Creating Policies, Coalitions, and Actions for Global Sustainable Development

What Congress Needs to Know in the Lead Up to COP26: Briefing Series on the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Glasgow
Find out more about the briefings in this series below:
Part 1	Creating Policies, Coalitions, and Actions for Global Sustainable Development
Part 2	Momentum on Climate Adaptation
Part 3	The Role of International Climate Finance
Part 4	The Negotiations: What’s on the Table
Conclusion	Recap of COP26: Key Outcomes and What Comes Next

The Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) held a briefing that explored cross-cutting challenges—climate change, biodiversity loss, land degradation, and pollution—facing the United States and countries around the world, and how policymakers are finding and implementing solutions to these challenges.

This briefing kicked off EESI’s Congressional briefing series, What Congress Needs to Know in the Lead Up to COP26. For more information about the series, visit www.eesi.org/1021cop26. 

Distinguished Speakers:

Sir Robert Watson, lead author of the U.N. Environment Programme’s report Making Peace with Nature: A scientific blueprint to tackle the climate, biodiversity, and pollution emergencies, will discuss the current and projected changes in climate and biodiversity and share the range of solutions that emerge when these issues are considered together in policy design and implementation. He is the former chair of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) and former chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Former U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres will discuss the opportunity presented by the upcoming U.N. climate change conference (COP26) and will dive into ways governments and leaders can take meaningful action on climate change globally—an urgent need underscored by the findings of the Making Peace with Nature report. Ms. Figueres is a Founding Partner of Global Optimism, co-presenter of climate podcast Outrage + Optimism, and co-author of The Future We Choose: The Stubborn Optimist's Guide to the Climate Crisis.

This briefing was Co-moderated by Daniel Bresette, Executive Director, Environmental and Energy Study Institute, and Rosina Bierbaum, Professor, School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan; School of Public Policy, University of Maryland.

This briefing was part of a series made possible by our partnership with the Henry M. Jackson Foundation.

HIGHLIGHTS

Sir Robert Watson
Lead Author, United Nations Environment Programme Report: Making Peace with Nature: A Scientific Blueprint to Tackle the Climate, Biodiversity and Pollution Emergencies

• The extraction of natural resources and the generation of energy (predominantly from fossil fuels) has tripled over the last 50 years.
• Humans now have a major impact on three-quarters of land and two-thirds of ocean area. Near-natural land is projected to cover only 10 percent of total land area by 2050. 
• The release of chemicals from pesticides and fertilizers is increasing, causing human health problems and coastal dead zones. 
• Greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase, causing more extreme weather events and sea level rise that threaten humans and ecosystems. The world is already 1° Celsius warmer than it was a century ago.
• One million of the world’s estimated eight million plant and animal species are threatened with extinction. Climate change may become the greatest threat to biodiversity over the next few decades.
• Climate change, biodiversity, and land degradation are intertwined, so solutions need to be mutually supporting. These environmental issues are also economic, development, security, social, ethical, and moral issues.
• With 2° Celsius of warming, species are projected to lose over 50 percent of their climatically-determined geographic range.
• None of the international Aichi Biodiversity Targets [agreed by the countries that have signed the Convention on Biological Diversity] have been fully met; in some cases, the situation is worse than when the targets were set in 2010. The Post-2020 Biodiversity Framework, which is expected to be adopted at the Convention on Biological Diversity’s 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15), must agree on actions to conserve and restore biodiversity, not just targets and goals.
• Greenhouse gas emissions need to be reduced by 45 percent by 2030 and brought to net zero by 2050 to limit global warming to 1.5° Celsius. Emissions need to be reduced by 25 percent by 2030 and brought to net zero by 2070 to limit warming to 2° Celsius. We are currently on the pathway to a 3-4° Celsius warmer world. 
• Failure to restore biodiversity and address climate change will threaten the achievement of all the United Nations' sustainable development goals (SDGs) by, for example, weakening food and water security, adversely affecting development, and keeping people in poverty. 
• A sustainable future will require a fundamental change in the technological, economic, and social organization of society. Major shifts in investment and regulation are key to a just and informed transformation that overcomes inertia and opposition from vested interests.
• Meeting the Paris Agreement targets [of limiting global warming to well below 2° Celsius—preferably 1.5° C—compared to pre-industrial levels] will require reducing the demand for carbon-intensive activities, adopting low-carbon solutions, expanding low-carbon energy, and promoting sustainable land use. 
• The loss of biodiversity can only be reversed by providing space dedicated for nature while also addressing root problems such as changing land and sea use, over-exploitation, climate change, pollution, and invasive species.
• The food, water, and energy systems need to be integrated and transformed to meet growing human needs in an equitable, resilient, and environmentally friendly manner.
• Biodiversity, climate, and other environmental finance could be ramped up by redirecting subsidies currently afforded to fossil fuels, agriculture, fisheries, and transportation.
• Governments at all levels need to lead the way to transform economic systems toward sustainability and circularity by establishing carbon markets, shifting away from harmful subsidies, accounting for natural capital and environmental costs in decision-making, and investing in the transition to a sustainable future.
• United Nations agencies should facilitate international cooperation to address the climate, biodiversity, and pollution emergencies together.
• The finance sector needs to disclose climate-related financial risk and the use of natural resources, as well as the environmental impact of such use.

Christiana Figueres
Former Executive Secretary, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); Founding Partner, Global Optimism

• Floods continue to be the most common, destructive natural disaster. Hurricane Ida [the second-most damaging hurricane on record to hit Louisiana] shows that climate disasters all over the world are becoming more costly.
• Climate and biodiversity form the basis for all other human activities, so failure to address them will impede progress on all the United Nations' sustainable development goals (SDGs). 
• The unanimously adopted Paris Agreement says the world needs to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 and to halve current global emissions by 2030 to stand a chance of limiting warming to 1.5° Celsius. The world is currently at 1.1–1.2° Celsius of warming, set to reach 1.5° Celsius by as early as the next decade.
• Over 110 governments have submitted new or updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) as required by the Paris Agreement. [NDCs are national commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.] This translates to countries representing about 70 percent of global gross domestic product committed to a goal of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
  • However, most long-term targets do not currently incorporate much needed short-term targets such as 50 percent emission reductions by 2030, which is what science demands to keep below 1.5° Celsius of warming.
• There are signs of progress on climate action from outside of governments.
• Electric vehicle use is surging due to a combination of policy support, improvements in technology (especially batteries), and decrease in cost.
  • Fifteen countries and 31 cities and regions, including Norway, California, the United Kingdom, France, and Canada, plan to phase out internal combustion engines.
  • Electric vehicles already displace over one million barrels of oil demand per day.
  • Oil demand has peaked in all segments of road transportation except for commercial trucks, but green hydrogen trucks will help with the transition to clean transportation. 
• Renewable energy for new electric capacity is now cheaper than fossil fuels, not just than installed fossil fuels, but also than generating plants that have already paid for their investments. 
  • In the United States, wind energy capacity increased by 17 gigawatts in 2020, 85 percent more than the previous year’s increase. Solar energy capacity increased by 16 gigawatts, also breaking records. 
  • In the United States, renewable energy installation in 2020 was more than 50 percent higher than the previous record set in 2016. 
  • The increase in solar and wind farms around the world means that renewable energy will continue to get cheaper.
• In the financial sector, the 40 largest banks in the world, 70 major asset managers worth $32 trillion, the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance worth $6.6 trillion, and the Climate Pledge coalition have committed to net-zero investment portfolios, signaling a shift in the financial sector toward decarbonization to protect assets. 
• Not enough attention has been paid to biodiversity and land-based solutions, but they must go hand-in-hand with climate solutions.

Q&A

What role can nature-based solutions play in addressing climate change and biodiversity, while also enhancing health and livelihoods?

• Watson: They can play a significant role, but they are not a panacea. The first goal must still be to decarbonize our energy system in production and use. After that, nature-based solutions can be beneficial to address both climate change and biodiversity. The highest priority is conservation, so well-managed, well-designed, and climate-resilient protected areas can play a role. The key issue for land outside protected areas is restoration and reforestation with native species, not with monocultures. Large-scale use of monoculture plants can have unintended consequences like displacing native vegetation and deteriorating arable land and can have negative effects on biodiversity and on food and water security. Nature-based solutions must be put in a social context because they are place-based. From the beginning of the design of a nature-based solution, the implications for climate, biodiversity, and human well-being must be considered. 

What are the most important and feasible climate actions for the United States and other countries to implement that will have a significant impact on reducing emissions and addressing the interconnections between climate, biodiversity, and pollution?

• Watson: The first is transforming the economic system to get rid of the perverse subsidies in agriculture, forestry, and mining that undermine biodiversity and stimulate climate change. We then must use that money to fund sustainable activities in agriculture and energy. Individuals can also make a difference. We need to stop wasting food, water, and energy, and adopt more balanced, plant-based diets. The one thing I would do is transform the economic system to recognize the social and biophysical value of nature. 
• Figueres: The easiest way to transform the way we value goods and services is to put a price on pollution, which would help human health as well as planetary health. This is still a difficult conversation to have but putting a price on pollution is the most effective economic instrument we have that would lead to the transformations we are talking about. We had a price on pollution years ago through the international Clean Development Mechanism, but that market crashed. 

 What are the roles for levels of governance to work together to bring to a successful conclusion the climate change (UNFCCC COP26) and biodiversity (CBD COP15) Conferences of Parties?

• Figueres: Only national governments sit at the table and hold the pen at these conventions. Whatever they decide there is only the tip of the iceberg because the national government of any country is not directly responsible for meaningful levels of greenhouse gas emissions. National governments set the direction at the national level and identify what the tip of the iceberg is. Most of the implementation comes from other levels of governments such as states, cities, and provinces, and the business and investment sectors. Countries that are most effective at reducing their emissions have a clear alignment of policies, incentives, and regulations that go across the governance vertical.
• Watson: We need all actors to work together, so you need all levels of government and interactions with the finance community, the business sector, and non-governmental organizations. We need a new polycentric governance structure where all voices can be heard, but crucially where vested interests who want to maintain the status quo cannot dominate. We have to develop a common vision for the future and to build trust that we are all working in the same direction for the same reasons. 

How should we further adaptation as we think about climate, infrastructure, and health?

• Watson: Most people think about mitigation when they think about climate change, but the Paris Agreement equally talks about adaptation and the $100 billion a year needed for both mitigation and adaptation. There is recognition that we need to adapt to the changing climate, and that poor countries are at the most risk. If well-designed, many of the nature-based solutions mentioned earlier can be good for adaptation, mitigation, and biodiversity. World Economic Forum reports point out that many sectors depend on nature and that the private sector wants to reduce its footprint on nature to avoid getting regulated. It all comes down to partnerships between government policies and actions by the private sector. It is also important that civil society tells governments that they want a sustainable future and tells the private sector they want sustainable products. Mitigation, adaptation, conservation, and restoration all need to be looked at together, along with equity and poverty, in the context of the sustainable development goals.
• Figueres: We do not have business models akin to investments in a solar or wind farm for replanting or restoring degraded soil or for any adaptation measures against desertification or sea level rise. The reason why we do not have business plans that would attract the levels of capital that are necessary right now for adaptation and biodiversity is because we do not have a price on pollution. The only way that those activities would be able to attract the trillions of dollars of capital that are needed is to put a price on pollution. Then, that price in itself develops the business plan for investment. Pursuing stakeholder capitalism rather than shareholder capitalism opens roads to those activities.

How can we, as a broad community, make the biodiversity crisis and the climate

crisis real to the average person? 

• Figueres: We need both a push and a pull. On the push side, we need to puncture the myth that climate change or biodiversity loss is affecting only far away developing countries or generations in the future. That is absolutely not the case. It is already affecting everyone, including industrialized countries. On the pull side, we need to imagine what it means to live in a decarbonized world in which every policy, measure, and incentive is actually about regenerating our capacity to not just survive but thrive in this world. We have to understand that it is possible because, collectively, we have the technology, capital, and policies we need. We have to feel pulled into a better future in addition to being pushed out of the terrible present that we have. 
• Watson: Behavior change at the individual level is badly needed, but behavior change on its own is rarely large scale unless you have appropriate government policies, financing, and incentives.

What is your advice for the young professionals and students who will carry on the work of sustainable development?

• Watson: Make sure you vote for politicians that care for your future and a sustainable world. You can also get involved in the political process. Youth activism is crucial, so be advocates for the change you want. Make your purchasing power consistent by purchasing from companies that care about a sustainable world. 
• Figueres: First, keep up the pressure on my generation and hold us accountable, because this decade counts more than any other. Second, do not operate out of anger and blame, but from constructive, meaningful engagement. Third, these consequences will play out over decades if not centuries, so start your meaningful engagement now.

Highlight notes compiled by Valerie Nguyen