TIGHTENING THE NET

  • Recently, a report (Tightening the Net) published by Oxfam International has said that announcing Net Zero Carbon Targets may be a dangerous distraction from the priority of cutting carbon emissions.
  • Many countries like New Zealand, UK, US, China and the European Union have set net-zero targets on greenhouse gas emissions to tackle climate change.
  • The report emphasises that reducing emissions cannot be considered a substitute for cutting emissions.
  • Oxfam International is a group of independent non-governmental organisations formed in 1995.

Important points:

  • Net-zero, also means carbon neutrality, is a state in which a country’s emissions are compensated by absorption and removal of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
  • It does not mean that a country would bring down its emissions to zero. That would be gross-zero, which means reaching a state where there are no emissions at all, a scenario hard to comprehend.
  • One way by which carbon can be absorbed is by creating carbon sinks. This way, it is even possible for a country to have negative emissions, if the absorption and removal exceed the actual emissions.
  • Until recently, the Amazon rainforests in South America, which are the largest tropical forests in the world, were carbon sinks. But eastern parts of these forests have started emitting CO2 instead of absorbing carbon emissions as a result of significant deforestation.
  • Bhutan has negative emissions, because it absorbs more than it emits.

Findings of the Report:

  • A very big area is needed to control energy sector emissions:
  • If the entire energy sector-whose emissions continue to soar- were to set similar ‘net-zero’ targets, it would require an area of land nearly the size of the Amazon rainforest, equivalent to a third of all farmland worldwide.
  • If the challenge of change is tackled only by way of planting more trees, then about 1.6 billion hectares of new forests would be required to remove the world’s excess carbon emissions by the year 2050.
  • Currently, countries’ plans to cut emissions will only lead to a 1% reduction by the year 2030.
  • Significantly, if only land-based methods (Forestation) to deal with climate change are used, food crises are expected to rise even more. Oxfam estimates that they could rise by 80% by the year 2050.
  • To limit global warming below 1.5°C and to prevent irreversible damage from climate change, the world needs to collectively be on track and should aim to cut emissions by 45% by 2030 from 2010 levels, “with the sharpest being made by the biggest emitters.”

Way Forward

Net zero should be a pathway to real and transformative climate action and not greenwash. Carbon emissions need to be reduced now, and land-based climate solutions must center ‘food-first’ approaches that help achieve both zero emissions and zero hunger.

SOURCE: THE HINDU,THE ECONOMIC TIMES,MINT

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