Welcome to Carbon Brief’s China Briefing.
Carbon Brief handpicks and explains the most important climate and energy stories from China over the past fortnight. Subscribe for free here.
Key developments
US-China climate deal paves way for Xi-Biden meeting and COP28
SUNNYLANDS STATEMENT: Following talks between US and Chinese climate envoys John Kerry and Xie Zhenhua, the two nations released statements “to jointly tackle global warming by ramping up…renewable energy with the goal of displacing fossil fuels”, the New York Times reported. Both countries pledged to “pursue efforts to triple renewable energy capacity globally by 2030”, a key goal in COP28 negotiations, it added. The statement backed the “success of COP28”, which Reuters said was “crucial” to coming to a consensus in Dubai. However, while the statement supported a broad political outcome from the “global stocktake” at COP28, there was no agreed language on fossil fuel phaseout, noted Carbon Brief’s Simon Evans on Twitter. The BBC quoted Bernice Lee, distinguished fellow at Chatham House, as saying that it had likely “proven to be too difficult to find the form of language that works for both” on fossil fuels. Similarly, while there were commitments in the statement to hold policy dialogues on energy efficiency, doubling the rate of efficiency improvements by 2030 was not mentioned.
EMISSIONS PEAKING: The two countries “expect meaningful cuts to be made to power sector emissions before 2030”, Bloomberg reported, quoting Joanna Lewis, an expert in international policy at Georgetown University, as saying this implies “a reduction in emissions from China’s coal plants very soon”. (This aligns with recent analysis by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) for Carbon Brief, see below.) However, on Twitter, senior Politico climate correspondent Karl Mathiesen spotted a slight difference between the readouts – in the US version, power sector emissions cuts are tied to “this critical decade of the 2020s”, whereas in the Chinese readout, reductions are not linked to any date. Reductions will likely be driven in part by carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS), with Chinese energy outlet BJX News reporting that “the two countries aim to promote at least five large-scale [CCUS] cooperation projects in industry and energy…by 2030 in each country”.
‘RESTARTING’ COOPERATION: Kerry and Xie’s meeting was followed by a meeting between presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, at which the two leaders discussed maintaining “high-level communications” and cooperating “on trade, agriculture, climate change and artificial intelligence”, Reuters said. Le Monde reported that the US and China will restart bilateral energy dialogues and establish working groups to cover key areas of concern. US treasury secretary Janet Yellen and Chinese vice premier He Lifeng also agreed to improve climate change and global debt relief cooperation in earlier talks, the South China Morning Post reported.
‘Structural decline’ in carbon emissions expected from 2024
2024 DECLINE: In analysis for Carbon Brief, Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at CREA, estimated that China’s carbon emissions “could peak this year before falling into a structural decline” due to “a historic expansion of the country’s low-carbon energy sources”, reported the Guardian. Covering the analysis, Chinese energy news site IN-EN.com said rapid growth in power generation from low-carbon energy sources, a consequent decline in coal’s share of energy consumption and China’s real estate sector downturn “lays the groundwork” for declining emissions. Myllyvirta noted that solar energy saw the “most significant increases”, with 210 gigawatts (GW) of solar power set to be installed this year, the news platform Guancha reported. These record additions are “all but guaranteed to push China’s fossil-fuel electricity generation and CO2 emissions into decline in 2024”, Business Green said in its coverage. Myllyvirta spoke on state broadcaster CGTN to discuss the findings, which were also reported by CNN, Reuters, Bloomberg, Global Times and South China Morning Post.
COAL SPOILER? In a parallel piece in Foreign Policy, Myllyvirta and his co-author Byford Tsang, senior policy advisor at climate thinktank E3G, wrote under the headline: “China pledged to ‘strictly control’ coal. The opposite happened.” Yet Myllyvirta also noted in his analysis for Carbon Brief that a surge in China’s investment in manufacturing capacity for low-carbon technologies is creating an increasingly important interest group in the country, which could affect its approach to domestic and international climate politics. This is “setting the scene for a showdown between the country’s traditional [coal] and newly emerging interest groups”, Agence France-Presse noted in its coverage.
OVERSEAS FREEZE: Meanwhile, China’s two development banks did not make any new energy sector loan commitments in 2022 for “the second year in a row”, according to a new policy brief by the Boston University Global Development Policy Center. In an article for the China Global South Project, co-author Cecilia Springer wrote that this was driven by “ongoing domestic economic woes” and “heightened debt distress in borrowing nations”.
China compensates coal power plants for spare capacity
CAPACITY COMPENSATION: China will give “guaranteed payments” to coal power producers under a new coal capacity compensation mechanism effective 1 January 2024, the country’s top economic planner, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), announced in a notice released on Friday, Reuters reported. It added that the “widely-anticipated” move aims to ensure the financial viability of “seldom-utilised, backup” coal power and counter challenges with the variability of renewable energy. The mechanism will allow coal power plants to recover their fixed costs through a capacity tariff set at either 30% or 50% of 330 yuan per kilowatt per year through 2025, depending on their location, reported energy news website BJX News. From 2026, provinces will raise the tariff to “no less than 50%” of the 330 yuan benchmark. A representative from the state-owned China Energy Investment Group wrote in power sector outlet Dianlian News that the policy will adjust the role of coal-fired power units in the power system from “being primarily quantity providers to becoming capacity providers”.
REFORM LAG? Economic news outlet Jiemian quoted the NDRC as saying the policy will have a “positive impact on the electricity costs for end-users in the short and long term”. However, the mechanism has major implications for market reforms, Anders Hove, a senior research fellow at Oxford Institute for Energy Studies told Carbon Brief. “The segregation of long-term contracts, spot markets and ancillary services markets already hinders the ability of market prices to convey investment signals,” he said. While the initial policy on a national electricity market design had suggested the possibility of a market-based capacity mechanism, China ultimately chose a flat capacity payment made only to coal, he added. David Fishman, a senior manager at energy consultancy the Lantau Group, posted on Twitter that it “could distort market signals, which would ordinarily force expensive or inefficient generators out of the market”. Still, Reuters quoted Fishman saying: “It adds a lot of flexibility to the grid system and should allow more intermittent generation (like wind or solar) to enter the generation mix without compromising grid stability or energy security.”
Spotlight
What does China’s new methane plan mean for its climate goals?
In November, China published its long-awaited plan to reduce methane emissions. Carbon Brief explores how effective the plan may be for the world’s largest emitter of methane.
What does the plan say?
The plan described China’s approach as to “control methane emissions in a scientific, rational and orderly manner”, with a specific focus on the energy, agriculture and waste sectors.
It included 20 “key tasks” in emissions monitoring, technological innovation, development of policy frameworks, global cooperation and other areas.
During the 15th five year plan period (2026-2030), monitoring and accounting of methane emissions will be “significantly enhanced”, it added. Methane utilisation, emissions control technologies and policy frameworks will be “effectively improved”.
Other notable pledges included that by 2030 oil and gas producers will “strive” to “gradually” eliminate flaring, and utilisation of coal mine methane will reach 6bn cubic metres annually.
(This “corresponds to about 10%” of the coal mining sector’s total methane emissions, said Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA).)
Where do methane emissions come from in China?
China is responsible for 10% of all human-caused methane emissions, with two estimates in 2021 placing its annual output at 58m tonnes (Mt) and 65Mt respectively, equivalent to 1.7-1.9bn tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent.
Around 40% of China’s methane emissions are gas that escapes during the mining of coal, according to the Innovative Green Development Program (iGDP), a Chinese thinktank. Another 42% is from agriculture, including livestock and rice cultivation, it said.
Coal mine methane emissions are particularly challenging to detect, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), as they are “diffuse”. It added that abandoned mines, which could contribute “almost one fifth” of global methane emissions, cannot be included in calculations as “reliable data” is often unavailable.
Climate Home reported, however, that according to Global Energy Monitor (GEM) research, “the real figure for coal mine methane is almost double what the government claims”. Shanxi province could emit as much methane from its coal mines as the rest of the world combined, according to GEM.
Why is tackling methane important?
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, with around 30 times the warming power of carbon dioxide 100 years after it is emitted. It is responsible for around 30% of the rise in global temperatures since the industrial revolution.
Cutting methane by 30% by 2030 – the target of the global methane pledge – is the “fastest way to reduce near-term warming” and keep 1.5C “within reach”, according to a US and EU factsheet.
Will China’s plan be effective in curbing emissions?
The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) wrote on WeChat that it believed “in the long term”, the plan will provide “a clear guiding framework” for methane reduction efforts.
It pointed to the role the plan could play in establishing a monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) system that could underpin a carbon pricing methodology for methane.
Dr Chen Meian, program director and senior analyst at iGDP, tells Carbon Brief that some of the “sector-specific targets mentioned in the methane plan can help China to reduce methane emissions” in coalbed methane and other areas.
However, she added, it is “difficult” to set hard targets for cutting emissions by specific amounts, due to challenges in data monitoring, “[which is why] China also listed the improvement of methane emissions MRV” as a key task.
Others are less convinced. The plan is “too ambiguous”, “descriptive” and lacking in quantitative targets, Refinitiv lead carbon analyst Yan Qin told Reuters.
Ember’s methane analyst Anatoli Smirnov told Climate Home that the “only real solution to reduce methane emissions is to close coal mines”. The outlet also quoted CREA’s Myllyvirta saying there is a lack of “political will and buy-in” to curb methane in China.
“I think China is trying to be realistic in target-setting [for its] coal sector emissions,” Chen tells Carbon Brief. She adds that China “used to set ambitious targets” for coalbed methane capture and utilisation in its five-year plans, but that it repeatedly missed them.
She added that it would be important for local governments to “set their own methane plans…tailored to local conditions” and to improve data monitoring.
What does this mean for global cooperation on methane?
A week after the plan was released, the US and Chinese climate envoys John Kerry and Xie Zhenhua issued a declaration on enhancing climate cooperation, known as the “Sunnylands statement”.
It included commitments to establish a working group that will look at several areas of cooperation, including methane emissions, and to create another working group to focus on “building on” their current national methane plans.
In addition, they commit to include “actions/targets” on methane reduction in their next climate pledges under the Paris Agreement, which will also cover other non-CO2 greenhouse gases. They will host, with the UAE, a summit on non-CO2 gases at COP28.
Without the plan’s public release, Li Shuo, director of the China climate hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute told Bloomberg, there “certainly wouldn’t have been further deals”.
However, differences in the sources of the US and China’s methane emissions could hamper cooperation. Dr Teng Fei, deputy director of the Institute of Energy, Environment and Economy at Tsinghua University, told China Dialogue that the main source of EU and US methane emissions is oil and gas, compared to coal mining for China.
Tackling coal mining methane emissions is harder and more costly than oil and gas. This could be why China has not signed up to the global methane pledge, which may be easier for the EU and US to meet, Teng added.
Watch, read, listen
COAL ADDICTION: Michael Davidson, assistant professor at the University of California, San Diego, explained in Foreign Affairs how “the need for energy security, the structure of China’s climate goals and…local interests” keeps China committed to coal, even though it “makes little financial sense”.
SOLAR DEBATE: In a video interview, Wall Street Journal reporter Phred Dvorak outlined how different countries are responding to dropping prices of Chinese solar panels in an effort to protect their own manufacturers.
EV RACE: Bloomberg published a podcast looking into how China became the dominant player in the electric vehicle industry, and what this could mean for the global economy.
GREEN BRI: A symposium summarised in Environmental Politics examined how environmental governance is practised in China’s belt and road initiative (BRI), with focus areas including China’s political mechanisms to “green” the BRI and the dynamics influencing the effectiveness of BRI renewable energy projects.
SUPPLY CHAIN RISKS? The Royal United Services Institute assessed the threat of China’s “near monopoly” of rare earth production and manufacturing of “net zero technologies”, finding that risks are “currently limited by low levels of manufacturing of these technologies in the UK”.
New science
Weather and Climate Extremes
A new study estimated that “compound” extreme weather events under a high-emissions scenario may become “10 times and 14 times more likely” through the mid-21st century and end of the century respectively. The study authors used the compound event of heavy precipitation and heatwaves in China in 2020 to identify the dynamic and thermodynamic factors contributing to the such events. They defined spatially compounding events as those occurring “when multiple connected locations are concurrently affected by the same or different hazards, thus inducing an aggregated impact”.
Global Change Biology
New research investigating recent trends in blooms of microalgal “red tides” and macroalgae in China found that microalgal blooms have been decreasing in frequency since 2003, while macroalgal blooms have generally been rising since 1999. It attributed the growth of macroalgae around China over the past 30 years to “eutrophication, climate change and grazing stress”, which it said indicated “a fundamental change in coastal systems in the region”.
China Briefing is compiled by Anika Patel and edited by Wanyuan Song and Simon Evans. Please send tips and feedback to china@carbonbrief.org.
The post China Briefing 16 November: Sunnylands statement; China methane plan; Coal capacity payments appeared first on Carbon Brief.
China Briefing 16 November: Sunnylands statement; China methane plan; Coal capacity payments
Climate Change
DeBriefed 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’?
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Absolute State of the Union
‘DRILL, BABY’: US president Donald Trump “doubled down on his ‘drill, baby, drill’ agenda” in his State of the Union (SOTU) address, said the Los Angeles Times. He “tout[ed] his support of the fossil-fuel industry and renew[ed] his focus on electricity affordability”, reported the Financial Times. Trump also attacked the “green new scam”, noted Carbon Brief’s SOTU tracker.
COAL REPRIEVE: Earlier in the week, the Trump administration had watered down limits on mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants, reported the Financial Times. It remains “unclear” if this will be enough to prevent the decline of coal power, said Bloomberg, in the face of lower-cost gas and renewables. Reuters noted that US coal plants are “ageing”.
OIL STAY: The US Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments brought by the oil industry in a “major lawsuit”, reported the New York Times. The newspaper said the firms are attempting to head off dozens of other lawsuits at state level, relating to their role in global warming.
SHIP-SHILLING: The Trump administration is working to “kill” a global carbon levy on shipping “permanently”, reported Politico, after succeeding in delaying the measure late last year. The Guardian said US “bullying” could be “paying off”, after Panama signalled it was reversing its support for the levy in a proposal submitted to the UN shipping body.
Around the world
- RARE EARTHS: The governments of Brazil and India signed a deal on rare earths, said the Times of India, as well as agreeing to collaborate on renewable energy.
- HEAT ROLLBACK: German homes will be allowed to continue installing gas and oil heating, under watered-down government plans covered by Clean Energy Wire.
- BRAZIL FLOODS: At least 53 people died in floods in the state of Minas Gerais, after some areas saw 170mm of rain in a few hours, reported CNN Brasil.
- ITALY’S ATTACK: Italy is calling for the EU to “suspend” its emissions trading system (ETS) ahead of a review later this year, said Politico.
- COOKSTOVE CREDITS: The first-ever carbon credits under the Paris Agreement have been issued to a cookstove project in Myanmar, said Climate Home News.
- SAUDI SOLAR: Turkey has signed a “major” solar deal that will see Saudi firm ACWA building 2 gigawatts in the country, according to Agence France-Presse.
$467 billion
The profits made by five major oil firms since prices spiked following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine four years ago, according to a report by Global Witness covered by BusinessGreen.
Latest climate research
- Claims about the “fingerprint” of human-caused climate change, made in a recent US Department of Energy report, are “factually incorrect” | AGU Advances
- Large lakes in the Congo Basin are releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from “immense ancient stores” | Nature Geoscience
- Shared Socioeconomic Pathways – scenarios used regularly in climate modelling – underrepresent “narratives explicitly centring on democratic principles such as participation, accountability and justice” | npj Climate Action
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
The constituency of Richard Tice MP, the climate-sceptic deputy leader of Reform UK, is the second-largest recipient of flood defence spending in England, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Overall, the funding is disproportionately targeted at coastal and urban areas, many of which have Conservative or Liberal Democrat MPs.
Spotlight
Is there really a UK ‘greenlash’?
This week, after a historic Green Party byelection win, Carbon Brief looks at whether there really is a “greenlash” against climate policy in the UK.
Over the past year, the UK’s political consensus on climate change has been shattered.
Yet despite a sharp turn against climate action among right-wing politicians and right-leaning media outlets, UK public support for climate action remains strong.
Prof Federica Genovese, who studies climate politics at the University of Oxford, told Carbon Brief:
“The current ‘war’ on green policy is mostly driven by media and political elites, not by the public.”
Indeed, there is still a greater than two-to-one majority among the UK public in favour of the country’s legally binding target to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, as shown below.
Steve Akehurst, director of public-opinion research initiative Persuasion UK, also noted the growing divide between the public and “elites”. He told Carbon Brief:
“The biggest movement is, without doubt, in media and elite opinion. There is a bit more polarisation and opposition [to climate action] among voters, but it’s typically no more than 20-25% and mostly confined within core Reform voters.”
Conservative gear shift
For decades, the UK had enjoyed strong, cross-party political support for climate action.
Lord Deben, the Conservative peer and former chair of the Climate Change Committee, told Carbon Brief that the UK’s landmark 2008 Climate Change Act had been born of this cross-party consensus, saying “all parties supported it”.
Since their landslide loss at the 2024 election, however, the Conservatives have turned against the UK’s target of net-zero emissions by 2050, which they legislated for in 2019.
Curiously, while opposition to net-zero has surged among Conservative MPs, there is majority support for the target among those that plan to vote for the party, as shown below.
Dr Adam Corner, advisor to the Climate Barometer initiative that tracks public opinion on climate change, told Carbon Brief that those who currently plan to vote Reform are the only segment who “tend to be more opposed to net-zero goals”. He said:
“Despite the rise in hostile media coverage and the collapse of the political consensus, we find that public support for the net-zero by 2050 target is plateauing – not plummeting.”
Reform, which rejects the scientific evidence on global warming and campaigns against net-zero, has been leading the polls for a year. (However, it was comfortably beaten by the Greens in yesterday’s Gorton and Denton byelection.)
Corner acknowledged that “some of the anti-net zero noise…[is] showing up in our data”, adding:
“We see rising concerns about the near-term costs of policies and an uptick in people [falsely] attributing high energy bills to climate initiatives.”
But Akehurst said that, rather than a big fall in public support, there had been a drop in the “salience” of climate action:
“So many other issues [are] competing for their attention.”
UK newspapers published more editorials opposing climate action than supporting it for the first time on record in 2025, according to Carbon Brief analysis.
Global ‘greenlash’?
All of this sits against a challenging global backdrop, in which US president Donald Trump has been repeating climate-sceptic talking points and rolling back related policy.
At the same time, prominent figures have been calling for a change in climate strategy, sold variously as a “reset”, a “pivot”, as “realism”, or as “pragmatism”.
Genovese said that “far-right leaders have succeeded in the past 10 years in capturing net-zero as a poster child of things they are ‘fighting against’”.
She added that “much of this is fodder for conservative media and this whole ecosystem is essentially driving what we call the ‘greenlash’”.
Corner said the “disconnect” between elite views and the wider public “can create problems” – for example, “MPs consistently underestimate support for renewables”. He added:
“There is clearly a risk that the public starts to disengage too, if not enough positive voices are countering the negative ones.”
Watch, read, listen
TRUMP’S ‘PETROSTATE’: The US is becoming a “petrostate” that will be “sicker and poorer”, wrote Financial Times associate editor Rana Forohaar.
RHETORIC VS REALITY: Despite a “political mood [that] has darkened”, there is “more green stuff being installed than ever”, said New York Times columnist David Wallace-Wells.
CHINA’S ‘REVOLUTION’: The BBC’s Climate Question podcast reported from China on the “green energy revolution” taking place in the country.
Coming up
- 2-6 March: UN Food and Agriculture Organization regional conference for Latin America and Caribbean, Brasília
- 3 March: UK spring statement
- 4-11 March: China’s “two sessions”
- 5 March: Nepal elections
Pick of the jobs
- The Guardian, senior reporter, climate justice | Salary: $123,000-$135,000. Location: New York or Washington DC
- China-Global South Project, non-resident fellow, climate change | Salary: Up to $1,000 a month. Location: Remote
- University of East Anglia, PhD in mobilising community-based climate action through co-designed sports and wellbeing interventions | Salary: Stipend (unknown amount). Location: Norwich, UK
- TABLE and the University of São Paulo, Brazil, postdoctoral researcher in food system narratives | Salary: Unknown. Location: Pirassununga, Brazil
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Seven Pacific island nations say they will demand heftier levies on global shipping emissions if opponents of a green deal for the industry succeed in reopening negotiations on the stalled accord.
The United States and Saudi Arabia persuaded countries not to grant final approval to the International Maritime Organization’s Net-Zero Framework (NZF) in October and they are now leading a drive for changes to the deal.
In a joint submission seen by Climate Home News, the seven climate-vulnerable Pacific countries said the framework was already a “fragile compromise”, and vowed to push for a universal levy on all ship emissions, as well as higher fees . The deal currently stipulates that fees will be charged when a vessel’s emissions exceed a certain level.
“For many countries, the NZF represents the absolute limit of what they can accept,” said the unpublished submission by Fiji, Kiribati, Vanuatu, Nauru, Palau, Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands.
The countries said a universal levy and higher charges on shipping would raise more funds to enable a “just and equitable transition leaving no country behind”. They added, however, that “despite its many shortcomings”, the framework should be adopted later this year.
US allies want exemption for ‘transition fuels’
The previous attempt to adopt the framework failed after governments narrowly voted to postpone it by a year. Ahead of the vote, the US threatened governments and their officials with sanctions, tariffs and visa restrictions – and President Donald Trump called the framework a “Green New Scam Tax on Shipping”.
Since then, Liberia – an African nation with a major low-tax shipping registry headquartered in the US state of Virginia – has proposed a new measure under which, rather than staying fixed under the NZF, ships’ emissions intensity targets change depending on “demonstrated uptake” of both “low-carbon and zero-carbon fuels”.
The proposal places stringent conditions on what fuels are taken into consideration when setting these targets, stressing that the low- and zero-carbon fuels should be “scalable”, not cost more than 15% more than standard marine fuels and should be available at “sufficient ports worldwide”.
This proposal would not “penalise transitional fuels” like natural gas and biofuels, they said. In the last decade, the US has built a host of large liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals, which the Trump administration is lobbying other countries to purchase from.
The draft motion, seen by Climate Home News, was co-sponsored by US ally Argentina and also by Panama, a shipping hub whose canal the US has threatened to annex. Both countries voted with the US to postpone the last vote on adopting the framework.
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IMO head: Shipping decarbonisation “has started” despite green deal delay
Arsenio Dominguez said the shipping industry’s net zero emissions goal is not in dispute although countries have stalled on adopting a framework to reach it -
US-led alliance wins a year’s delay in adoption of green shipping deal
The IMO’s Net-Zero Framework will be up for approval again in October 2026, after the US and Saudi Arabia persuaded countries not to vote on it as planned
The IMO’s Panamanian head Arsenio Dominguez told reporters in January that changes to the framework were now possible.
“It is clear from what happened last year that we need to look into the concerns that have been expressed [and] … make sure that they are somehow addressed within the framework,” he said.
Patchwork of levies
While the European Union pushed firmly for the framework’s adoption, two of its shipping-reliant member states – Greece and Cyprus – abstained in October’s vote.
After a meeting between the Greek shipping minister and Saudi Arabia’s energy minister in January, Greece said a “common position” united Greece, Saudi Arabia and the US on the framework.
If the NZF or a similar instrument is not adopted, the IMO has warned that there will be a patchwork of differing regional levies on pollution – like the EU’s emissions trading system for ships visiting its ports – which will be complicated and expensive to comply with.
This would mean that only countries with their own levies and with lots of ships visiting their ports would raise funds, making it harder for other nations to fund green investments in their ports, seafarers and shipping companies. In contrast, under the NZF, revenues would be disbursed by the IMO to all nations based on set criteria.
Anais Rios, shipping policy officer from green campaign group Seas At Risk, told Climate Home News the proposal by the Pacific nations for a levy on all shipping emissions – not just those above a certain threshold – was “the most credible way to meet the IMO’s climate goals”.
“With geopolitics reframing climate policy, asking the IMO to reopen the discussion on the universal levy is the only way to decarbonise shipping whilst bringing revenue to manage impacts fairly,” Rios said.
“It is […] far stronger than the Net-Zero Framework that is currently on offer.”
The post Pacific nations want higher emissions charges if shipping talks reopen appeared first on Climate Home News.
Pacific nations want higher emissions charges if shipping talks reopen
Doubts over whether governments will maintain ambitious targets on boosting the use of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) are a threat to the industry’s growth and play into the hands of fossil fuel companies, investors warned this week.
Several executives from airlines and oil firms have forecast recently that SAF requirements in the European Union, United Kingdom and elsewhere will be eased or scrapped altogether, potentially upending the aviation industry’s main policy to shrink air travel’s growing carbon footprint.
Such speculation poses a “fundamental threat” to the SAF industry, which mainly produces an alternative to traditional kerosene jet fuel using organic feedstocks such as used cooking oil (UCO), Thomas Engelmann, head of energy transition at German investment manager KGAL, told the Sustainable Aviation Fuel Investor conference in London.
He said fossil fuel firms would be the only winners from questions about compulsory SAF blending requirements.
The EU and the UK introduced the world’s first SAF mandates in January 2025, requiring fuel suppliers to blend at least 2% SAF with fossil fuel kerosene. The blending requirement will gradually increase to reach 32% in the EU and 22% in the UK by 2040.
Another case of diluted green rules?
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January, CEO of French oil and gas company TotalEnergies Patrick Pouyanné said he would bet “that what happened to the car regulation will happen to the SAF regulation in Europe”.
The EU watered down green rules for car-makers in March 2025 after lobbying from car companies, Germany and Italy.
“You will see. Today all the airline companies are fighting [against the EU’s 2030 SAF target of 6%],” Pouyanne said, even though it’s “easy to reach to be honest”.
While most European airline lobbies publicly support the mandates, Ryanair Group CEO Michael O’Leary said last year that the SAF is “nonsense” and is “gradually dying a death, which is what it deserves to do”.
EU and UK stand by SAF targets
But the EU and the British government have disputed that. EU transport commissioner Apostolos Tzitzikostas said in November that the EU’s targets are “stable”, warning that “investment decisions and construction must start by 2027, or we will miss the 2030 targets”.
UK aviation minister Keir Mather told this week’s investor event that meeting the country’s SAF blending requirement of 10% by 2030 was “ambitious but, with the right investment, the right innovation and the right outlook, it is absolutely within our reach”.
“We need to go further and we need to go faster,” Mather said.
SAF investors and developers said such certainty on SAF mandates from policymakers was key to drawing the necessary investment to ramp up production of the greener fuel, which needs to scale up in order to bring down high production costs. Currently, SAF is between two and seven times more expensive than traditional jet fuel.
Urbano Perez, global clean molecules lead at Spanish bank Santander, said banks will not invest if there is a perceived regulatory risk.
David Scott, chair of Australian SAF producer Jet Zero Australia, said developing SAF was already challenging due to the risks of “pretty new” technology requiring high capital expenditure.
“That’s a scary model with a volatile political environment, so mandate questioning creates this problem on steroids”, Scott said.
Others played down the risk. Glenn Morgan, partner at investment and advisory firm SkiesFifty, said “policy is always a risk”, adding that traditional oil-based jet fuel could also lose subsidies.
Asian countries join SAF mandate adopters
In Asia, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Japan have recently adopted SAF mandates, and Matti Lievonen, CEO of Asia-based SAF producer EcoCeres, predicted that China, Indonesia and Hong Kong would follow suit.
David Fisken, investment director at the Australian Trade and Investment Commission, said the Australian government, which does not have a mandate, was watching to see how the EU and UK’s requirements played out.
The US does not have a SAF mandate and under President Donald Trump the government has slashed tax credits available for SAF producers from $1.75 a gallon to $1.
Is the world’s big idea for greener air travel a flight of fancy?
SAF and energy security
SAF’s potential role in boosting energy security was a major theme of this week’s discussions as geopolitical tensions push the issue to the fore.
Marcella Franchi, chief commercial officer for SAF at France’s Haffner Energy, said the Canadian government, which has “very unsettling neighbours at the moment”, was looking to produce SAF to protect its energy security, especially as it has ample supplies of biomass to use as potential feedstock.
Similarly, German weapons manufacturer Rheinmetall said last year it was working on plans that would enable European armed forces to produce their own synthetic, carbon-neutral fuel “locally and independently of global fossil fuel supply chain”.
Scott said Australia needs SAF to improve its fuel security, as it imports almost 99% of its liquid fuels.
He added that support for Australian SAF production is bipartisan, in part because it appeals to those more concerned about energy security than tackling climate change.
The post Doubts over European SAF rules threaten cleaner aviation hopes, investors warn appeared first on Climate Home News.
Doubts over European SAF rules threaten cleaner aviation hopes, investors warn
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Greenhouse Gases7 months ago
Guest post: Why China is still building new coal – and when it might stop
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Climate Change7 months ago
Guest post: Why China is still building new coal – and when it might stop
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Greenhouse Gases2 years ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
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Climate Change2 years ago
Bill Discounting Climate Change in Florida’s Energy Policy Awaits DeSantis’ Approval
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Climate Change2 years ago
Spanish-language misinformation on renewable energy spreads online, report shows
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Climate Change2 years ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
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Climate Change Videos2 years ago
The toxic gas flares fuelling Nigeria’s climate change – BBC News
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Carbon Footprint2 years agoUS SEC’s Climate Disclosure Rules Spur Renewed Interest in Carbon Credits