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In two weeks the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow would have started.
– This year would have been a very important year for the fight against climate change. During COP26 in Glasgow, the world’s governments were expected to declare faster emission reductions, more ambitious national contributions, etc., says Marina Andrijevic.
He is an economist and doctoral student at Humboldt University and the Climate Analytics organization in Berlin, where he studies socio-economics and climate change. At this time, under normal circumstances, she and her colleagues would be fully occupied with the final preparations for COP26. Instead, the corona pandemic arrived and the climate summit in Glasgow was postponed for a year.
– Now governments are concerned about something that none of us could have foreseen: a very serious health crisis in almost every country in the world, which is also linked to a very serious economic recession. Our way of recovering from this economic crisis will have very important consequences for the fight against climate change, says Marina Andrijevic.
During spring she and her colleagues began comparing how the world handles the corona crisis and the climate crisis.
– We soon realized how governments around the world rushed to introduce stimulus packages, first to tackle the crisis in the health sector and help individuals and households and stabilize employment. But in the long run, governments naturally want to strengthen and revive the economy. And this is a good moment, a kind of critical moment, in which we have to choose what development we want.
By the end of August, the world had invested a total of $ 12.2 billion in crisis aid as a result of the pandemic, according to estimates published by Marina Andrijevic and her staff in Science magazine on Thursday. The United States accounts for a quarter of the money and is therefore the single country that has invested the most, while total financial support from the EU is higher. 80% of the total amount comes from OECD countries.
– It shows how governments act when they take a crisis seriously, says Marina Andrijevic.
Stimulus packages correspond to almost 15 percent of world gross domestic product.
– When the governments of the world now allocate billions of dollars, we wanted to compare the sums with the investments that would be necessary to eliminate carbon dioxide emissions from energy systems. That is the most important thing any economy must do to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement.
According to the 2015 Paris Agreement By the end of the century, warming should remain well below two degrees above the average temperature before industrialization begins, with a view to one and a half degrees. The energy investments required to achieve the most ambitious goal, 1.5 degrees, are only 10 percent of total stimulus packages, according to the researchers’ Science paper.
– Coping with the climate crisis is often presented as very expensive. Here we can, first of all, show that it is not very expensive at all, especially when taking a crisis seriously, says Marina Andrijevic.
In the short term, crisis packages will of course be used for urgent problems, such as saving people’s health care and livelihoods.
– But we see that there will be a lot of room in the stimulus packages for direct capital investments, but also for guarantees, as it already does in Sweden, so that investments in low-carbon energy sources are less risky. It is very important to make them more economically attractive.
If the money is invested correctly In this way, they can both jump-start the economy after the pandemic and solve the climate crisis.
Governments can use this to achieve other goals, such as increasing employment, stimulating innovation, accelerating the development of various technologies, etc. So, all investments that give us a secure future can go in the same direction, says Marina Andrijevic.
Do you think this will happen?
– I hope so, and that is the purpose of our article. If there’s one thing we’ve learned this year, it’s that good leadership, quick action, and listening to scientific advice is a pretty good recipe for dealing with a crisis.
But there are important differences between the two crises.
– Now, during the pandemic, countries have mostly turned inward and cared about their own national interests. To stop climate change, we must look beyond borders and have stronger international collaborations. Just as governments have different conditions and capacities to deal with the crown crisis, their capacity and also their responsibility to deal with climate change also differ, says Marina Andrijevic.
There are significant regional differences in the ability of countries to cope with the crown crisis and in the investments they must make to have more climate-friendly energy systems.
– It becomes especially clear when we look at the relative share of the countries’ economies. For example, the United States and the European Union have set aside the largest amount of funds for post-pandemic recovery. But if you look at their GDP, they have relatively the least need for new energy investments to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement. At the same time, emerging economies like India have so far provided less money for economic recovery after the crown crisis. But higher relative investments are needed, in terms of GDP, to be able to provide its population with reliable and clean energy at an affordable price. That imbalance really underscores the importance of international cooperation.
The IPCC, the Green Climate Fund and other institutions that facilitate cooperation and investment, transfers, loan guarantees and direct financial support are already in operation.
– We do not need to reinvent the wheel and invent new concepts about how we should cooperate internationally. International cooperation is, of course, a buzzword, but it is certainly the key to stopping climate change. It must be our common goal, to save the future of my generation and of future generations, at this crucial moment, says Marina Andrijevic.
That must be our most important lesson from the corona pandemic.
– We have difficult and painful experiences. Now we must not miss the opportunity that is offered to us and it will have far-reaching consequences when we restart world economies.
Marina Andrijevic
Photo: Franca Wohlt
