Scott Morrison tells Cop26 Australia to surpass 2030 target to push back criticism | Australia News

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Scott Morrison used his national statement at Cop26 to point out that Australia will likely surpass its 2030 emissions reduction target in an attempt to blunt international criticism of his government’s lack of climate ambition.

While preparations for the Glasgow summit have been dominated by Morrison’s negotiations with the National Party to secure net zero commitment by 2050, the UN-led event is focused on ambition for the 2030s.

Australia – which is part of a bloc of big emitters and exporters at last weekend’s G20 summit in Rome trying to water down the final communiqué’s commitments to phase out coal – has been criticized for not having increased its ambition during the critical decade.

Morrison used his remarks at the Glasgow conference to tell his peers that Australia had submitted a new nationally determined contribution, noting that Australia’s emissions “would fall by 35% by 2030, exceeding by far from our commitment from Paris ”.

For 2030, the new NDC states: “Australia reaffirms its ambitious economic goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 26-28% below 2005 levels by 2030, and will exceed it by up to 9. percentage points ”.

“Australia’s emissions projections for 2021 show that we are on track to reduce emissions by up to 35% from 2005 levels by 2030,” he said.

The updated NDC also said Australia would adopt an economy-wide net zero emissions target by 2050 “covering all sectors and gases included in Australia’s national inventory”.

Ahead of Cop26, under pressure from key allies, including summit host Boris Johnson – Morrison has attempted to increase Australia’s Abbott-era 2030 target to something more in line with projections updates, which indicate that a 35% reduction is possible.

But this effort was opposed by the national party. The agreement to adopt net zero has also fallen by the wayside.

While a number of leaders have used their opening contributions to the Glasgow summit to issue stark warnings about the existential risks associated with failing to mitigate the risks of runaway global warming, Morrison struck an optimistic note. .

In statements to the conference on Monday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said optimistic assessments of progress in tackling the climate crisis were “an illusion” as the British Prime Minister compared the position current world to a James Bond storyline. movie.

Boris Johnson said a common plot device in spy thrillers was 007 “attached to an apocalyptic device, desperately trying to figure out which colored wire to pull to turn it off as a red digital clock rings without remorse. a detonation that will end human life as we know it.

“And we’re pretty much in the same position, my fellow world leaders, as James Bond today, except the tragedy is that it’s not a movie and the apocalyptic device is real.”

But Morrison said there were “reasons to be optimistic.” Eighteen months ago, the Australian Prime Minister told leaders the world “is looking into the abyss of a one in a hundred year pandemic”.

“The vaccines we would need had not only not been invented, but there had never been a vaccine against a coronavirus,” the prime minister said. “But here we are. Billions of people vaccinated and the world is getting back what Covid has taken from us.

“The challenge of tackling climate change will be met in the same way, and it will be met by those who are largely not in this room.

“It will be our scientists, technologists, engineers, entrepreneurs, industrialists and financiers who will chart this path to net zero – and it is up to us, as leaders, to support them.”

Hopes that the Glasgow summit will result in more ambitious commitments were dampened by the failure of the G20 countries to reach consensus on key commitments in Rome last weekend.

The Rome summit – held as a groundbreaking event for Glasgow – ended with a statement that did not include a firm commitment to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050, and only had a vague commitment to “phase out investment in new coal-fired power plants relentlessly.” production capacity… as soon as possible ”.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is not attending the Glasgow conference. In a written statement to the cop, China – the world’s largest emitter – called on developed countries to “provide support to help developing countries do better.”

According to a text of his statement released by the Xinhua News Agency, the Chinese president stressed the responsibility of developed countries in the fight against climate change, saying that they should not only do more themselves, but also bring a support to help developing countries do better.

China has not made any significant new commitments. India is now committed to achieving a goal of net zero emissions by 2070.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled five pledges on Monday. The country will increase its non-fossil energy capacity to 500 GW by 2030 and derive half of its energy from renewable resources by the same date.

Modi said India would cut its planned carbon emissions by one billion tonnes by 2030 and reduce the carbon intensity of its economy by 45%.

US President Joe Biden told the conference that the world has only a limited window to deal with the climate crisis. He said his country was “back to the table” of international climate action and intended to lead by example.

Biden’s decision to bring the United States back to the Paris agreement spurred a series of ambitious climate commitments from other world leaders earlier in 2021. But he is struggling to secure legislative approval for his political program in his country.

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