- Details
- Written by: Glenn and Rick
- Category: Economic & Corporate
- Hits: 97
Oil companies and governments have pledged to slash methane emissions in recent years, but so far have little to show for it. Emissions of this potent greenhouse gas by the fossil fuel industry continued to climb in 2022, the International Energy Agency said Tuesday. The group condemned the oil and gas industry for failing to address this problem even as it saw record profits last year, driven up by a tighter energy market following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The technology needed to eliminate most methane emissions already exists and would require spending only a tiny percentage of those profits to deploy, the agency said. “Methane cuts are among the cheapest options to limit near-term global warming,” Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, or IEA, said in a statement outlining the findings. “There is just no excuse.” About one-third of the global warming to date can be attributed to methane emissions. Many human activities are to blame, including agriculture and all the rotting waste people throw out. But in the U.S., energy production is the biggest culprit, according to the IEA. Methane, the main component in natural gas, leaks into the atmosphere accidentally and is also intentionally released during the production and transport of fossil fuels. The IEA estimates that the global energy industry released nearly 135 million metric tons of methane in 2022, which is higher than the previous year and only slightly below the record seen in 2019. Methane traps nearly 90 times as much heat as carbon dioxide during its first 20 years in the atmosphere. The good news is it breaks down within decades. That means curbing its release could slow global warming in the short term while the world moves beyond fossil fuels. Fortunately, 75 percent of energy-related methane emissions can be eliminated with readily available technologies, the IEA said Tuesday, at a cost of about $100 billion. That’s less than 3 percent of the profits that oil and gas companies earned last year, the group pointed out. https://grist.org/energy/big-oil-record-2022-profits-methane-emissions-iea/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=beacon
- Details
- Written by: Glenn and Rick
- Category: Economic & Corporate
- Hits: 79
China and SE Asia- Climate adaptation may bring China $8.1bn investment opportunities by 2030 Jiang Xueqing, China DailyChina Daily writes that the “estimated minimum climate adaptation investment required by 2030 in a 1.5C warming scenario is $8.1bn (54.4bn yuan) for China”, citing a study recently issued by the bank Standard Chartered. The study says that China is one of the markets that is “less at risk of climate damage under the 1.5C warming scenario, explaining its relatively low requirement for adaptation investment as a proportion of GDP”, the state-run newspaper adds. The study continues that China’s economic strength and “historically strong” investment in climate adaptation “drives an economic benefit of $14 for every one dollar invested – one of the highest in the study”. The estimated minimum climate adaptation investment required by 2030 in a 1.5 C warming scenario is $8.1 billion (54.4 billion yuan) for China, said a study report recently issued by Standard Chartered. The study examines the need for adaptation investment in 10 developing markets – Bangladesh, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria, Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates and Vietnam – and explores the current appetite for this particular type of investment among global banks, asset managers and investors. These markets are among those where action is critical, either because of their size and contribution to global or regional economies, or because of their greater risk of exposure to negative climate effects, the report said. India ranked top among the 10 markets in terms of the estimated minimum adaptation investment required by 2030 in the 1.5 C warming scenario, with the figure reaching $10.6 billion, which was followed secondly by China. Indonesia came in third place with $4 billion. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/
- Details
- Written by: Glenn and Rick
- Category: Economic & Corporate
- Hits: 83
Exxon privately Predicted Global Warming Correctly only to then Spend Decades Denying it to Protect its Core Business,rectly and skilfully” only to then spend decades publicly rubbishing such science in order to protect its core business, new research has found. A trove of internal documents and research papers has previously established that Exxon knew of the dangers of global heating from at least the 1970s, with other oil industry bodies knowing of the risk even earlier, from around the 1950s. They forcefully and successfully mobilized against the science to stymie any action to reduce fossil fuel use.A new study, however, has made clear that Exxon’s scientists were uncannily accurate in their projections from the 1970s onwards, predicting an upward curve of global temperatures and carbon dioxide emissions that is close to matching what actually occurred as the world heated up at a pace not seen in millions of years. Exxon scientists predicted there would be global heating of about 0.2C a decade due to the emissions of planet-heating gases from the burning of oil, coal and other fossil fuels. The new analysis, published in Science, finds that Exxon’s science was highly adept and the “projections were also consistent with, and at least as skillful as, those of independent academic and government models”. Geoffrey Supran, whose previous research of historical industry documents helped shed light on what Exxon and other oil firms knew, said it was “breathtaking” to see Exxon’s projections line up so closely with what subsequently happened. “This really does sum up what Exxon knew, years before many of us were born,” said Supran, who led the analysis conducted by researchers from Harvard University and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. “We now have the smoking gun showing that they accurately predicted warming years before they started attacking the science. These graphs confirm the complicity of what Exxon knew and how they misled.” The analysis found that Exxon correctly rejected the idea the world was headed for an imminent ice age, which was a possibility mooted in the 1970s, instead predicting that the planet was facing a “carbon dioxide induced ‘super-interglacial’”. Company scientists also found that global heating was human-influenced and would be detected around the year 2000, and they predicted the “carbon budget” for holding the warming below 2C above pre-industrial times. Armed with this knowledge, Exxon embarked upon a lengthy campaign to downplay or discredit what its own scientists had confirmed. As recently as 2013, Rex Tillerson, then chief executive of the oil company, said that the climate models were “not competent” and that “there are uncertainties” over the impact of burning fossil fuels. https://www.theguardian.com/
- Details
- Written by: Glenn and Rick
- Category: Economic & Corporate
- Hits: 110
AND THE CORPORATIONS WILL STOP AT NOTHING TO ACHIEVE THEIR AIMS! HOW THE ENVIRONMENTAL LAWYER WHO WON A MASSIVE JUDGMENT AGAINST CHEVRON LOST EVERYTHING. Steven Donziger won a multibillion-dollar judgment against Chevron in Ecuador. The company sued him in New York, and now he’s under house arrest.Tim Hirschel-Burns is a second-year student at Yale Law School is a member of Law Students for Climate Accountability, found out about Donziger’s house arrest in an article that ran in The Intercept in January 2020. “I remember reading that and thinking this can’t be true,” he said. But his research into the case confirmed that Chevron and Gibson Dunn had personally targeted the lawyer after Donziger’s team won in Ecuadorian court. “I found it wild that Chevron could withdraw its assets from Ecuador and not pay anything.”Now he and others in the group are launching a campaign to get law students around the country to renounce Gibson Dunn for its representation of Chevron in Ecuador and in the litigation against Donziger, as well as for its larger role in the climate crisis. “Gibson Dunn does fossil fuel work on a ton of extremely objectionable projects,” said Hirschel-Burns, who pointed to the law firm’s work on 18 legal cases in which they represent climate polluters or clients who otherwise exacerbate climate change, such as Dakota Access LLC, the company behind the Dakota Access pipeline. The Chevron case may be most devastating for the plaintiffs in the Amazon, who never received their judgment despite being left with hundreds of unlined waste pits and contaminated water and soil from millions of gallons of spilled crude oil and billions of gallons of dumped toxic waste. Everything that’s happened to Donziger “is small potatoes compared to the fact that a US court has rendered the damage the company actually did as totally irrelevant,” said Nesson. But the latest twists and turns in the Chevron case may also be particularly bad news for climate activists. A mere 20 companies are responsible for a third of the greenhouse gases emitted in the modern era; Chevron ranks second only to Saudi Aramco among them. And it’s increasingly clear that addressing the climate crisis will require confronting these mega-emitters, whose resources for litigation dwarf that of any individual https://theintercept.com/
- Details
- Written by: Glenn and Rick
- Category: Economic & Corporate
- Hits: 101
Doughnut Design for Business to function within Ecological Boundaries - DEAL’s guide to redesigning businesses through Doughnut Economics.......Core workshop- tool overview......This tool sets out how businesses can engage with Doughnut Economics. Built for use by workshop facilitators, it guides businesses through an action-oriented workshop that is practical but ambitious, and aimed at catalysing innovations in their deep design . By focusing on the deep design of business, the workshop invites companies to engage in a transformative agenda of becoming regenerative and distributive in their strategies, operations, and impacts, so that they help to bring humanity into the Doughnut........Central to the tool is the concept of enterprise design. This is explored through five design layers: a company’s Purpose, Networks, Governance, Ownership, and Finance........These design layers powerfully shape the strategic decisions and operational impacts of businesses, and ultimately determine whether or not businesses can transform to become part of a regenerative and distributive future. By diving into five layers of deep design, this tool reveals both design blockages that prevent transformative action, and design innovations that can unlock its possibility. You can view the tool here as Google Slides or download as a PDF here (or see Downloads section below). Paper.......The tool is accompanied by a paper, What Doughnut Economics Means for Business, which contains background context and further detail on the core concepts as well as additional examples of business design. The paper was co-authored by DEAL and Centre for Economic Transformation. To read the paper, click here or see the Downloads section below. Who it is for........The tool is for any facilitator of a workshop who is able to engage an individual business or group of businesses in exploring their deep design. The tool can be used by organisations or individuals who can gather multiple businesses for a workshop. It can also be used by those working within or with an individual business. The tool is designed to support workshops run by a broad range of people and organisations, including: business networks, start-up incubators, enterprise accelerators, think tanks, NGOs, certification organisations, business founders, trade unions, consultants, business schools, impact investors, community groups and thought-leaders and intrapreneurs within businesses. How long it takes........The duration for a workshop is suggested as 4-5 hours. It can be broken up into two or more sessions, and can also be extended to give additional time for the activities and related discussions. The format.......The workshop can be held in-person or online. Some workshops will bring together multiple companies, while others will bring together a group from within a single business. All activities across this tool can also be conducted in pairs or by an individual applying it to their own business. Some key considerations and options are offered at the end of the tool. Materials you needThe canvases that you need are provided both as printable pdfs and in an online Miro version (see Annex A towards the end of the slides). If you plan to hold the workshop in-person, you will additionally need a workshop space where you can share a presentation and work in groups, as well as basic workshop materials like sticky notes and pens. You can also run this workshop online, using video conferencing to present the slides and hold the discussions, alongside Miro to run the activities. What the facilitator needs to know......The key requirement is that the facilitator is enthusiastic and ambitious in exploring transformative ideas that challenge the possibilities of today’s business world, and is curious about the way that innovations in the deep design of business can unlock such ideas. This tool shouldn’t be used to provide specific advice to businesses, but instead used to support and facilitate their journey. It is useful, however, if the facilitator is aware of some existing alternative enterprise designs that are relevant to participating businesses (e.g. employee ownership, social enterprise, steward ownership). If you are a consultant or other organisation wanting to use this tool with your clients, make sure that you meet DEAL’s criteria (see DEAL’s policy for consultancies and professional advisors). DEAL's policy for business.......To balance openness with protecting the integrity of the concept of Doughnut Economics, DEAL has created a policy applying to businesses (including consultants in their work with business clients). This policy contains seven main principles......read more. Downloads
Doughnut & Enterprise Design - CET_DEAL paper V.1.0.pdf Doughnut Design for Business tool - Core version - 1.0.pdf
More Articles …
Page 11 of 13