New EU fuel efficiency rules are forcing truck makers into a race to get their low emission vehicles onto the roads. From 2025, newly registered trucks must have 15% lower emissions, and from 2030 it’s 30%. Battery-electric drivetrains are most likely to dominate, assisted in their evolution by the assured progress and charging infrastructure of EVs. Hydrogen fuel cells and synthetic fuels are also in the game, though hindered by the inevitable … [Read more...]
The Energy Charter Treaty makes the transition easier. Don’t scrap it, reform it
Energy and climate experts as well as national and EU parliamentarians are lining up to press their governments to withdraw from the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) if insufficient progress is made in its modernisation. Their main argument is that it gives protection to fossil investments in a world where policies are changing in order to constrain or phase them out. Here, Frank Umbach at EUCERS sternly warns against abandoning the ECT. The treaty … [Read more...]
New net-zero pledges from China, US, EU and others can meet our climate goals, says UNEP. But…
Existing national commitments imply that today’s emissions will simply plateau, remaining only slightly below 2019 levels by 2030. However, according to the latest UN Environment Programme (UNEP) emissions gap report, the new commitments from China, the EU, Japan, South Korea, the UK, Joe Biden’s US and others are “broadly consistent” with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C goal for 2050. But commitments aren’t policy, warns UNEP, and only real change … [Read more...]
Coastal town Grande-Synthe took France to court over missed climate targets. How, why and what happens next
Taking your own government to court is an indispensable tool for sticking to our climate goals, says Lucien Chabason at the IDDRI. In November, the French State Council (Conseil d'État) gave an interim judgment largely favourable to the municipality/commune of Grande-Synthe following the government's implicit refusal to take additional measures to comply with the Paris Climate Agreement. Grande-Synthe sits on the coast by Dunkirk and is at … [Read more...]
A beginner’s guide to European climate laws
Confused by the range of EU and national climate laws? The EU-ETS, the Effort-Sharing Regulation, the Renewable Energy Directive, the Energy Efficiency Directive, the Clean Energy for all Europeans Package, LULUCF, and more? Which are the important ones? Who exactly is making policy, and how? What are the real world effects? Julian Wettengel at Clean Energy Wire has asked experts to improve our understanding by answering a list of questions on … [Read more...]
How can Europe help build China’s Hydrogen economy?
On 18th November Energy Post, in partnership with the EU-China Energy Cooperation Platform, hosted a series of online workshops under the theme “China: Carbon Neutral by 2060”. The purpose was to understand the Chinese landscape and uncover opportunities for Europe. Here, the moderator for our “Hydrogen” panel, Gökçe Mete, summarises the workshop which included an expert panel discussion and questions from the audience. Taking part were Tudor … [Read more...]
IEA’s “accelerated case” becoming the norm? Global Wind + Solar to overtake Gas and Coal by 2024
The IEA’s 2019 “accelerated case” for renewables is turning into this year’s “main case”. It predicts that Wind and Solar capacity combined will overtake both Gas and Coal globally by 2024. Josh Gabbatiss at Carbon Brief summarises the IEA’s Renewables 2020 report. Within five years, renewables will constitute 1/3 of all electricity generation, equivalent to the combined demand of China and the EU. Virtually all global growth in electricity … [Read more...]
Battery innovation must drive the 50-fold increase in storage capacity needed by 2040
The IEA has set the storage sector a challenge. It says the world will need 10,000 GW-hours of batteries and other forms of energy storage by 2040, a 50-fold increase on today. The good news is that a joint study by the European Patent Office and the IEA reveals electricity storage patenting activity has grown 14% a year over the past decade. Here the IEA summarises the findings of its comprehensive report. It explains that Japan and Korea lead, … [Read more...]
Europe has enough Gas infrastructure. Why build more?
In early November a first vote is expected in the European Parliament on the Recovery & Resilience Facility’s €672.5bn budget. Esther Bollendorff at CAN Europe runs through the arguments against providing any funding for new gas infrastructure. She presents evidence to show that the EU is already oversupplied with gas import capacity, and all new fossil gas transmission projects have been rejected by the market since 2017. Solar and wind … [Read more...]
Europe’s Deep Buildings Renovations need to quadruple
The European Green Deal must grasp the opportunity to kick-start buildings renovations, says Thibaud Voïta at the IFRI Center for Energy & Climate, summarising his report “The Renovation Wave: A Make or Break for the European Green Deal”. A lot of European buildings are old, and progress is slow. Stiffer regulations have helped, and household energy efficiency has risen by 30% since 2000. But the number of deep building renovations completed … [Read more...]
The energy transition needs some of the $12tn global Covid stimulus. But much less than you think
Governments worldwide have committed over $12tn to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic, spent over the next 5 years. Current estimates say the energy transition needs $1.4tn/year globally between 2020 and 2024 to get us on the path to meet the 1.5oC Paris goal. Clearly, there is an opportunity here. Although support for healthcare systems and the overall economy are the stated priority of governments, much of that $12tn is still not committed. … [Read more...]
China’s new net zero emissions target for 2060: why now, and how?
China’s promise of peak emissions before 2030 and net zero by 2060 is a major and welcome step for the economic (and fossil fuel) powerhouse. Better still, the rest of the world doesn’t need to make concessions to get China to stick to the new target, says John Seaman at the IFRI Centre for Energy & Climate. That’s because an energy transition is in China’s interests. It wants and needs to be at the forefront of new energy technologies to … [Read more...]
Net Zero by 2050 technically and economically achievable, says Energy Transitions Commission report
Making Mission Possible, the latest report by the Energy Transitions Commission, describes a net-zero world by mid-century as technically and economically possible. The solutions are already available or close to being brought to market. What is still missing is the will to embrace, rapidly and at scale, the inevitable disruption that will ultimately deliver net-zero emissions, lower air pollution, cheaper energy bills, create new jobs and raise … [Read more...]
Gas oversupply and clean energy’s rise: now is the time to fast-track gas market reforms
Traditional monopolistic and oligopolistic gas markets artificially keep gas prices high, work against competition and efficiency, and have no place in the modern world, say Jean-Baptiste Dubreuil, Gergely Molnar and Songho Jeon at the IEA. They calculate that gas market reforms in the EU, begun in the mid 1990s, saved the bloc $15bn in 2019. But it typically takes 20 years for such a market to be properly established. The authors explain that … [Read more...]
The Energy Charter Treaty needs updating, but remains a valuable tool for the transition
Last Thursday we published this critique of the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT). Created in the 1990s, the ECT was designed to protect cross-border energy investments from political risk. Critics now say it is being used to protect fossil fuel investments in a world committed to phasing them out. Today, Andrei Belyi of energy consulting firm Balesene OU and Adjunct Professor in Energy Law and Policy at the University of Eastern Finland, who was named … [Read more...]
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