Much of the buzz around the climate discussion these days focuses on promises of “net-zero” carbon emissions by a particular future date — such as 2050 or 2060 — made by various countries, governmental jurisdictions, corporations, or non-governmental organizations.
But net-zero pledges are nothing more than posturing because we don’t know how to achieve net zero or whether it is possible, economically or even physically.
I think a little background may be necessary. As is well known, certain gases in low atmospheric concentrations — chiefly carbon dioxide due to the burning of the fossil fuels coal, oil and natural gas — tend to trap heat that is trying to escape from the Earth, thereby causing the Earth’s atmosphere to warm. This warming will continue until the temperature increases to an equilibrium, even if we stop emitting those greenhouse gases, because the Earth will continue to warm until the more-intense heat energy escaping faster from a higher-temperature Earth equals the solar energy coming in. But if human technology continues to emit greenhouse gases, the temperature will not stop at an equilibrium but will continue to rise. Therefore, we will eventually need to add no greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, or else the atmosphere will continue to warm indefinitely; we will surely need to achieve net zero at some point in the future. But precisely zero is not necessary for a very long time; low or very low will suffice to mitigate significantly the problem.
It is generally conceded, however, that it will not be possible to eliminate all of our greenhouse gas emissions without halting nearly all modern technological and economic activity. Hence, to achieve net-zero emissions, we will also need to extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But we have no way to do that on the massive scale necessary that we know will work and is now anywhere near economically feasible. China’s plan is the most likely to work, but it is still barely plausible.
The Paris Agreement on climate change adopted in 2015 required signatories to prepare statements every five years of their proposed “nationally determined contributions” to solving climate change. Although there is no requirement in the Paris Agreement for these statements to target a specific date at which their emissions will reach net zero, doing so has become almost an obsession for some parties. Sometimes the obsession is linked to the Paris goal of “holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 C”.
The problem with obsessing over the date for net zero is that it can become a fantasy goal without real substance. It can elevate to an absolute goal, a goal that needn’t be absolute at all, making the perfect enemy of the good. And goal setting can become political as much as scientific and technological.
The problem with obsessing over the date for net zero is that it can become a fantasy goal without real substance. It can elevate to an absolute goal, a goal that needn’t be absolute at all, making the perfect enemy of the good. And goal setting can become political as much as scientific and technological
As an example, participants in an online panel discussion in August 2021, organized by Our Hong Kong Foundation and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and moderated by HKUST’s Christine Loh, included three leading climate policymakers from three countries, the United States, the United Kingdom and China. The US and UK had both set net-zero targets for 2050, while China’s target date was 2060.
Xie Zhenhua, special representative for Climate Change Affairs of China, spoke first. Then there were responses from Todd Stern, formerly the United States Special Envoy for Climate Change and the US chief negotiator of the Paris Climate Agreement, and Lord Adair Turner, chair of the Energy Transitions Commission.
Stern and Turner, responding to Xie, chided China for not “increasing its ambition” to net zero by 2050 instead of 2060. The verbal pressure exerted was intense, with Stern, for example, saying, “If you have the United States, the EU and others taking all-out action in the 2020s to keep the hope of 1.5 alive and if the rest sees China of the world as the main reason why the 1.5 goal is not kept alive, with all due respect my own judgment is that that will significantly damage China’s global standing and reputation.”
Xie responded reasonably, that we should take action on climate change rather than debating whether the goal should be 1.5 C or 2 C, and at what target date. But for the US and UK participants, “taking action” appeared virtually synonymous with “setting targets”. Quantified promises set for decades hence, and taking action are conflated. “Action” is used almost identically with merely “setting targets”, with net-zero targets that may not even be realistically achievable.
Another problem with an obsessive focus on net-zero goals is that it prioritizes mitigation over adaptation. Mitigation of the climate change threat means trying to diminish the threat by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Adaptation means adapting to those changes when they do occur despite mitigation efforts.
But some developing countries, in particular, with initially low emissions, may find it more practical to grow their economies using whatever is the cheapest and most convenient energy source, the better to enable them to adapt to the coming climate change. Countries that are more developed and focused only on mitigation, on the other hand, needn’t worry as much about adaptation because they — for example, the Netherlands — are already rich enough to build seawalls to keep out rising oceans. But the developed countries control major purse-strings, such as the World Bank’s, that may deny developing countries financing to help them develop unless they prioritize mitigation over adaptation.
“Net-zero” goal setting may serve as a useful energizing rallying cry. Still, it is seriously distorting the understanding of what needs to be done to address the climate change problem.
The author is a mathematician and economist with expertise in the finance, energy and sustainable development fields. He is an adjunct associate professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.