Connect with us

Published

on

China’s Third Plenum, an important five-yearly meeting traditionally associated with major economic reforms, concluded on 18 July in Beijing.

Observers have been eagerly anticipating signals from the meeting about the leadership’s plans for economic growth and wider development, including on climate action.

The official readout from the meeting of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party calls on policymakers to pursue a range of relevant reforms.

These include a focus on “high-quality economic development” (高质量发展), as well as “supporting all-around innovation” (支持全面创新) and “deepening reform in ecological conservation systems” (深化生态文明体制改革), among other areas.

It also urges officials to “make concerted efforts to cut carbon emissions” and “actively respond to climate change”. This is the first time carbon emissions have been mentioned in a plenum document. 

A key step to achieve this, it adds, is through “improving institutional mechanisms for developing new quality productive forces” (NQPF, 新质生产力).

Since its first appearance in official rhetoric in September last year, this term has featured in Chinese state media in numerous high-level policy documents and commentaries about industrial development and low-carbon growth.

According to Chinese president Xi Jinping, one important element of NQPF is “green development”, which he has described as the “base colour of high-quality development”. In comments made in January 2024, he added that “new quality productivity itself is green productivity” (新质生产力本身就是绿色生产力).

This encapsulates both the development of low-carbon technologies, such as electric vehicles (EVs), and the “green transformation” of the economy.

However, there is significant debate as to whether the concept, which can also be translated as “new productive forces” or “new quality productivity”, will result in concrete policy outcomes and support further development of industries critical to China’s energy transition.

In this article, Carbon Brief unpacks the concepts underpinning new quality productive forces, and what it means for China’s climate, energy and industrial policy.

What does ‘new quality productive forces’ mean?

The phrase was first mentioned by Xi during a visit to Heilongjiang province, located in the “rust belt” of northeast China, in 2023. 

In January 2024, he further defined it as innovation-led development that creates “a break with traditional economic growth models and development pathways”, resulting in a “high level of technology, efficiency and quality” (高科技、高效能、高质量) as well as an “in-depth transformation and upgrading of industry” (产业深度转型升级).

This has led to a “ubiquitous” focus on innovation across official discussions about NQPF, according to the University of Cambridge-affiliated thinktank Cambridge Industrial Innovation Policy.

Unleashing this innovation, according to official interpretations, will lead to a cascade of changes across China’s industrial system – “both technological and institutional” – that will improve China’s advanced manufacturing capabilities.

Nevertheless, innovation and advanced technology are not the only focus. Analysis by the Council on Geostrategy says the framing of NQPF “suggests that, while scientific and technological innovation is essential, [China recognises there] needs also to be deeper reforms of the…economic model”.

Chinese president Xi Jinping inspects a forest farm in Mohe in the Dahinggan Mountains, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province on 6 September 2023.
Chinese president Xi Jinping inspects a forest farm in Mohe in the Dahinggan Mountains, northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province on 6 September 2023. Credit: Yin Bogu / Alamy Stock Photo

Priority areas for reform include the market-based economy; state owned enterprises (SOE); and China’s fiscal, household registration and healthcare systems.

These economic reforms, driven both by “the government’s ‘visible hand’ and the market’s ‘invisible hand’”, are necessary for China’s continuous prosperity, according to the Xinhua Institute, a thinktank affiliated with state news agency Xinhua.

The institute links NQPF with Marxism, arguing this is in line with improving “means of production” – an important force in Marxist theory for production, reform and human development. 

Most official explanations of the concept are relatively broad and unspecific. However, low-carbon development is one of the few named priorities. 

Back to top

How significant is this for low-carbon development? 

NQPF will provide an “important support for green development”, according to a commentary in the Communist party-affiliated People’s Daily, which was reposted on the website of China’s National Energy Administration

“Protecting the ecological environment is to protect productivity and improving the ecological environment is to develop productivity,” it adds.

Some analysis takes this further. Prof Zhang Yunfei, from the Marxism studies department at Renmin University in Beijing and researcher at its National Institute of Development and Strategy, tells the government-affiliated newspaper China Environment News that NQPF represents a development model specific to China.

This contrasts with “traditional productive forces in Western societies”, or “black productivity” (黑色生产力), which saw “high consumption of resources and energy, and high pollution of the ecological environment”, he says.

Instead, NQPF signifies “green productivity”, which will help China “shift from conforming to leading globalisation, and promote the country’s healthy and green development”.

“Green productivity”, Zhang adds, is sustainable productivity that focuses both on increasingly productive “ecologicalisation” (生态化) and increasingly ecological productive forces driving wider development. 

These forces are fundamentally provided by and rooted in nature, he explains. Driving forces include “sustainable resources such as information”, a “new generation of workers” that understand the concept of ecological civilisation and an enhanced “level of sustainable development” based on “green science and technology”.

Back to top

Why is the concept important?

This concept of NQPF is a holistic approach “designed to address complex, interrelated challenges faced by China and to create a more resilient and dynamic economy that will bring long-term prosperity”, Dr Muyi Yang, senior electricity policy analyst for China from the thinktank Ember, tells Carbon Brief. 

Arthur Kroeber, founding partner and head of research at research firm Gavekal Dragonomics, tells Carbon Brief that NQPF is “the latest iteration of a long-running trend towards industrial policy, technology and intensive growth”.

This is “essentially a new bottle for old wine”, Kroeber adds. “I think what it does do is emphasise the point that there is a national mission” to build China into a technological superpower.

“It is a big deal”, Bill Bishop, author of the Sinocism newsletter, told Bloomberg, as Xi “putting a stamp” on the idea will “send a powerful signal” to stakeholders across the system.

The idea addresses specific anxieties facing China’s leadership. As well as supporting economic growth, some argue that strengthening the country’s ability to innovate provides China with a greater sense of security. 

Workers inspect battery products at a lithium battery factory in Tangshan, China.
Workers inspect battery products at a lithium battery factory in Tangshan, China. Credit: Yang Shiyao / Alamy Stock Photo

According to the Chinese Communist party’s leading theoretical journal Qiushi, for example, Xi believes that China is “still reliant on others for some core technologies…our industry is still not strong enough in spite of its size and falls short of excellence…and we face significant pressure in making the transition to green and low-carbon production modes”. 

Prof Yao Yang, liberal arts chair professor at the China Center for Economic Research and the National School of Development at Peking University in Beijing, echoes this, writing in a comment for China Daily that the “significance” of the concept is the overarching aim of “laying a solid foundation for the future of the Chinese economy”.

Kroeber tells Carbon Brief that this is also driven, in part, by historical parallels between China’s fear of being cut off from US technological advancements and the rupture with the Soviet Union in the Mao era. He says:

“After the Sino-Soviet split, Soviet advisors who went [to China] to help build steel plants and develop the petrochemical industry, for example, all left. China was left [to develop its economy] on its own…Xi Jinping has drawn a specific connection [to that].”

Back to top

What does this mean for China’s low-carbon technology industries?

A primary aim of NQPF is to expand “strategic emerging industries” and “nurture future industries”, Deng Zhou, associate research fellow at the Institute of Industrial Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, writes in the state-run newspaper China Daily

“Strategic industries” include “new energy”, “new energy vehicles” and “energy conservation and environmental protection”. Recent analysis for Carbon Brief found that “clean energy” sectors contributed 11.4tn yuan ($1.6tn) to China’s economy in 2023.

“Future industries”, according to a policy document issued in January, include nuclear energy, nuclear fusion, hydrogen, biomass, crystalline silicon solar cells, thin-film solar cells and new energy storage such as batteries, among other areas.

These are “implied to be the major sectoral targets” for the NQPF, according to Kroeber.

In his January speech, Xi said that successful deployment of NQPF requires “accelerating green science and technology innovation…promoting application of advanced green technology…strengthening the green manufacturing industry…growing the green energy industry…[and] developing green and low-carbon industrial and supply chains”.

Much of this will be driven by state-coordinated efforts. China Daily says that efforts to cultivate NQPF “will encourage its centrally administered state-owned enterprises [SOEs] to deploy more resources toward developing strategic emerging industries”.

Kroeber believes that this will lead to “national resources [being] mobilised through a ‘new national system’ (新型举国体制)”.

He tells Carbon Brief that the system is an attempt to “create better coordination mechanisms” between the central and local governments in order to better achieve policy goals, such as through research consortiums focused on technological innovations.

This is inspired by the success of China’s electric vehicle (EV) industry, which benefited both from significant state support and from the emergence of innovative and intensely competitive businesses.

Several commentaries and articles highlight EVs as a key example of NQPF working in practice.

Wang Yiming, vice chairman of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges and former vice minister of the Development Research Center of the State Council, wrote in the state-sponsored Guangming Daily that “the rapid development of China’s EVs is a vivid case of NQPF, formed by the deep transformation and upgrading of industry”.

Using innovation to foster leading expertise across different industries, China hopes, will allow the country to replicate its achievements in the EV sector in other industries.

For example, a blog post on Yuyuan Tantian, a WeChat account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV, draws a link between China’s experience in manufacturing LCD televisions and its later success in developing solar technologies, which require similar manufacturing technologies and processes.   

Prof Zhang tells China Environment News:

“New quality productive forces are not simply a process of transformation from old productivity to new productivity…It is a qualitative leap in productivity based on the achievements of the new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, which is characterised by green, intelligent and ubiquitous (绿色、智能、泛在) trends.”

Back to top

What are the concerns over NQPF? 

China’s use of state resources to support strategically important industries, such as EVs, has recently fuelled anxieties about “overcapacity” in some countries.

Both the US and the EU have imposed tariffs on China-made EV imports. The EU’s tariff rate for individual automakers is based on the amount of state subsidies, including R&D grants, that the bloc determined those companies to have received. 

There are also concerns around overcapacity domestically. A March Reuters article quoted an anonymous Chinese policy adviser saying: “The direction of promoting tech innovation is right, but my worry is how to achieve it – what path and what institutional mechanisms should we rely on?”

To a point, these concerns are also shared by the leadership. In an article translated by the Pekingology newsletter, Han Wenxiu, a top economic policy planner, cautioned against “campaign-style” implementation of NQPF policies that lead to “neglecting or abandoning traditional industries”, as well as “blind conformity and bubbles”.

Some analysts have linked NQPF to a broader push for faster economic growth and challenges tackling “deep-seated difficulties” in economic reform, which has led to a “lack of more radical action on consumption”.

Michael Pettis, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, is quoted by the Financial Times saying that “the exit strategy has to be, at the end of the day, consumption – there’s no point producing all this stuff if no one’s going to buy it”. 

But given current tensions with the US, Kroeber tells Carbon Brief, China “can’t rely on imports of technology in the same way…It must have an all-of-nation effort to develop its own alternatives for the technologies it used to import.”

France's President Emmanuel Macron, Chinese President Xi Jinping and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on 6 May 2024.
France’s President Emmanuel Macron, Chinese President Xi Jinping and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on 6 May 2024. Credit: Eliot Blondet / Alamy Stock Photo

In his view, efforts to foster NQPF “could” lead to the creation of more capacity – although he finds concerns around overcapacity to be overly “politicised”.

He says that any spikes in capacity may be “unintentional” as “the Europeans and Chinese are actually starting discussions on [resolving concerns around] EVs”.

Yang tells Carbon Brief that “innovative technologies are often not commercially viable and struggle to compete with mature technologies in the market”, highlighting the need for government support to make the EV industry viable. He adds:

“The world needs to achieve rapid and deep decarbonisation within a very short timeframe. The market often drives incremental change. But what is required now is more radical, fundamental change.”

Back to top

Will NQPF translate into concrete climate policy?

At a press conference on 24 June, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) announced that it will release a ‘1+N’ policy on NQPF, which will “promote the accelerated development of NQPF” and “thicken” the “green-ness” of high-quality development (​​厚植高质量发展的绿色底色).

This followed an article in Qiushi by MEE minister Huang Runqiu and party secretary Sun Jinlong, who wrote that “ecology is itself the economy – if you protect ecology, ecology will give you returns”.

The ‘1+N’ framework is well-established in Chinese environmental policymaking, forming the basis for China’s climate policy. 

It refers to “1” policy setting overarching objectives, which guides numerous (“N”) action plans and policy measures that include more concrete targets.

The MEE said that NQPF “can help promote the significant decline of pollutants and carbon emissions, and radically improve the quality of the ecological environment”.

An article on 'green productive forces' by MEE minister Huang Runqiu and party secretary Sun Jinlong.
An article on ‘green productive forces’ by MEE minister Huang Runqiu and party secretary Sun Jinlong. Source: Qiushi

On 11 July, it released one of the first “N” policies in the system – regulations to update “management of ecological environment zoning control”.

Analysis by consulting firm Trivium China questions whether this “will directly contribute” to development of NQPF, but adds that it could signal the MEE “leveraging” the concept to “push through reforms that might otherwise be stymied” by other stakeholders.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) announced on 17 July that it will establish a centre for promoting NQPF. This may improve MOST’s “autonomy” in policy planning for science and technology innovation, an analyst told finance newspaper 21st Century Business Herald

Kroeber says that “every document the government comes out with now has to have some reference to NQPF. It’s just a way for bureaucrats to say ‘we have heard the signal [from Beijing] and we are pursuing [those goals]’”.

He adds that one area in which China may issue more concrete policies is power market reform.

China has been trying to “introduce more competition” into its power market to address a range of challenges inherent to the old grid system, including increasing the share of renewable power in overall power generation. 

It is “an area where this idea of coordination and the state playing a more leading role in getting everyone to move together” is crucial, Kroeber says, given the importance of access to abundant, low-cost electricity to power development of more technology.

Seeing further progress “would be the litmus test of whether the government is pursuing its aims [around NQPF] in an effective way”, he adds.

However, Yang tells Carbon Brief that while NQPF “has theoretical underpinnings, it is far from being purely conceptual”.

He says: “I believe more actions in various sectors will come soon to translate it into concrete initiatives and programs.” 

The post Q&A: What China’s push for ‘new quality productive forces’ means for climate action appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Q&A: What China’s push for ‘new quality productive forces’ means for climate action

Continue Reading

Climate Change

Night Skies and Shifting Stars: How Indigenous Celestial Knowledge Tracks a Changing Climate

Published

on

When the land no longer answers the stars the way it once did, Indigenous peoples are among the first to notice — and the first to ask why.

A Sky Full of Knowledge

Look up on a clear night on Turtle Island and you’re seeing a sky that has guided human life for thousands of years. Across Indigenous nations in Canada, detailed systems of celestial knowledge developed not as abstract science but as living, practical guides —telling people when to plant, when to harvest, when herds would move, and when ice would come. This astronomical knowledge was woven into language, ceremony, and everyday life, passed down through generations with remarkable precision.

The Mi’kmaq and the Celestial Bear

Among the Mi’kmaq of Atlantic Canada, star stories are ecological calendars, precise and functional. The story of Muin and the Seven Bird Hunters connects the annual movement of what Western astronomy calls Ursa Major to the seasonal cycle of hunting and harvest: the bear rises in spring, is hunted through summer, and falls to earth in autumn. This knowledge was brought to broader public attention in 2009 during the International Year of Astronomy, when Mi’kmaq Elders Lillian Marshall of Potlotek First Nation and Murdena Marshall of Eskasoni First Nation shared the story through an animated film produced at Cape Breton University narrated in English, French, and Mi’kmaq.¹ The story encodes specific observations about when and where to hunt, and which species to expect at which time of year. It is science in narrative form.

The Anishinaabe and the Seasonal Star Map

Among the Anishinaabe peoples of the Great Lakes and northern Ontario, celestial knowledge forms part of a comprehensive seasonal understanding. Knowledge keepers like Michael Wassegijig Price of Wikwemikong First Nation have described how Anishinaabe constellations  quite different from those of Western astronomy connect the movement of the heavens to naming ceremonies, seasonal gatherings, and land practices.² The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada now offers planispheres featuring Indigenous constellations from Cree, Ojibwe, and Dakota sky traditions, recognizing their value as both cultural heritage and ecological knowledge systems.³

When the Stars and the Land Fall Out of Rhythm

Here’s the challenge that climate change has introduced: the stars still move on their ancient, reliable schedule. But the land no longer always responds as expected. Migratory birds that once arrived when certain constellations appeared are now showing up earlier or later. Ice that once formed in predictable windows is forming weeks late, or not at all. Berry harvests, fish runs, animal migrations, all once timed by celestial cues accumulated over millennia are shifting. Indigenous knowledge holders across Canada describe this as a kind of dissonance: the sky remains faithful, but the land has changed.⁴

Long-Baseline Ecological Records

Far from being historical curiosity, Indigenous celestial knowledge systems are now being recognized by researchers as long-baseline ecological calendars —records of how nature behaved over centuries, encoded in story and ceremony. When an Elder observes that a particular star rising no longer predicts the arrival of certain geese, that observation represents a departure from a pattern that may have held true for hundreds of years. The Climate Atlas of Canada integrates Indigenous knowledge observations alongside western climate data, recognizing that both contribute meaningfully to understanding ecological change.⁵

Keeping the Knowledge Alive

Language revitalization and land-based education programs are helping ensure this knowledge reaches the future. From youth astronomy nights on-reserve to the integration of Indigenous sky stories in school curricula, there is growing recognition that these knowledge systems belong to what comes next, not only what came before. As Canada grapples with accelerating ecological change, the quiet precision of thousands of years of skyward observation offers something no satellite can fully replicate: a continuous record of the relationship between the cosmos and a living land.

Blog by Rye Karonhiowanen Barberstock

Image Credit: Dustin Bowdige, Unsplash

References 

[1] Marshall, L., Marshall, M., Harris, P., & Bartlett, C. (2010). Muin and the Seven Bird Hunters: A Mi’kmaw Night Sky Story. Cape Breton University Press. See also: Integrative Science, CBU. (2009). Background on the Making of the Muin Video for IYA2009. http://www.integrativescience.ca/uploads/activities/BACKGROUND-making-video-Muin-Seven-Bird-Hunters-IYA-binder.pdf

[2] Price, M.W. (Various). Anishinaabe celestial knowledge. Wikwemikong First Nation. Referenced in: Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Indigenous Astronomy resources.

[3] Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. (2020). Indigenous Skies planisphere series. RASC. https://www.rasc.ca/indigenous-skies

[4] Neilson, H. (2022, December 11). The night sky over Mi’kmaki: A Q&A with astronomer Hilding Neilson. CBC News. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/hilding-neilson-indigenizing-astronomy-1.6679072

[5] Climate Atlas of Canada. (2024). Prairie Climate Centre, University of Winnipeg. https://climateatlas.ca/

The post Night Skies and Shifting Stars: How Indigenous Celestial Knowledge Tracks a Changing Climate appeared first on Indigenous Climate Hub.

https://indigenousclimatehub.ca/2026/04/night-skies-and-shifting-stars-how-indigenous-celestial-knowledge-tracks-a-changing-climate/

Continue Reading

Climate Change

World ‘will not see significant return to coal’ in 2026 – despite Iran crisis

Published

on

A much-discussed “return to coal” by some countries in the wake of the Iran war is likely to be far more limited than thought, amounting to a global rise of no more than 1.8% in coal power output this year.

The new analysis by thinktank Ember, shared exclusively with Carbon Brief, is a “worst-case” scenario and the reality could be even lower.

Separate data shows that, to date, there has been no “return to coal” in 2026.

While some countries, such as Japan, Pakistan and the Philippines, have responded to disrupted gas supplies with plans to increase their coal use, the new analysis shows that these actions will likely result in a “small rise” at most.

In fact, the decline of coal power in some countries and the potential for global electricity demand growth to slow down could mean coal generation continues falling this year.

Experts tell Carbon Brief that “the big story isn’t about a coal comeback” and any increase in coal use is “merely masking a longer-term structural decline”.

Instead, they say clean-energy projects are emerging as more appealing investments during the fossil-fuel driven energy crisis.

‘Return to coal’

The conflict following the US-Israeli attacks on Iran has disrupted global gas supplies, particularly after Iran blocked the strait of Hormuz, a key chokepoint in the Persian Gulf.

A fifth of the world’s liquified natural gas (LNG) is normally shipped through this region, mainly supplying Asian countries. The blockage in this supply route means there is now less gas available and the remaining supplies are more expensive.

(Note that while the strait usually carries a fifth of LNG trade, this amounts to a much smaller share of global gas supplies overall, with most gas being moved via pipelines.)

With gas supplies constrained and prices remaining well above pre-conflict levels, at least eight countries in Asia and Europe have announced plans to increase their coal-fired electricity generation, or to review or delay plans to phase out coal power.

These nations include Japan, South Korea, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Thailand, Pakistan, Germany and Italy. Many of these nations are major users of coal power.

Such announcements have triggered a wave of reporting by global media outlets and analysts about a “return to coal”. Some have lamented a trend that is “incompatible with climate imperatives”, while others have even framed this as a positive development that illustrates coal’s return “from the dead”.

This mirrors a trend seen after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which many commentators said would lead to a surge in European coal use, due to disrupted gas supplies from Russia. 

In fact, despite a spike in 2022, EU coal use has returned to its “terminal decline” and reached a historic low in 2025.

Gas to coal

So far, the evidence suggests that there has been no return to coal in 2026.

Analysis by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air found that, in March, coal power generation remained flat globally and a fall in gas-fired generation was “offset by large increases in solar and wind power, rather than coal”.

However, as some governments only announced their coal plans towards the end of March, these figures may not capture their impact.

To get a sense of what that impact could be, Ember assessed the impact of coal policy changes and market responses across 16 countries, plus the 27 member states of the EU, which together accounted for 95% of total coal power generation in 2025.

For each country, the analysis considers a maximum “worst-case” scenario for switching from gas to coal power in the face of high gas prices.

It also considers the potential for any out-of-service coal power plants to return and for there to be delays in previously expected closures as a result of the response to the energy crisis.

Ember concludes that these factors could increase coal use by 175 terawatt hours (TWh), or 1.8%, in 2026 compared to 2025.

(This increase is measured relative to what would have happened without the energy crisis and does not account for wider trends in electricity generation from coal, which could see demand decline overall. Last year, coal power dropped by 63TWh, or 0.6%.)

Roughly three-quarters of the global effect in the Ember analysis is from potential gas-to-coal switching in China and the EU.

Other notable increases could come from switching in India and Indonesia and – to a lesser extent – from coal-policy shifts in South Korea, Bangladesh and Pakistan.

However, widely reported policy changes by Japan, Thailand and the Philippines are estimated to have very little, if any, impact on coal-power generation in 2026. The table below briefly summarises the potential for and reasoning behind the estimated increases in coal generation in each country in 2026.

Dave Jones, chief analyst at Ember, stresses that the 1.8% figure is an upper estimate, telling Carbon Brief:

“This would only happen if gas prices remained very high for the rest of the year and if there were sufficient coal stocks at power plants. The real risk of higher coal burn in 2026 comes not from coal units returning…but rather from pockets of gas-to-coal switching by existing power plants, primarily in China and the EU.”

Moreover, Jones says there is a real chance that global coal power could continue falling over the course of this year, partly driven by the energy crisis. He explains:

“If the energy crisis starts to dent electricity demand growth, coal generation – as well as gas generation – might actually be lower than before the crisis.”

‘Structural decline’

Energy experts tell Carbon Brief that Ember’s analysis aligns with their own assessments of the state of coal power.

Coal already had lower operation costs than gas before the energy crisis. This means that coal power plants were already being run at high levels in coal-dependent Asian economies that also use imported LNG to generate electricity. As such, they have limited potential to cut their need for LNG by further increasing coal generation.

Christine Shearer, who manages the global coal plant tracker at Global Energy Monitor, tells Carbon Brief that, in the EU, there is a shrinking pool of countries where gas-to-coal switching is possible:

“In Europe, coal fleets are smaller, older and increasingly uneconomic, while wind, solar and storage are becoming more competitive and widespread.”

In the context of the energy crisis, Italy has announced plans to delay its coal phaseout from 2025 to 2038. This plan, dismissed by the ECCO thinktank as “ineffective and costly”, would have minimal impact given coal only provides around 1% of the country’s power. 

Notably, experts say that there is no evidence of the kind of structural “return to coal” that would spark concerns about countries’ climate goals. There have been no new coal plants announced in recent weeks.

Suzie Marshall, a policy advisor working on the “coal-to-clean transition” at E3G, tells Carbon Brief:

“We’re seeing possible delayed retirements and higher utilisation [of existing coal plants], as understandable emergency measures to keep the lights on, but not investment in new coal projects…Any short-term increase in coal consumption that we may see in response to this ongoing energy crisis is merely masking a longer-term structural decline.”

With cost-competitive solar, wind and batteries given a boost over fossil fuels by the energy crisis, there have been numerous announcements about new renewable energy projects since the start of war, including from India, Japan and Indonesia

Shearer says that, rather than a “sustained coal comeback” in 2026, the Iran war “strengthens the case for renewables”. She says:

“If anything, a second gas shock in less than five years strengthens the case for renewables as the more secure long-term path.”

Jones says that Ember expects “little change in overall fossil generation, but with a small rise in coal and a fall in gas” in 2026. He adds:

“This would maximise gas-to-coal switching globally outside of the US, leaving no possibility for further switching in future years. Therefore, the big story isn’t about a coal comeback. It’s about how the relative economics of renewables, compared to fossil fuels, have been given a superboost by the crisis.”

The post World ‘will not see significant return to coal’ in 2026 – despite Iran crisis appeared first on Carbon Brief.

World ‘will not see significant return to coal’ in 2026 – despite Iran crisis

Continue Reading

Climate Change

Disaster Declarations Ripple Through South Texas Amid Water Crisis

Published

on

Small towns around Corpus Christi worry where they’ll fall on the pecking order if the region’s water runs out.

At least six small cities and towns in the Coastal Bend region of Texas issued disaster declarations in the last two weeks, begging not to be forgotten amid a spiraling water crisis.

Disaster Declarations Ripple Through South Texas Amid Water Crisis

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2022 BreakingClimateChange.com