, by reaching agreement under the International Maritime Organization and the International Civil Aviation Organization on a fast track to implementation of market-based measures for international maritime transport and aviation that can put a price on emissions from these sectors.

The ADP must take up this issue and ensure that these sectors make their fair contribution to global efforts to control emissions and generate finance for climate action in developing countries.

Action is needed on many fronts. As yesterday's opening statement by AOSIS laid out, “this is about political will.” Developed countries must have the will to take real action on curbing the continual increase in global temperatures or, let's face it, a new global deal won’t meet our agreed goal of staying below 2°C. So, developed country Parties, best shape up or head home.

Tags:

Topics:

Related Event:

ADP Second Session 2013

rvoorhaar's blog

Climate Action Network International Submission to ADP Chairs on Workstream 1: Post-2020

Submitted by Sam Harris on March 4, 2013 - 5:43pm

march52013_adp_submission_ws1_final.pdf

(a) Application of Principles of Convention

Equity, including a dynamic approach to common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDRRC), must be at the very heart of the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action Workstream 1 if it is to be able to deliver adequately for the climate. The internationally legally binding protocol now under negotiation must include common and accurate accounting, MRV, strong compliance and enforcement, all respecting the principles of equity, including CBDRRC. It must have fair targets and actions that are consistent with the strong likelihood of meeting a 2°C global carbon budget, and thus keeping 1.5°C budget within reach. It should build on, develop and improve the rules already agreed under the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol.

The failure to consider equity principles for a global effort sharing agreement – an equitable approach to sharing the costs of mitigation and adaptation amongst countries – has been a stumbling block to agreeing sufficient ambition. Adaptation must be treated with the same importance as mitigation. Countries are concerned that they will be asked to do more than is their fair share, and conversely that other countries will ‘free ride’ off their efforts. A common understanding of fair shares can help overcome this trust barrier and lead to higher levels of ambition from all. Countries must urgently start their work to increase understanding of, and further agreement on, ways and options for the allocation of fair shares of the global effort.

<more>

Tags:

Topics:

Equity/effort-sharing

Finance

Flexible Mechanisms

Fossil Fuel Subsidies

Organization:

Climate Action Network

CAN Positions

Related Event:

ADP Second Session 2013

Climate Action Network International Submission to ADP Chairs on Workstream 2: Pre-2020 Ambition

Submitted by Sam Harris on March 4, 2013 - 2:31pm

can_submission_adp_ws_2_final.pdf

At successive UNFCCC meetings, Parties have acknowledged the existence of a multi-gigatonnes gap between the current level of ambition to mitigate emissions until 2020 (expressed in QELROs, pledges, targets and NAMAs) for the period until 2020 and what is required in that period to allow the world to stay below the critical 1.5/2°C threshold. According to the Climate Action Tracker, current pre-2020 ambition (expressed by countries in QELROs, pledges and NAMAs) puts the world onto a path of 2.7-4.2°C warming. There is a consensus within the scientific community that we are fast approaching a devastating tipping point. In this context it is alarming that governments have not taken any steps yet to close the gap but allow it to grow. According to UNEP, the estimated emissions gap in 2020 for a “likely” chance of being on track to stay below the 2°C target is 8 to 13 GtCO2e, while it was 6 to 11 GtCO2e in the 2011 report. Global emissions are currently 14 per cent above where they should be to have a likely chance to limit global warming to no more than 2°C.

Some Parties seem to hope to get away with misinterpreting “enhancing ambition” to mean to continue to mitigate after 2020, and to leave the current pre-2020 ambition gap untouched – at least as far as own action is concerned. This is a highly irresponsible assumption. Raising the ambition level of action before 2020 is a prerequisite to stay below the 1.5/2°C threshold.

With sufficient political will, that is lacking for instance in the US, China, EU, Canada, Japan, Australia and Russia, emissions can be brought to a level by 2020 consistent with staying below the critical 1.5/2°C threshold. UNEP's “Bridging the Emissions Gap 2012” report asserts that this is possible and economically feasible, using existing, mature technologies. In fact it should be common knowledge by now that if nothing more is done to increase the current unconditional pledges, costs would be much higher to reach deeper reductions in later years and/or the adaptation needs would be far greater.

Tags:

Topics:

Organization:

Climate Action Network

CAN Positions

Related Event:

ADP Second Session 2013

Climate Action Network Position on Market Based Measures (MBMs) for International Aviation-February 2013

Submitted by Sam Harris on February 28, 2013 - 11:53am

can_position_on_aviation_-_final_feb2013.pdf

International aviation is a major and fast-growing source of greenhouse gas emissions. Despite on-going discussions for over 15 years within the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) there exists no legal instrument which addresses the limitation and reduction of emissions of the international aviation sector globally, even though emissions have grown to the point where aviation represents an estimated 4.9% of global radiative forcing. Further, aviation activities are being under-charged from an environmental perspective. Yet there is high potential to reduce these emissions globally, beyond the energy efficiency measures being developed and considered under ICAO. Carbon pricing would be an effective means of addressing this situation and can be applied fairly and equitably.

The current year – 2013 – is a crucial year for decisions on the adoption of market-based mechanisms to address aviation emissions. The European Commission proposed in late 2012 a one year “stop the clock” exemption, temporarily deferring enforcement of the obligation of aircraft operators in respect of incoming and outgoing flights under the EU’s Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) to give a final chance for the adoption of a global approach through a multilateral process under ICAO. In late 2012 the ICAO Council created a High Level Group on Climate Change to provide political impetus towards agreement on measures to address GHG emissions, including a global market-based measure (MBM). The highest decision making body of ICAO – its triennial Assembly – is meeting in September/ October 2013. Since it only meets every three years it is essential that an ambitious global MBM for addressing the sector’s emissions is agreed upon at this year’s Assembly.

<more>

Tags:

aviation

bunkers

MBMs

Emissions from international aviation and shipping

Market Based Measures

Topics:

Bunkers

Organization:

Climate Action Network

CAN Positions

No oasis for climate in Doha desert

Submitted by MBrockley on December 8, 2012 - 11:36am

can-i_doha_end_talks_news_release.pdf

The UN climate talks failed to deliver increased cuts to carbon pollution, nor did they provide any credible pathway to $100 billion per year in finance by 2020 to help the poorest countries deal with climate change, according to the 700 NGOs who are members of Climate Action Network-International (CAN-I).

Two weeks ago, just prior to the start of these negotiations, numerous credible reports were published by an array of well respected scientists, economists and climate change experts, all with essentially the same conclusion - we are currently on an unsustainable path which virtually guarantees the world will be faced with catastrophic effects from climate change, according to Greenpeace International executive director, Kumi Naidoo.

“Two weeks of negotiations have not altered that path and that politicians need to reflect the consensus around climate change through funds, targets and effective action."

WWF head of delegation, Tasneem Essop, said Doha was supposed to be an important element in setting up for a fair, ambitious and binding deal in 2015 and therefore needed to rebuild trust and instill equity.

“These talks have failed the climate and they have failed developing nations,” Essop said. “The Doha decision has delivered no real cuts in emissions, it has delivered no concrete finance, and it has not delivered on equity.”

Governments have delivered a very vague outcome that might lead to increased ambition but only if the politics shift to working for the people, our future, and not the polluters.

In particular, countries including the US, who have continually blocked progress in the talks, need to fundamentally change their positions in line with their obligation to lead on the solution to this crisis that they created.

Tim Gore, International Climate Change Policy Advisor for Oxfam, said Doha had done nothing to guarantee that public climate finance would go up next year, not down.

“Developing countrieshave come here in good faith and have been forced to accept vague words and no numbers,” Gore said. “It's a betrayal.”

Wael Hmaidan, director of CAN-I, said that ministers needed to go back to their capitals and work hard to put concrete proposals on the table for the next talks so that progress could be made towards to secure a fair, ambitious, and binding deal in 2015.

“The path forward is actually quite clear: we have the technology and know-how to reduce dangerous carbon pollution, protect vulnerable communities, and grow sustainable, resilient, economies.”

“But we also need people in all regions of the world to demand leadership from their governments on climate change – just like the new youth movement in the Arab region has done.”

The Doha Decision:

An extraordinarily weak outcome on climate finance which fails to put any money on the table or to ensure a pathway to the $100 billion a year by 2020 target. The decision asks for submissions from governments on long term finance pathways, calls for public funds for adaptation but does not mention a figure, and encourages developed countries to maintain funding at existing levels dependent on their economies.
An eight year second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol with loopholes that allow carry over, use and trading of hot air
A call – though not an official ambition ratchet mechanism - for Kyoto Protocol countries to review their emissions reduction target inline with the 25-40% range by 2014 at the latest. While it could have been stronger, the decision reinforces clear moral obligation for countries to increase their emission reduction targets prior to 2020 and provides opportunities for them to do so
An agreed work program on loss and damage to help victims of climate change will start immediately anda decision “to establish institutional arrangement, such as an international mechanism, at COP19”
Developed countries failed to agree a way to account for their carbon in a comparable way

Contacts
Climate Action Network (CAN) is a global network of over 700 NGOs working to promote government and individual action to limit human-induced climate change to ecologically sustainable levels.
For more information, please contact CAN International Communications Coordinator Ria Voorhaar, email: rvoorhaar@climatenetwork.org, local mobile: +974 33 38 6907.