Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the global power sector grew just 0.2% in the first six months of 2023, with rapidly rising wind and solar outpacing sluggish demand growth.
Emissions from electricity generation would have fallen, but droughts forced countries to increase fossil fuel use to cover declines in hydropower.
The findings come from a new report by thinktank Ember, covering 78 countries and 92% of global electricity demand in the first half of 2023.
The report shows that global electricity demand growth and the expansion of low-carbon supplies remain delicately balanced, with ongoing droughts putting a question mark over Ember’s earlier prediction of a decline in fossil-fueled power in 2023.
While expanded wind and solar capacity met a record 14.3% of global electricity demand in the first half of this year, up from 12.8% a year earlier, hydro generation fell by 8.5%.
With a small rise in fossil-fueled power helping to make up for the drop from hydro, emissions from the sector plateaued rather than declining, despite weak electricity demand growth.
The expansion of low-carbon electricity supplies overall remains insufficient to put the world on track for limiting warming to 1.5C, according to Ember’s report.
Solar topples records
Global wind and solar generation continued to increase across the first six months of 2023, according to Ember.
The amount of electricity generated by solar and wind rose to 1,930 terawatt hours (TWh), up 12% from 1,717TWh during the first half of 2022. This accounted for 14.3% of global electricity generation overall, of which 5.5% came from solar and 8.8% came from wind.
In percentage terms, both sources grew more slowly than in the same period last year. For example, wind output grew 10% in the first half of 2023 compared to 16% in the same period last year. Solar grew 16%, compared to 26% in the first half of 2022.
Such levels of growth are below what is needed to limit warming to 1.5C under the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) net-zero emissions by 2050 scenario, which requires a yearly average growth of 17% for wind and 24% for solar up to 2050, Ember notes.
Similarly, in absolute terms, the growth in wind and solar generation was below the levels seen in 2022. Solar grew by 104TWh, down from 132TWh in the same period last year. Wind increased by 109TWh, compared to 147TWh in the same period last year.
Some 50 countries set new monthly records for solar generation in the first half of 2023, Ember says. This includes 24 of the EU’s 27 members seeing new solar highs as of June.
China, meanwhile, generated 50TWh (6.4% of its electricity) from solar in June 2023, up by 9.7TWh (+25%) on the previous June. This means China’s solar generation in one month would be enough to power New Zealand, Qatar or Hungary for a whole year.
Records were also broken in the US, Mexico, Brazil and Chile, among many others in the Americas, Ember says. As shown in the below chart, where the light green line shows solar trending above 2022 generation levels (dark green line) across a range of countries worldwide.
Having peaked in 2020, wind capacity additions have trended downwards over the past few years, according to Ember. In 2020, 111 gigawatts (GW) of capacity were installed worldwide, in 2021 it was 92GW and in 2022 it was 73GW.
Wind generation growth has similarly slowed, with the largest increase in history (+268TWh) in 2021. This then decreased to +251TWh in 2022, and 109TWh in the first half of 2023.
As with solar, China is surging ahead on wind, being responsible for 91% of global growth in generation in the first half of this year, according to Ember.
China saw a 26% growth in wind generation in the first half of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. In contrast, wind generation in the EU grew by just 4.8% and in Japan by 2.4%, from an already low baseline, the report notes.
Together, wind and solar generation increased by 213TWh in the first six months of 2023. This increase was much larger than the growth in global electricity demand of 59TWh. However, with hydro output falling dramatically due to drought (see below), there was still a small increase in fossil fuel use and emissions..
Without the increase from wind and solar, global power sector emissions would have risen by 154m tonnes of CO2 (MtCO2, 2.6%), instead of the 12MtCO2 (0.2%) actually seen, according to Ember.
Hydropower drops by record amount
In the first six months of 2023, global hydropower generation fell by 8.5% (-177TWh), according to Ember. Hydro generated 1,898TWh of electricity, some 14% of the global total in the first half of the year, in comparison with 2,074TWh (15%) in the same period of 2022.
The decrease in hydropower generation was caused by droughts, which Ember says were likely exacerbated by climate change. The fall in the six months to June (dark blue) was larger than any decline recorded across a full year in the last two decades, as shown in the chart below.
This was most notable in China, which accounted for around three-quarters of the fall.
China is home to nearly a third of the world’s hydropower generation (30% in 2022).
This year, the country’s hydropower sector was hit by summer droughts for the third consecutive year, as reported by Carbon Brief’s China Briefing.
In July, China’s National Bureau of Statistics announced that hydropower output fell by nearly 23% in the first half of 2023 – the largest drop among all electricity sources.
Similarly, the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air recorded a “collapse” in output in the month of June, down 34% year-on-year. It attributed this to “drought and pressure to save water for generation during peak demand season in July–August”.
Ember’s analysis found that China’s hydropower “capacity factor” fell to 30.5% in the first six half of 2023, ten percentage points below the first half of 2022 and the lowest value since at least 2015.
Beyond China, the global capacity factor for hydropower generation fell to 35.6%, nearly four percentage points lower than in the first half of 2022. Across the last decade, the average global hydropower capacity factor was 40.9%, notes Ember.
According to the IEA’s electricity market report, the capacity factor of global hydropower has been a declining trend over the last decade. It has fallen from an average of 38% in 1990-2016, to about 36% in 2020-2022.
This 2% difference means installed hydropower is producing about 240TWh less electricity than it would have produced had the capacity factor stayed the same as it was a decade ago, the IEA report notes.
It adds:
“As a result, an amount of energy as large as Spain’s annual electricity consumption needs to be produced by other dispatchable sources of power, which is currently supplied mainly by fossil-fired generation.”
Currently, 2023 is likely to set a record for the lowest global hydropower capacity factor in recorded history, if conditions fail to substantially improve, Ember adds.
Fossil fuel generation increased to meet the shortfall created by low hydropower rates. If hydropower generation had matched its rate in 2022, power sector emissions would have fallen by 2.9%, Ember says.
Ember suggests that the way hydropower capacity has been hit in the first six months of 2023 is a “warning shot” about how the technology could negatively affect the speed of the electricity transition, given its susceptibility to climate change.
In a statement, Malgorzata Wiatros-Motyka, senior electricity analyst at Ember, says:
“It’s still hanging in the balance if 2023 will see a fall in power sector emissions. While it is encouraging to see the remarkable growth of wind and solar energy, we can’t ignore the stark reality of adverse hydro conditions intensified by climate change. The world is teetering at the peak of power sector emissions, and we now need to unleash the momentum for a rapid decline in fossil fuels by securing a global agreement to triple renewables capacity this decade.”
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) sixth assessment report states that by 2080, climate conditions could affect hydropower generation by between +5% and -5%, under a high emissions scenario. However, it said the expected impact varies significantly depending on the region.
Demand drops in major economies
Across the first six months of 2023, global demand for electricity grew by just 0.4%, according to Ember.
This is much lower than the average annual growth rate between 2012 and 2022, which sat at 2.6%.
Major economies saw falls in demand, including Japan (-5.6%), the EU (-4.6%), the US (-3.4%) and South Korea (-1.4%), leading to a decline in their fossil fuel use for electricity.
This fall in demand in high income economies was due to a number of reasons, according to Ember. In the EU, for example, this continued a trend that began in March 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine.
Policy measures designed to reduce demand amid the wider energy crisis and concerns over the security of gas, falling output from energy intensive industries, mild winter weather, and reduced personal use due to the cost of living crisis, all contributed.
Mild weather and slower economic activity also drove electricity demand reductions in the US and Japan, Ember says.
Meanwhile, India saw lower-than-expected demand growth in the first six months of 2023, according to the report, rising 3.1% compared to 10.7% in the same period last year. This was lower than the average growth seen from 2012-22 (5.4%).
In China, electricity demand increased by 6%, which is in line with the China Electricity Council’s national estimates, Ember notes, and the historic average for 2012-22 (+5.9%). This reflects China’s rebound from Covid lockdowns in 2022 as well as heatwaves during May and June.
Demand growth is unlikely to continue at such a slow level globally in the future, especially in mature economies that are looking to electrify key sectors such as transport and heating to decarbonise, the report notes.
Electricity demand is set to continue increasing in rapidly-growing economies, including China and India, as they continue to advance their economies and boost electricity access.
Emissions plateau
Thanks to the increase in solar and wind power generation – and despite the drop in hydro output – global power sector emissions plateaued over the first half of 2023, according to Ember. It says the increase from wind and solar avoided 142MtCO2 of emissions.
Globally, the power sector emitted 5,795MtCO2 in the six months of 2023, up just 12MtCO2 (0.2%) from the same period in 2022. This continued a downwards trend that had been seen in the power sector prior to 2021, as seen in the chart below.
Falls in power-sector emissions were seen in the EU (-17%), Japan (-12%), US (-8.6%) and South Korea (-3%), largely as a result of falls in coal generation.
Emissions growth slowed in India, Ember says, where there was a 3.7% increase in the first half of 2023, down from 9.7% a year earlier.
However, Ember’s report notes that current progress falls short of what would be needed to keep warming below 1.5C, stating:
“Power-sector emissions need to be falling fast this decade, not just plateauing. Moreover, having falling emissions when demand is exceptionally low is not enough; emissions must be falling even when global demand is increasing as the world consumes more electricity and moves towards electrifying the entire economy.”
In economies where emissions rose, this was due to an increase in fossil fuel generation.
Globally, fossil-fueled power reached 8,100TWh in the first half of 2023, accounting for 59.9% of global generation overall. This was an increase of 9TWh (0.1%) from a year earlier..
Coal generation increased by 1% (47TWh) and gas generation by 0.5% (14TWh), however other fossil fuel (mainly oil) generation fell 15% (-52TWh).
The changes varied significantly at regional and country level. For example, in China, coal generation increased by 203TWh (8%) in the first half of 2023. This was largely due to the hydropower deficit (129TWh) and contributed to China’s emissions for its power sector rising by 7.9% (173MtCO2).
Without the need to meet the hydropower deficit, China’s coal generation would only have risen by 74TWh (2.9%), according to Ember. This would have been enough to turn the observed 47TWh rise in global coal generation into a fall of 82TWh.
Meanwhile, in the EU, fossil generation fell to its lowest since at least 2000 in the first half of 2023, at 410TWh.
The fall was Europe-wide, with 11 countries seeing a decline of at least 20% and five a decline of more than 30% (Portugal, Austria, Bulgaria, Estonia and Finland), as detailed in an earlier report from Ember, covered by Carbon Brief.
Coal generation in the bloc fell 23% (-49TWh), in contrast to the global rise of 1%.
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World’s electricity supply close to ‘peak emissions’ due to growth of wind and solar
Climate Change
COP30 Bulletin Day 8: Draft decision draws battle lines on fossil fuel transition, finance and trade
Hopeful that countries can agree on a Belém “political package” by tomorrow when President Lula comes to town, Brazil’s COP30 presidency has drawn up the first draft of a text intended to form the backbone of a deal.
The “Mutirão” decision – which the summit’s hosts insist is not a cover text – delves into the four big issues that, although not formally on the agenda, have dominated the discussions in the humid Amazon city: emissions-cutting ambition, country’s climate plans, finance and trade.
The draft contains a menu of options reflecting a wide range of positions on the thorniest issues at stake, exposing the divisions between governments and the strong diplomatic push still needed to get an agreement over the line.
David Waskow, director of the international climate initiative at the World Resources Institute, said each bundle of options on the key topics contains both stronger and weaker elements, and countries now face a clear choice. They can get behind “the stronger elements and really reinforce the more ambitious potential outcomes or move in a weaker direction and water down what they come away with from Belém,” he added.
Mutirão decision for COP30 seen weak on fossil fuel roadmap
On efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, a decision could encourage countries to build on the landmark COP28 agreement and convene a roundtable aimed at supporting countries to develop “just, orderly and equitable transition roadmaps”, including on reducing dependency on fuels and stopping deforestation. That appears to refer to domestic blueprints and stops short of advocating for a global roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels which more than 80 countries are now calling for.
A second option, which analysts described as weaker, only invites countries to share opportunities and “success stories” on the transition towards “low carbon solutions”. There is a third option for no text.
The transition away from fossil fuels gets another mention in the section on how to respond to a shortfall in ambition in countries’ new national climate plans (NDCs) submitted this year.
Africa wants wiggle room on energy transition as funds fall short
The first option would see the creation of an annual forum to consider the UN’s official review of emission-cutting targets, known as a “synthesis report”, with the goal of “accelerating action” around the three energy-related outcomes agreed at COP28 in Dubai: tripling renewable energy capacity, doubling energy efficiency and transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems. All of those objectives are currently lagging behind.
Another option in the draft Mutirão” decision would instead see the establishment of a “Global Implementation Accelerator”, a voluntary initiative overseen by this year’s and next year’s COP presidencies to accelerate the implementation of commitments and support countries in turning NDC promises into action.
Under a third option, the COP30 and COP31 presidencies would coordinate the creation of a “Belem Roadmap to 1.5”, identifying ways to put the world back on track towards reaching the most ambitious temperature goal of the Paris Accord – which the UN has conceded will inevitably be breached, at least temporarily. The presidencies would produce a report summarising their work by COP31 next November.
Cosima Cassel, programme lead at UK think-tank E3G, said the current options should not be mutually exclusive and a strong outcome would include a combination of an annual stocktake on filling the ambition gap and a roadmap to wean the world off fossil fuels.
“For that to happen, the presidency will need to work hard to ensure the finance and adaptation package is robust enough to support enhanced NDCs,” she added.
Finance remains wide open, adaptation in focus
On adaptation finance, the draft text includes a proposal to triple the support provided by wealthy nations to help developing countries strengthen their resilience to climate impacts.
The language could be interpreted in two ways: either as a new standalone target of delivering an additional $120 billion per year by 2030, as proposed by the Least Developed Countries (LDC) group, or as a sub-target within the broader £300 billion annual climate-finance goal agreed last year – something likely to be more acceptable to developed countries with shrinking aid budgets.
There is also a weaker option that only goes as far as acknowledging the need to “dramatically scale up adaptation finance” and provide public and grant-based resources that do not come with strings attached or costly repayments.
After climate memo row, Gates gives $1.4bn to help farmers cope with a hotter world
On wider finance issues, the document features a sweep of options. There is the possibility of creating a three-year work programme and “legally-binding plan” on the implementation of Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement, which requires rich nations to stump up cash for climate action in the developing world. That is something most developing countries have been calling for, but is highly unlikely to fly with industrialised nations.
Another option would see countries draw up four different roadmaps, including one aimed at building on the recommendations in the recently published Baku to Belém Roadmap, which charted a path to mobilise $1.3 trillion in annual climate finance for developing countries by 2035.
There is also an option for no text on finance.
Finding ways to talk about trade and climate
Proposals to tackle concerns over trade also feature prominently for the first time in a draft COP decision, after emerging economies like China and India led a pushback against climate-related mechanisms like the EU’s carbon border adjustment.
Li Shuo, director of the China Climate Hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute, said the final deal would need to include both a political message calling for an “open, free and fair” trading environment and the definition of a process with next steps to achieve that.
The draft includes a variety of options on both fronts. On the implementation front, the text suggests that the COP30 and COP31 presidencies could organise workshops examining the links between trade and climate. It also raises the option of launching a new dialogue or platform at next year’s mid-year session in Bonn and at COP31 to further discuss trade-related issues.
Another alternative is for a UN summit and an annual dialogue “on the importance of an open and supportive international economic system in the context of sustainable development and poverty eradication”.
Li added that trade is expected to be one of the “pillar stones” of the COP30 outcome, but discussions are still very “open-ended” at this stage, and a lot more work needs to be done to find compromises over the coming days.
COP31 – Australia bid losing steam?
After a year-long standoff between Turkey and Australia bidding for the hosting rights for next year’s COP31, Aussie prime minister Anthony Albanese showed the first signs of backing down today, saying that a stalemate would “not send a good signal”.
Speaking at an event in Perth, Albanese said “if Turkey is chosen, we wouldn’t seek to veto that”, The Guardian reported.
COP’s host rotates every year by region, with next year belonging to the group of “West Europe and Others” – which includes Australia and Turkey. If no agreement is reached by the group, the conference would be held in Bonn, at UN Climate Change headquarters, under the standing Brazilian presidency.
Albanese said defaulting the venue to Bonn would send the wrong signal “about the unity that’s needed for the world to act on climate”. Environment minister Chris Bowen has said he wants to bring world leaders to Adelaide, in collaboration with Pacific countries.
A majority of voting countries in the group are supporting Australia’s bid, but Turkey has not withdrawn its bid with just a few days left until the end of COP30 – the deadline for choosing the next host city. COP32’s host, on the other hand, was settled last week, with Ethiopia winning the bid to host the 2027 conference in its capital Addis Ababa.
Pope keeps faith in 1.5C
The United Nations may have accepted that overshooting 1.5C of warming – at least temporarily – is inevitable – but God’s representative on Earth didn’t get the memo.
The new pope, Leo XIV, sent a video message to cardinals from the Global South gathered at the Amazonian Museum in Belém on Monday evening, saying “there is still time to keep the rise in global temperature below 1.5°C” although, he warned, “the window is closing.”
“As stewards of God’s creation, we are called to act swiftly, with faith and prophecy, to protect the gift he entrusted to us,” he said, reading from a sheet of paper in front of a portrait of the Vatican.
And he defended the 10-year-old Paris Agreement, saying it has ”driven real progress and remains our strongest tool for protecting people and the planet.” “It is not the Agreement that is failing – we are failing in our response,” he said. In particular, the American Pope pointed to “the political will of some.”
“We walk alongside scientists, leaders and pastors of every nation and creed. We are guardians of creation, not rivals for its spoils. Let us send a clear global signal together: nations standing in unwavering solidarity behind the Paris Agreement and behind climate cooperation,” he emphasised.
UN climate chief Simon Stiell welcomed the message, adding that the Pope’s words “challenge us to keep choosing hope and action, honouring our shared humanity and standing with communities all around the world already crying out in floods, droughts, storms and relentless heat”.
War’s carbon footprint grows but stays off the books
During the Leaders’ Summit that happened just before COP, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva referred to ongoing conflicts around the world, saying that “spending twice as much on weapons as we do on climate action is paving the way for climate apocalypse”. “There will be no energy security in a world at war,” he added.
But COP30’s schedule doesn’t appear to reflect his concerns, as there’s no mention of any peace initiative on the official schedule and no thematic day for peace, a marked difference from COP28 and COP29, when Baku called for a global truce for the summit’s duration. It didn’t produce the desired result.
And yet discussions about militarism and what it is costing the planet have not been absent from the COP30 halls. The first week saw the publication of ‘Accounting for the uncounted: The global climate impact of military activities’, an analysis by a group of civil society organisations and the University of Warwick that showed how global armed forces produce 5.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions.
If counted as a country, they would be the fourth-biggest emitter, topped only by the US, China and India – and producing more emissions than the continent of Africa.
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COP30 Bulletin Day 5: COP30 could greenlight work on a fossil fuel transition roadmap
At the climate talks in Belém, governments are considering whether to launch a process to craft a roadmap and how that might look -
COP30 Bulletin Day 6: First week ends with a colourful march and much work left to do
UN climate chief Simon Stiell tells governments “to give a little to get a lot”, as many thorny issues remain for ministers to resolve next week -
COP30 Bulletin Day 7: Brazil sets out options to agree a Belém package
The COP30 presidency signposts how governments could land a political decision covering climate finance, trade measures and the emissions cuts needed to limit warming to 1.5C
Ellie Kinney, senior climate advocacy officer with the Conflict and Environment Observatory (CEOBS), one of the organisations behind the report, explained that, while the Paris Agreement made military emissions reporting voluntary, few countries fully comply.
China and the US, the world’s two biggest military spenders, have ceased their partial reporting on them altogether: the US has not sent its annual report to UNFCCC this year, and China said its military emissions are “not occurring”.
Yet the research findings are alarming: the Russia-Ukraine conflict has produced 237 million tonnes of CO₂ over three years, while the Gaza conflict has already surpassed the combined annual emissions of Costa Rica and Estonia. The Afghanistan war was responsible for a staggering 400 million tonnes CO₂, and the EU’s rearmament could lock in 200 million tonnes of CO₂ mainly through the production and transportation of weapons, an activity that uses steel and aluminium, which are very carbon-intensive to produce.
Ana Toni, COP30’s CEO, said back in March that countries that increase their military budgets should also increase their climate spending or face more wars in the future. “Wars come and go. Unfortunately, climate change is there for a long time,” she added.
The European Parliament used its annual COP resolution this year to call on the defence sector to help tackle climate change by cutting its emissions intensity and urged EU decision-makers to formulate a proposal to increase the transparency of military emissions accounting to the UNFCCC.
Campaigners want military emissions reporting to be mandatory, especially after 2024 – the first calendar year to surpass the 1.5C temperature goal and, with 56 wars involving 92 nations, the year with the highest number of active conflicts since WWII.
“We can’t have this future where defence comes at the cost of climate action,” Kinney of CEOBS said. “Military security is not the only security – climate action is part of our collective security, too.”
The post COP30 Bulletin Day 8: Draft decision draws battle lines on fossil fuel transition, finance and trade appeared first on Climate Home News.
COP30 Bulletin Day 8: Draft decision draws battle lines on fossil fuel transition, finance and trade
The United Nations may have accepted that overshooting 1.5C of warming – at least temporarily – is inevitable – but God’s representative on Earth didn’t get the memo.
The new pope, Leo XIV, sent a video message to cardinals from the Global South gathered at the Amazonian Museum in Belém last night, saying “there is still time to keep the rise in global temperature below 1.5°C” although, he warned, “the window is closing.”
“As stewards of God’s creation, we are called to act swiftly, with faith and prophecy, to protect the gift he entrusted to us,” he said, reading from a sheet of paper in front of a portrait of the Vatican.
And he defended the 10-year-old Paris Agreement, saying it has ”driven real progress and remains our strongest tool for protecting people and the planet.” “It is not the Agreement that is failing – we are failing in our response,” he said In particular, the American Pope pointed to“the political will of some.”
“We walk alongside scientists, leaders and pastors of every nation and creed. We are guardians of creation, not rivals for its spoils. Let us send a clear global signal together: nations standing in unwavering solidarity behind the Paris Agreement and behind climate cooperation,” he emphasised.
UN climate chief Simon Stiell welcomed the message, adding that the Pope’s words “challenge us to keep choosing hope and action, honouring our shared humanity and standing with communities all around the world already crying out in floods, droughts, storms and relentless heat”.
The post COP Bulletin Day 8: Pope keeps faith in 1.5C appeared first on Climate Home News.
I pause to write this letter in the middle of week one of the 30th UNFCCC Conference of the Parties — the big international climate conference, the space for multilateral decision making to save ourselves from ourselves and rein in the climate crisis. Day two photos showed that a torrential downpour left the blue zone entrance flooded. Mother Nature is present and making her anger known.
This morning I also saw the announcement of Time Magazine’s 100 Climate leaders for 2025. At the top of the list I found the Global Head of Climate Advisory for JP Morgan Chase, Sarah Kapnick. I shook my head, thinking perhaps I was still asleep, and refocused. There it was indeed.
JPMorgan Chase is the world’s largest financier of fossil fuels, having provided over $382 billion since the Paris Agreement, with $53.5 billion in 2024 alone. The bank faces criticism from scientists and activists for its continued large-scale investments, particularly in fossil fuel expansion. How does a person who works for such an institution end up being lauded as a hero working to resolve the climate crisis?
Last week the Guardian released a report from Kick Big Polluters Out showing that over the past four years fossil fuel lobbyists have gained access to negotiation spaces at COP. The roughly 5,350 lobbyists mingling with world leaders and climate negotiators in recent years worked for at least 859 fossil fuel organizations including trade groups, foundations and 180 oil, gas and coal companies involved in every part of the supply chain from exploration and production to distribution and equipment. There are more fossil fuel lobbyists and executives in negotiations than delegates representing the most climate vulnerable countries on the planet.
We’ve known since the late 1800s that greenhouse gas emissions warm the planet. In 1902 a Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius calculated that burning fossil fuels will, over time, lead to a hotter Earth. But the fossil fuel industry followed Big Tobacco’s playbook and despite knowing the truth, waged a multi-decade, multibillion dollar disinformation, propaganda and lobbying campaign to delay climate action by confusing the public and policymakers about the climate crisis and its solutions. See this report from Climate Action Against Disinformation and the Exxon funded think tanks to spread climate change denial in Latin America.
They’ve infiltrated our K-12 classrooms. The Oklahoma Energy Resources Board, a state agency funded by oil and gas producers, has spent upwards of $40m over the past two decades on providing education with a pro-industry bent, including hundreds of pages of curriculums, a speaker series and an after-school program — all at no cost to educators of children from kindergarten to high school. In Ohio students learn about the beauty of fracking. Even Scholastic, a brand trusted by parents and educators, has attached its seal of approval to pro fossil fuel materials. Discovery Education has also embedded pro oil propaganda into its science and stem free resources.
There is no just transition, no possible way to keep our global temperatures to the limit agreed to in Paris ten years ago without a fast and fair phase out of fossil fuels. We know this is possible, during the first half of 2025, renewables generated more electricity than coal. As UN General Secretary António Guterres said in his opening remarks in Belem, “We’ve never been better equipped to fight back… we just lack political courage.”
Next year, I hope that TIME’s Climate 100 is a list of indigenous climate activists from around the world, whose leadership has led us to find the political courage Guterres spoke of, the courage to do the right thing and phase out fossil fuels forever.
Susan Phillips
Executive Director
Photo by Andrea DiCenzo
The post A fast, fair, full, and funded fossil fuel phaseout appeared first on Climate Generation.
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