- Formal negotiations
- Finance
- Global review
- Global report
- Digital sequence information
- Harmful subsidies
- Marine biodiversity
- Planning, monitoring, reporting and review
- Article 8(j) implementation
- Biodiversity and climate change
- Links with other bodies
- Around the COP
- Armenian presidency
- Protests
- Lobbying and influence
- Carbon and biodiversity markets
The European Union’s executive arm has proposed a goal to cut the EU’s net emissions by 90% on 1990 levels by 2040 – with up to 3% of those reductions coming from paying other countries outside the bloc to cut their greenhouse gas pollution.
The European Commission has faced pressure from EU member states like Italy to weaken the goal and from France to introduce “flexibility”. Member states and the European Parliament will need to sign off on the proposal for it to become the EU’s official goal.
But, during a press conference in heatwave-hit Brussels today, European climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra denied that “flexibilites” like carbon offsets were a concession to these countries on what he called a “sensitive topic”.
“We truly, genuinely are convinced that they are an improvement to the system,” he told journalists, adding that the 90% goal was “ambitious” and options like carbon credits are “pragmatic” and “non-dogmatic”.
Coalition set sights on taxing luxury air travel to fund climate action
Justifying buying offsets from abroad, he said that the “planet doesn’t discriminate where emissions are being put into the air” and that the offsets the EU buys would be “high quality”.
With many developing countries keen to sell offsets under the United Nations’ new Article 6 mechanism, Hoekstra said buying them would “help in building bridges with our friends all across the globe” and “give breathing space” for European industries which find it hard to cut their emissions.
Other governments like the UK, Norway and Canada have also left open the possibility of using carbon offsets to meet their emissions reduction targets.
Japan has gone further, saying it aims to buy offsets for 100 million tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2030 and 200 million by 2040. Japan has a target to reduce emissions 46% by 2030 and 73% by 2040 below 2013 levels. In 2013, Japan’s emissions were 1,408 million tonnes.
In January 2024, Switzerland received the first ever batch of carbon credits produced through an Article 6 project – with Switzerland paying for electric buses in Thailand’s capital Bangkok. Swiss charities said the offsets were flawed as the switch to electric buses would have happened anyway without Swiss money.
Carbon offsetting loopholes
Some European climate campaigners criticised the European Commission’s offsets proposal. Many carbon credits have been exposed as failing to deliver the emissions reductions they claim.
Carbon Market Watch policy director Sam Van den plas said the “carbon offsetting loopholes” in the EU’s plan are “nothing more than distractions and delays from the climate action Europe needs”.
Brazil’s environment minister suggests roadmap to end fossil fuels at COP30
Climate Analytics CEO Bill Hare said that the 90% target for 2040 was aligned with the Paris Agreement’s most ambitious goal of limiting global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. But, he said, the potential use of carbon credits is “outsourcing Europe’s responsibility” for meeting that.
Several campaigners pointed to a 2023 recommendation from the EU’s Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change that the bloc of 27 nations should adopt a 90-95% target.
The advisory body said that even this would be less than the EU’s fair share of global emissions reductions – and, to address the shortfall, the EU should aim to be carbon-negative after 2050 and support governments outside the EU to reduce their emissions. It did not comment on what form that support could take.
Political trouble ahead
The European Commission will now have to get EU member states and the European Parliament to agree to its proposal. Environment ministers from the EU’s member states will meet in Denmark next Thursday and Friday, where they will discuss the 2040 target.
Time is tight as the Commission and Council want to submit a 2035 emissions target as part of the EU’s updated climate plan to the United Nations by the end of September – the deadline for inclusion in a UN report synthesising the emissions reductions offered by different countries in their NDC climate plans.
The EU plans to base its 2035 target on a point between the already agreed 2030 goal of a reduction of at least 55% and the new 2040 target. The EU aims to reach net zero – where it emits no more greenhouse gases than it removes from the atmosphere – by 2050.
One EU climate negotiator told Climate Home they were “concerned” for the Danish government, which is now presiding over the Council that represents the EU’s national governments.
E3G Brussels head Manon Dufour said: “Denmark’s been handed an unnecessarily tough job – that of getting all European governments to work and agree something during the summer months – but the preparations will pay off. They have to.”
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EU Commission proposes allowing carbon offsets to help meet 2040 climate goal
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Prepared by a coalition of nine Western Australian union, industry, conservation, and community organisations—including UnionsWA, the Conservation Council WA, and the Smart Energy Council—the WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan provides a practical roadmap to transform Western Australia into a clean energy powerhouse while creating thousands of secure local jobs.
Western Australia stands at a pivotal crossroads: lead the global clean energy economy or watch investment, future industries, and secure jobs go elsewhere. The WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan outlines a transformative blueprint to harness the state’s world-class solar and wind resources. Discover how legislated renewable targets, green iron manufacturing, and a dedicated regional training strategy can generate tens of thousands of local jobs, lower household bills, and build a resilient, net-zero future for all Western Australians.
WA needs a clear and forward-thinking plan if it is going to become a competitive renewable energy powerhouse and maintain its economic strength through the energy transition.
“Western Australians know a faster renewable energy transition will lower their household expenses and prevent harmful climate pollution. But the community also needs clear direction to ensure this transition will create jobs, lower costs and not cause undue environmental harm.
“Here, sectors representing a broad range of interests have laid the groundwork for those outcomes, clearly outlining what is needed to create a future for WA that is good for the environment, for the climate, for workers and for the economy.
Summary
The WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan sets out a strategic roadmap to position Western Australia as a global clean energy superpower while creating thousands of secure local jobs.
The report establishes three overarching goals:
- Creating local employment.
- Maintaining industrial competitiveness.
- Lowering household energy costs
To realize this vision, the framework details actionable measures to follow on from the recent WA Government announcement of a 75% Renewable Energy Target by 2031 for the South West Interconnected System. This includes developing a statewide Renewable Energy Target, coordinating statewide workforce and training pipelines, strategically planning regional infrastructure to safeguard high-value biodiversity and cultural heritage, and ensuring equitable benefit-sharing through household electrification incentives and First Nations equity partnerships. Ultimately, the plan highlights that establishing clear policy and regulatory certainty will unlock lower energy bills, boost power reliability, and secure the state’s global competitiveness in emerging green commodity export markets.
Key Findings
- Statewide Renewable Energy Target and Emissions Reduction Targets: The report calls for a statewide RET and 1.5°C aligned emission reduction targets to remove policy risk, lower capital costs, and attract clean energy investment.
- Transformative Job Creation: Accelerating the transition offers massive employment prospects, including up to 8,800 solar and battery jobs by 2050, as well as 24,000 ongoing and 11,000 construction jobs in a commercial green iron industry.
- Industrial Electrification & Competitiveness: Requiring large gas users to adopt binding electrification timetables and providing concessional financing will protect existing energy-intensive manufacturers from rising energy costs and impending domestic gas shortfalls.
- Green Commodity Export Leadership: Western Australia can build new export markets in green iron, green ammonia, and offshore oil/gas decommissioning by constructing shared common-user infrastructure and setting dedicated Green Commodity Export Targets.
- Coordinated Workforce & Training Pipeline: To address critical skill shortages the plan recommends establishing a WA Clean Energy Jobs Plan 2050, three regional training hubs, and dedicated pathways for female and under-represented apprentices.
- Environmental Safeguards & Community Benefits: Fast-tracked development must be paired with State Planning Policies that avoid high-biodiversity and cultural heritage lands, mandate new data centres to run on additional renewable power, and deliver household electrification rebates and First Nations equity partnerships.
What you can do
WA has an opportunity to lead on sustainable, clean energy and associated industries. You can help by:
- Sending an email to Environment Minister Murray Watt and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, calling on them to reject Browse.
- Sharing this story to help more Australians understand what’s at stake.
- Encouraging your friends and family to take action.
Countries have completed the first “global review” of their progress towards reversing nature loss by 2030 at the COP17 biodiversity talks in Yerevan, Armenia.
The review “notes with deep concern” that, unless action is “rapidly accelerated”, the goal to reverse nature loss and meet a set of 23 targets by 2030 “will not be achieved”.
It “urges” countries to accelerate action, including by “increased ambition in addressing the gaps”.
Much of the discussions in Yerevan focused on how to raise the necessary funds to help developing countries protect nature.
Some major economies pushed to expand the range of nations that are expected to provide finance, with countries agreeing at the end of the two weeks of talks that non-donors that want to contribute can “signal interest” before COP18.
This came after developed countries failed to meet a target to significantly ramp up nature finance over the last few years.
It also came as a landmark fund agreed at COP16 in Colombia to pay communities for the genetic resources derived from nature stands nearly empty two years on.
The Yerevan talks marked the halfway point of the “Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework” (GBF), the “Paris Agreement for nature” first made in 2022 and due to be achieved by 2030.
During the nearly 12-hour-long final plenary, countries voted for Quito, Ecuador, to host the COP18 nature talks, which will be held in 2028.
Countries managed to sign off on all the major negotiation texts, marking a stark contrast to COP16, which ran so far over time that the Colombian presidency lost “quorum”, forcing talks to resume in Rome months later.
Below, Carbon Brief has detailed analysis of all of the key outcomes from COP17.
Formal negotiations
Finance
Finance, predictably, was at the heart of the discord and deadlock at the Yerevan talks.
At COP17, discussions on finance had to achieve several outcomes.
The first part – to take stock of biodiversity finance mobilised so far to meet the nature deal’s goals – fell under the global review.
As the global report noted, developed countries failed to meet their commitments to raise “at least $20bn a year by 2025” for nature. Delegates pointed to falling aid levels and a sharp 27% decline in environmental funding for the 2026-30 period.
The second part was to agree on how to mobilise resources for the next four years, to meet the GBF’s goals and targets.
Calls to “broaden the contributor base” of who pays to protect nature – and whether that should include emerging economies – became the most fraught element of the talks.
Eventually, countries agreed on what Switzerland described as a “super, mega-delicate” text. It hinged on major “political compromises”, with “no major winner or loser”, according to Kenya.
Per the decision, countries that want to be included on a list of developed country donors can “signal interest” through bilateral, confidential consultations before COP18 and every alternate COP after.
Finally, countries also agreed on criteria to shape and resource a new, permanent financial mechanism to protect nature after 2030.
However, this did not immediately take the form of a new fund under the COP that biodiverse countries have demanded since 2022, deferring the mechanism’s institutional structure to COP18.
Resource mobilisation discussions at the GBF’s halfway mark were supposed to agree on how to close the “biodiversity finance gap” and to “increase resources from all sources” to “at least” $200bn per year by 2030, as set out in target 19 of the GBF.
The talks were largely dominated by a push, led by the JUSCANZ bloc of developed countries, to “broaden the contributor base”. This could see emerging economies, such as Qatar, China, Saudi Arabia and India, being added to the list of countries that pay to protect nature.
Article 20 of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) states that developed countries “shall provide new and additional financial resources” to developing countries to meet the costs of implementing measures to protect nature.