COP28 in Dubai will open its doors next week and the international climate negotiations will reach their annual climax. What will the conference achieve? A functioning loss and damage fund? The start of the global fossil fuel phase-out? A deadlock caused by the war in Israel and Gaza?
We will be closely following the developments with an extensive program: At the start of next week, we will be bringing you a special issue on the preparations for COP28, and then, starting next Thursday, we will report daily from Dubai with the latest Climate.Table on the negotiations and everything around the conference.
Today, we already bring you plenty of run-up information: A background study on Russia’s new climate doctrine, one of the often overlooked large emitters and blockers; an exclusive mid-term climate review of the German government by Greenpeace with a look at COP; a warning against letting the Middle East war dominate the conference. And hard to believe, but true: Five well-documented reasons why climate policy is succeeding and why we should not lose faith.
One week before the start of COP28, a new study by the environmental organization Greenpeace gives Germany’s climate policy after the first half of its term a disappointing verdict, characterized above all by “missed targets and setbacks” and “partial successes.” Over 28 pages, the report rates the progress for the climate achieved by Germany’s most important ministers based on a red-yellow-green traffic light ranking system. The study is available exclusively to Table.Media.
In its assessment, Greenpeace admits that the German government got off to an “unexpectedly good” start. And “probably no government in recent decades has faced greater challenges at the start,” as was the case with the Ukraine war, the aftermath of the pandemic, inflation and energy shortages. However, the fact that the coalition agreement has only been implemented to a limited extent is also “the result of uncompromising party politics, public disputes, a lack of leadership and technical shortcomings,” it says.
Greenpeace sees some light and dark in the government’s work: “The expansion targets for renewable energies have been drastically increased and many obstacles have been removed,” praises the concept. “But at the same time, potentially environmentally and climate-damaging decisions have been made in other areas, from the housing industry to the agricultural industry to defense, which cannot be justified by the changed geopolitical conditions.” The promised progress in environmental and climate policy needs to be “largely achieved in the second half of the legislative period,” Greenpeace demands.
Martin Kaiser, Executive Director of Greenpeace Germany, explained the details to Table.Media.
Mr Kaiser, your general assessment of the German government’s climate policy is somewhere between red and yellow. What does that mean?
The German government has started to move forward, but has got stuck on key projects. This makes it all the more important not to put climate action on the back burner in the second term. The ongoing budget crisis is the time to free themselves from party political ideologies and ask: What do the country, the people and the economy need? We must not playoff climate action against social benefits. Most economic experts argue that now is the time to invest.
The Constitutional Court has just stopped the money for this.
That is why we are calling for a special budget of 100 billion euros for climate action and future investments. This is constitutionally secured in the same way as the special budget for the Bundeswehr. It should be financed by a progressively tiered, earmarked environmental capital levy. In addition, the budget cap should also apply to the defense budget – because outside of aid for Ukraine and the special budget, the funds for the defense ministry could be used more efficiently. On top of this, the 65 billion euros in environmentally harmful subsidies should be scaled back.
Finance Minister Christian Lindner receives the lowest score. Why?
Lindner does not want to pursue a climate policy. He apparently considers all of these issues to be the specialty of the Green Party. He opposes this internally and publicly. He cannot even begin to estimate the political damage he is causing by publicly airing these differences within a coalition. The resulting frustration with politics caused by his failure to fulfill his responsibility for this country for obvious party strategy reasons is devastating. We need to return to a policy that gives people confidence and addresses future social cohesion and climate action tasks. And we need a chancellor who is better at explaining his policies.
The study provides an in-depth assessment of the work of the Chancellor and eight of his ministers:
Mr Kaiser, in the run-up to COP28, Greenpeace is praising the German government for its climate policy while simultaneously complaining that Chancellor Scholz cannot show up at the conference with his climate track record. How does that fit together?
The coalition government has recognized that we need a new foreign climate policy. It has realigned strategic cooperation with other countries on development and energy policy more towards making multilateral processes successful. It has also recognized that the failure of developed countries to provide the promised 100 billion dollars in climate finance stood in the way of success in reducing emissions. That is why Germany has provided funds, albeit not enough, but still okay compared to other countries such as the United States. That is one side of the coin.
And the other one?
This really is a glaring contradiction: The same government is failing to put climate action on the road to success at home. Germany has officially announced that, contrary to its Climate Action Programme 2030, it emits a surplus of around 200 million tons of CO2 and says: so what? At the same time, the government is softening the driving force of climate action, the Climate Change Act, although it is precisely this law that urgently requires readjustments following these shortcomings. Scholz can’t go to COP28 like this.
Greenpeace says the Chancellor must correct his course when he comes to Dubai. What does that mean?
Olaf Scholz favors fossil gas projects in other countries, which he intends to finance with German money. This is a breach of the publicly celebrated agreement at COP26 in Glasgow. He must rectify this. If Germany legally commits itself to phasing out fossil fuels, it cannot go on a shopping spree for fossil gas elsewhere and finance this infrastructure. This, together with expanding capacities in Germany beyond what is needed, is not a sign of a credible climate policy.
What does that mean for Germany’s position at COP?
The crucial question regarding climate action is whether the economy internationally recognizes where investments should be made and where money should be withdrawn. Scholz’s “as-well-as-policy” does not reflect this. This also prevents the Chancellor from joining the “High Ambition Coalition” (HAC), which demands that we should immediately stop making new fossil fuel investments and gradually phase them out for humanitarian and economic reasons. Only such a coalition of the Global South and Global North can break up the power blocs at COP and bring the negotiations to a successful conclusion.
But is this accusation against the government justified? Without Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, there would be no new infrastructure and the fossil gas would continue to flow from Russia.
Putin’s war of aggression completely changed the energy policy landscape. The German government managed the subsequent energy crisis well. But the newly created capacities at the height of the crisis are perfectly adequate. The floating LNG terminals, as unfortunate as they are and as quickly as they were pushed through, can still pass as necessary. But everything else, planning an LNG terminal off Rügen [Germany’s largest island], a jewel of nature conservation, is completely overblown. It is not about supplying the population, but about the special interests of the fossil fuel lobby, which intends to extend its business model.
Many African countries say that they have not contributed to climate change and have been unable to use their fossil fuels for their development. And they accuse environmentalists like you of now preventing these development opportunities.
I think this argumentation by these governments is entirely inappropriate. These countries are probably suffering the most from the consequences of climate change and are least able to bear the resulting costs. It makes sense for these countries, in particular, to invest in renewable energies right away and to have a head start there. But what Germany finances is a different matter. The government has a responsibility to finance renewables and to ensure that our tax money is not used to prolong the profit model of the oil and gas industry, which does not help the people there.
Only Steffi Lemke received a decent score. Was the environment minister so much better, or was she just lucky to be on the sidelines of the more controversial issues?
Steffi Lemke has achieved significant international successes that nobody would have expected: the Montreal Protocol on biodiversity, the High Seas Treaty, and now in pushing for the Plastic Pollution Treaty. Of course, the fact that she does not play a significant role in the controversial gas investments or transport policy also benefits her score. In the e-fuel debate, which caused havoc for the necessary change in drive systems and was arbitrarily raised by the FDP at the European level, she fought back as far as she could. Still, she could not do anything about this party-political debate in the government.
With COP 28 around the corner, the New Climate Institute think tank has published a new study highlighting progress and successes in international climate action. The review states that, against the backdrop of multiple crises, rising geopolitical tensions and increasing disinformation campaigns, it is important not only to point out the gaps where progress has not been made, but also what has been achieved over the past decade. The study is available exclusively to Table.Media.
The text points to scientific data regarding progress in climate action – without glossing over general progress being far too slow and timid to meet the Paris climate targets. The study is intended as an encouragement for a conference at which important decisions are to be made: “A closer look at progress will provide important insights into the dynamics of change on which we can build,” it says. The information could also encourage the climate community’s determination to prepare for the next – and undoubtedly difficult – decade. The report explicitly focuses on positive shifts. While the report recognizes that these are not enough to get us to where we need to be, they remind us that all is not lost.
The New Climate Institute accompanies international climate and sustainability policy with data analyses and background information. The independent experts finance their work through project commissions. In cooperation with the think tank Climate Analytics, they provide regular updates on global and national climate policy via the Climate Action Tracker, for example.
In their latest report, the experts highlight progress in five areas:
The researchers see the following progress:
Progress 1: Unlike a few years ago, the climate crisis has a “central” place in the public consciousness. People feel more directly affected by the crisis. This is reflected in global media coverage – even if fake news is also rising in this area. Advances in attribution science have made climate lawsuits possible. In addition, the climate movement has grown and is also exerting pressure through civil disobedience (Extinction Rebellion, Last Generation). The report notes that people seem to be willing to participate in climate efforts, at least in principle, even if it puts them under financial pressure.
Progress 2: The authors also see progress in political visions and goals: Contrary to the past few years, the idea that the entire economy must work towards net zero emissions is now generally accepted, with 90 percent of the global economy having a net zero target. The vision of a “fully decarbonized” world is being officially pursued, a global phase-out of fossil fuels is being seriously considered – and in the calculations for the temperature target for 2100, the world has advanced by a whole degree since 2015: In the meantime, the world’s plans have led to a warming of 2.7 degrees, compared to the predicted 3.6 to 3.9 degrees at the time of the Paris Agreement. The most optimistic estimates even assume that 1.7 degrees would be possible.
Progress 3: According to the report, economic developments also offer hope: climate change and climate policy are now generally recognized as a “threat to business models and investments.” The opportunities for green jobs and a restructuring of the industrial structure have also been recognized much more clearly than just a few years ago. The issue has arrived in the financial world as fossil infrastructures risk ending up as stranded investments. “Every investor and every business segment feels the pressure to act on climate,” it says. The business world has also recognized the legal risks of climate litigation. Many companies are preparing climate plans – but the report also notes a lot of greenwashing.
Progress 4: Regarding energy supply, the fact that renewables are the new normal and are competitive in many parts of the world is a good sign. And the fossil fuel phase-out – which was not discussed just a few years ago – is now a question of “when, not if.” The fact that growth and cost reductions for renewables and batteries have often been higher than forecasted in the past also gives hope.
Progress 5: Lastly, it is a good sign how quickly transport and industry are transitioning to electrification. There has been a global boom in electric cars, heat pumps, and hard-to-decarbonize sectors such as steel. Unlike in the past, these industries with large CO2 backpacks are no longer “hiding” behind the energy sector, which should decarbonize first – instead, they are looking for ways to do so themselves.
In summary, the report found that many things have moved in the right direction in the last decade. However, the climate crisis is also accelerating and threatening the progress made, making swift action vital.
Viewed from a positive perspective, this means: Change is possible and can happen unexpectedly – triggered by new actors (the global youth) and new strategies (climate lawsuits) that pressure governments and companies to act. According to the New Climate Institute, all of this gives hope that the Paris Agreement’s limit of 1.5 degrees of global warming is still within reach. But change must happen everywhere, simultaneously, very quickly, and in some areas even faster than seems realistic today.” To achieve this, we need to “think the impossible, find new alliances” and unite all of society behind this task.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin signed a new climate doctrine for the country on October 26, which outlines the country’s future climate policy framework. The document is an updated version of the doctrine from 2009 and confirms the acknowledgment of human-induced climate change and Russia’s goal to reach net zero by 2060.
However, the doctrine fails to mention fossil fuels phase-out, with the main decarbonization measures being energy efficiency, further development and use of natural gas, hydro and nuclear energy. In addition, some modest development of new renewable energy sources should contribute to achieving the net-zero target.
The new doctrine contains many references to Russia’s low carbon development strategy from 2020 to 2050. The strategy describes Russia’s climate targets in numbers. It states that electricity generation should:
The document’s publication shortly before COP28 likely pursues two objectives: To outline Russia’s position on national and international climate action and, at the same time, to demonstrate Russia’s willingness for international climate cooperation – despite the war in Ukraine and international sanctions.
Most of the paper is based on the first version of the Russian climate doctrine. It was signed in December 2009 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev during the COP in Copenhagen. According to Igor Makarov, climate policy researcher from the Higher School of Economics in Moscow, the new doctrine retains 90 percent of the text. One new addition is the net-zero target for 2060, although this was already included in Russia’s long-term low carbon development strategy, adopted in October 2021, shortly before COP26.
The Russian government’s first doctrine from 2009 already signaled that it had officially acknowledged climate change and its threats and was ready for international climate policy cooperation. It formed the foundation for all subsequent climate regulations in a country where some politicians – and even scientists – still doubt man-made climate change to this day.
The willingness to cooperate has continued since then, despite the annexation of Crimea and the international sanctions that followed. Russian officials have tried to maintain and expand it, including at last year’s COP27 in Egypt.
Vladimir Chuprov, Executive Director of the environmental NGO “Earth Concerns All” and former head of Greenpeace’s energy program, sees two positive aspects of the new doctrine:
Still, the doctrine also confirms previous plans of Russia to put the main emphasis on emission reduction in nuclear and natural gas development. It also assumes that forests in Russia will be able to sequestrate an increasing amount of CO2 from the air. This hope is also part of Russia’s strategy for low-carbon development. However, many experts consider it unrealistic – also in view of the increasing forest fires and unsustainable forest management practices.
“Overall the energy sector in 2050 is being seen by Russia’s climate strategy documents as still dominated by fossil fuels, which does not support green energy transition,” says Vladimir Chuprov. In the UN climate negotiations, Russia has also traditionally opposed a complete phase-out of fossil fuels to be mentioned in the final documents.
As Vladimir Chuprov notes, Russia’s new climate doctrine does not mention fossil fuels at all. In contrast to the first doctrine, the statement that Russia is concentrating its efforts on reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions by reducing market distortions and implementing stimulating financial and fiscal measures is also absent.
Another important point, which will likely play a large role at COP28, is that Russia keeps mentioning “technological neutrality,” which in practice means that all measures to reduce GHG emissions and increase carbon sequestration should be internationally acknowledged and all technologies should be considered equally. In practice, nuclear energy and large hydropower plants are particularly important to Russia.
Another new phrase in the latest version of the doctrine mentions “independence in assessments and conclusions about the ongoing and expected impacts of climate change,” which, according to Igor Makarov from the HSE, means technological and ideological sovereignty in questions of climate-related policy priorities and actions – something that Russia’s officials speak a lot since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. The doctrine, therefore, emphasizes that Russia wants to decide for itself which climate policy measures to take and which technologies it will use to reduce its emissions.
Finally, the doctrine also mentions criticism and unacceptability of “unreasonable discrimination while adopting climate measures which tackle international trade.” Here, the official Russian position is still critical of the EU’s CBAM, which, however, has become much less of an issue for Russia’s economy and the exports following the sanctions following the war in Ukraine.
Government climate plans are insufficient to reduce emissions to achieve the climate targets. The UN warns that a massive “emissions gap” needs to be closed urgently. Global warming will reach three degrees if the current climate policy is continued and not tightened. The gap “is more like a canyon – a canyon littered with broken promises, broken lives, and broken records,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres at Monday’s presentation of the latest Emissions Gap Report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). The UN Secretary-General called for the world to move away from its “addiction to fossil fuels.”
In order to keep the 2-degree target within reach, between 11 and 14 gigatons of additional CO2 equivalents would have to be reduced by 2030 than the countries have promised in their national climate plans (“conditional” and “unconditional NDCs”). The emissions gap is as high as 19 to 22 gigatons for the 1.5-degree target.
The report calls for the following:
The report warns that if all NDCs were met by 2030, the world would be on a path to 2.5 degrees of global warming by the end of the millennium. If emissions are not reduced more quickly, the global community will have to rely even more heavily on carbon dioxide removal (CDR). However, natural CDR processes could potentially lead to land conflicts – and forest fires could release stored emissions back into the atmosphere. Technical processes such as Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) and Direct Air Capture (DAC) are not yet fully mature. According to the UNEP, political support is needed to develop these technologies. nib
Kenya and France have announced plans to advance the debate on international climate taxes at the climate summit in Dubai. The presidents of the two countries, William Ruto and Emmanuel Macron, plan to set up a “task force” with the aim of developing concrete proposals within two years. As Climatechangenews.com reported last week, the heads of state hope to assemble a coalition from Europe and the Global South in the task force.
The debate on global climate taxes and levies has grown since Macron’s finance summit in Paris in June. The African Climate Summit hosted by Ruto in the Kenyan capital Nairobi in September, for instance, concluded with a call for a global carbon tax system “provide dedicated, affordable and accessible financing to invest in large-scale climate projects.”
International organizations are also examining the topic. In October, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO), announced a dedicated task force to develop consensus proposals for “a methodology for a global carbon price.” The International Monetary Fund (IMF), in turn, argued in its latest Fiscal Monitor that carbon taxes should be an “integral” part of all national climate packages.
The UN Organization for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) recently published a study showing the sums that could be raised through global taxes:
The Hamas massacre of Jews on October 7 and Israel’s military response have sparked a global battle for moral authority in the Middle East conflict. This dispute has also reached the global climate movement and is dominating the preparations for the UN Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai.
This is fatal. Not only because this battle of opinions increasingly uses anti-Semitic stereotypes by portraying Israel as a colonialist imperial power, coupled with an inability to distinguish between the Israeli government and Jewish people. But also because the dispute over the Hamas massacre and the resulting Israeli war in Gaza also threatens to overshadow the negotiations at the World Climate Conference.
The climate crisis risks being sidelined at the UN Climate Change Conference in Dubai. International civil society networks are campaigning to turn the COP into a “Palestinian COP.” Some networks are currently working to mix the climate policy negotiations in Dubai with indiscriminate criticism of Israel and its settlement policy – which is certainly deserving of criticism.
The multiple crises – from the climate to poverty, hunger, Ukraine and the Middle East – are becoming a confusing melange. It is obvious that we must recognize the simultaneity of the crises. However, this does not mean that we can solve them all indiscriminately in the same way – on the contrary. Anyone who overloads COP28 in Dubai with the debate on the Middle East conflict on top of all climate policy challenges is hampering potential progress. This is not a plea to ignore other crises, but rather a call for an honest analysis with differentiated answers.
This overshadows the actual challenge at COP28: Committing the global community to a binding fossil fuel phase-out and thus preventing an extension of the fossil fuel business model that has been the root cause of so many crises and wars.
This is not only fatal because the oil and gas multinationals are sniffing the morning air again right now. It also neglects the fact that fossil revenues are what finance conflicts and terror worldwide. The Iranian regime has been financing Hamas and Hezbollah with oil dollars for decades.
The October 7 massacre was a turning point. More than 1,400 people were murdered and hundreds kidnapped with unimaginable cruelty. Hamas is taking cover in hospitals and kindergartens, holding defenseless Palestinians hostage. Their cynicism is boundless.
Israel has a duty to protect its people from this terror and to defend itself. However, it must also be acknowledged that Israel’s attacks have caused unbearable suffering in the Gaza Strip and that the humanitarian situation is a disaster. But this is also in Hamas’ interests. While Hamas tramples on international law – including that of the people in Gaza – by preventing them from fleeing, Israel must abide by international law in its fight against terror. It must do everything it can to improve the humanitarian situation of the people in the Gaza Strip. In this respect, Germany has a particular responsibility to stand by the side of the Jewish people while naming any mistakes made by the Israeli government as such.
A vigilant civil society must criticize the terror of Hamas and the mistakes of the Israeli government. If a climate movement that has acquired great expertise and merits in the fight against the climate crisis now responds to a complex conflict with short-sighted answers, it neither does justice to the struggle for a better climate in the atmosphere nor the Middle East.
In recent years, the climate movement has developed a branch that not only calls for an end to the fossil age, but also to capitalism and the market economy by calling for “system change.” It calls for an anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist fight with liberation movements worldwide. Representatives of precisely this branch are now unilaterally taking sides with the Palestinians – and are becoming blind to totalitarianism.
This shows that Antisemitism is, unfortunately, no longer a purely right-wing phenomenon. It has also taken root in the left-wing spectrum. This is repeatedly denied in self-perceived progressive circles. Antisemitism is labeled as criticism of Israel, anti-Zionism or decolonialism. At its core, however, the Israel-critical debate is often anti-Semitic.
To avoid misunderstandings: Of course, Israeli policy can and must be criticized. Contrary to what is normal in the region, this is also possible in Israel, and many people there make use of this right. I have great respect for the people of Israel, who mourn the victims of terror and who simultaneously stand up for peaceful solutions and the coexistence of two states.
Yet, we see a desire for simple answers to the complexity of multiple crises, from climate to war. Around the world, pathetic solidarity with the Palestinian cause flourishes and the slogan “end settler colonialism – end climate colonialism” threatens to become a battle cry for COP28. Many no longer see shades of gray, but only one aggressor. This represents a significant challenge for international cooperation – including within the climate movement.
The pressure to take a side is growing by the hour in all international networks. And it’s the bewildered German climate and environmental organizations that are currently standing up to this one-sidedness. Sadly, they are quite alone in the international climate movement. Alongside many civil society actors, it was the environmental umbrella organization DNR and Fridays for Future Germany that jointly called for a large demonstration against Antisemitism and solidarity with Israel on October 22.
It will now be crucial in Dubai to focus on the climate crisis while standing up against populist answers to complex crises. As at previous climate conferences, German civil society will also campaign for the protection of minorities – and make it clear that there is no room for Antisemitism, hate against Muslims, racism and one-sidedness when it comes to saving the global climate. Neither the planetary nor the human limits of this planet can be met by shortcuts and populism.
Prof. Dr. Kai Niebert researches and teaches as a sustainability scientist at the University of Zurich and is President of the German Nature Conservation Ring (DNR). He is a member of the German Council for Sustainable Development and will attend the climate negotiations in Dubai as a member of the German delegation.
COP28 in Dubai will open its doors next week and the international climate negotiations will reach their annual climax. What will the conference achieve? A functioning loss and damage fund? The start of the global fossil fuel phase-out? A deadlock caused by the war in Israel and Gaza?
We will be closely following the developments with an extensive program: At the start of next week, we will be bringing you a special issue on the preparations for COP28, and then, starting next Thursday, we will report daily from Dubai with the latest Climate.Table on the negotiations and everything around the conference.
Today, we already bring you plenty of run-up information: A background study on Russia’s new climate doctrine, one of the often overlooked large emitters and blockers; an exclusive mid-term climate review of the German government by Greenpeace with a look at COP; a warning against letting the Middle East war dominate the conference. And hard to believe, but true: Five well-documented reasons why climate policy is succeeding and why we should not lose faith.
One week before the start of COP28, a new study by the environmental organization Greenpeace gives Germany’s climate policy after the first half of its term a disappointing verdict, characterized above all by “missed targets and setbacks” and “partial successes.” Over 28 pages, the report rates the progress for the climate achieved by Germany’s most important ministers based on a red-yellow-green traffic light ranking system. The study is available exclusively to Table.Media.
In its assessment, Greenpeace admits that the German government got off to an “unexpectedly good” start. And “probably no government in recent decades has faced greater challenges at the start,” as was the case with the Ukraine war, the aftermath of the pandemic, inflation and energy shortages. However, the fact that the coalition agreement has only been implemented to a limited extent is also “the result of uncompromising party politics, public disputes, a lack of leadership and technical shortcomings,” it says.
Greenpeace sees some light and dark in the government’s work: “The expansion targets for renewable energies have been drastically increased and many obstacles have been removed,” praises the concept. “But at the same time, potentially environmentally and climate-damaging decisions have been made in other areas, from the housing industry to the agricultural industry to defense, which cannot be justified by the changed geopolitical conditions.” The promised progress in environmental and climate policy needs to be “largely achieved in the second half of the legislative period,” Greenpeace demands.
Martin Kaiser, Executive Director of Greenpeace Germany, explained the details to Table.Media.
Mr Kaiser, your general assessment of the German government’s climate policy is somewhere between red and yellow. What does that mean?
The German government has started to move forward, but has got stuck on key projects. This makes it all the more important not to put climate action on the back burner in the second term. The ongoing budget crisis is the time to free themselves from party political ideologies and ask: What do the country, the people and the economy need? We must not playoff climate action against social benefits. Most economic experts argue that now is the time to invest.
The Constitutional Court has just stopped the money for this.
That is why we are calling for a special budget of 100 billion euros for climate action and future investments. This is constitutionally secured in the same way as the special budget for the Bundeswehr. It should be financed by a progressively tiered, earmarked environmental capital levy. In addition, the budget cap should also apply to the defense budget – because outside of aid for Ukraine and the special budget, the funds for the defense ministry could be used more efficiently. On top of this, the 65 billion euros in environmentally harmful subsidies should be scaled back.
Finance Minister Christian Lindner receives the lowest score. Why?
Lindner does not want to pursue a climate policy. He apparently considers all of these issues to be the specialty of the Green Party. He opposes this internally and publicly. He cannot even begin to estimate the political damage he is causing by publicly airing these differences within a coalition. The resulting frustration with politics caused by his failure to fulfill his responsibility for this country for obvious party strategy reasons is devastating. We need to return to a policy that gives people confidence and addresses future social cohesion and climate action tasks. And we need a chancellor who is better at explaining his policies.
The study provides an in-depth assessment of the work of the Chancellor and eight of his ministers:
Mr Kaiser, in the run-up to COP28, Greenpeace is praising the German government for its climate policy while simultaneously complaining that Chancellor Scholz cannot show up at the conference with his climate track record. How does that fit together?
The coalition government has recognized that we need a new foreign climate policy. It has realigned strategic cooperation with other countries on development and energy policy more towards making multilateral processes successful. It has also recognized that the failure of developed countries to provide the promised 100 billion dollars in climate finance stood in the way of success in reducing emissions. That is why Germany has provided funds, albeit not enough, but still okay compared to other countries such as the United States. That is one side of the coin.
And the other one?
This really is a glaring contradiction: The same government is failing to put climate action on the road to success at home. Germany has officially announced that, contrary to its Climate Action Programme 2030, it emits a surplus of around 200 million tons of CO2 and says: so what? At the same time, the government is softening the driving force of climate action, the Climate Change Act, although it is precisely this law that urgently requires readjustments following these shortcomings. Scholz can’t go to COP28 like this.
Greenpeace says the Chancellor must correct his course when he comes to Dubai. What does that mean?
Olaf Scholz favors fossil gas projects in other countries, which he intends to finance with German money. This is a breach of the publicly celebrated agreement at COP26 in Glasgow. He must rectify this. If Germany legally commits itself to phasing out fossil fuels, it cannot go on a shopping spree for fossil gas elsewhere and finance this infrastructure. This, together with expanding capacities in Germany beyond what is needed, is not a sign of a credible climate policy.
What does that mean for Germany’s position at COP?
The crucial question regarding climate action is whether the economy internationally recognizes where investments should be made and where money should be withdrawn. Scholz’s “as-well-as-policy” does not reflect this. This also prevents the Chancellor from joining the “High Ambition Coalition” (HAC), which demands that we should immediately stop making new fossil fuel investments and gradually phase them out for humanitarian and economic reasons. Only such a coalition of the Global South and Global North can break up the power blocs at COP and bring the negotiations to a successful conclusion.
But is this accusation against the government justified? Without Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, there would be no new infrastructure and the fossil gas would continue to flow from Russia.
Putin’s war of aggression completely changed the energy policy landscape. The German government managed the subsequent energy crisis well. But the newly created capacities at the height of the crisis are perfectly adequate. The floating LNG terminals, as unfortunate as they are and as quickly as they were pushed through, can still pass as necessary. But everything else, planning an LNG terminal off Rügen [Germany’s largest island], a jewel of nature conservation, is completely overblown. It is not about supplying the population, but about the special interests of the fossil fuel lobby, which intends to extend its business model.
Many African countries say that they have not contributed to climate change and have been unable to use their fossil fuels for their development. And they accuse environmentalists like you of now preventing these development opportunities.
I think this argumentation by these governments is entirely inappropriate. These countries are probably suffering the most from the consequences of climate change and are least able to bear the resulting costs. It makes sense for these countries, in particular, to invest in renewable energies right away and to have a head start there. But what Germany finances is a different matter. The government has a responsibility to finance renewables and to ensure that our tax money is not used to prolong the profit model of the oil and gas industry, which does not help the people there.
Only Steffi Lemke received a decent score. Was the environment minister so much better, or was she just lucky to be on the sidelines of the more controversial issues?
Steffi Lemke has achieved significant international successes that nobody would have expected: the Montreal Protocol on biodiversity, the High Seas Treaty, and now in pushing for the Plastic Pollution Treaty. Of course, the fact that she does not play a significant role in the controversial gas investments or transport policy also benefits her score. In the e-fuel debate, which caused havoc for the necessary change in drive systems and was arbitrarily raised by the FDP at the European level, she fought back as far as she could. Still, she could not do anything about this party-political debate in the government.
With COP 28 around the corner, the New Climate Institute think tank has published a new study highlighting progress and successes in international climate action. The review states that, against the backdrop of multiple crises, rising geopolitical tensions and increasing disinformation campaigns, it is important not only to point out the gaps where progress has not been made, but also what has been achieved over the past decade. The study is available exclusively to Table.Media.
The text points to scientific data regarding progress in climate action – without glossing over general progress being far too slow and timid to meet the Paris climate targets. The study is intended as an encouragement for a conference at which important decisions are to be made: “A closer look at progress will provide important insights into the dynamics of change on which we can build,” it says. The information could also encourage the climate community’s determination to prepare for the next – and undoubtedly difficult – decade. The report explicitly focuses on positive shifts. While the report recognizes that these are not enough to get us to where we need to be, they remind us that all is not lost.
The New Climate Institute accompanies international climate and sustainability policy with data analyses and background information. The independent experts finance their work through project commissions. In cooperation with the think tank Climate Analytics, they provide regular updates on global and national climate policy via the Climate Action Tracker, for example.
In their latest report, the experts highlight progress in five areas:
The researchers see the following progress:
Progress 1: Unlike a few years ago, the climate crisis has a “central” place in the public consciousness. People feel more directly affected by the crisis. This is reflected in global media coverage – even if fake news is also rising in this area. Advances in attribution science have made climate lawsuits possible. In addition, the climate movement has grown and is also exerting pressure through civil disobedience (Extinction Rebellion, Last Generation). The report notes that people seem to be willing to participate in climate efforts, at least in principle, even if it puts them under financial pressure.
Progress 2: The authors also see progress in political visions and goals: Contrary to the past few years, the idea that the entire economy must work towards net zero emissions is now generally accepted, with 90 percent of the global economy having a net zero target. The vision of a “fully decarbonized” world is being officially pursued, a global phase-out of fossil fuels is being seriously considered – and in the calculations for the temperature target for 2100, the world has advanced by a whole degree since 2015: In the meantime, the world’s plans have led to a warming of 2.7 degrees, compared to the predicted 3.6 to 3.9 degrees at the time of the Paris Agreement. The most optimistic estimates even assume that 1.7 degrees would be possible.
Progress 3: According to the report, economic developments also offer hope: climate change and climate policy are now generally recognized as a “threat to business models and investments.” The opportunities for green jobs and a restructuring of the industrial structure have also been recognized much more clearly than just a few years ago. The issue has arrived in the financial world as fossil infrastructures risk ending up as stranded investments. “Every investor and every business segment feels the pressure to act on climate,” it says. The business world has also recognized the legal risks of climate litigation. Many companies are preparing climate plans – but the report also notes a lot of greenwashing.
Progress 4: Regarding energy supply, the fact that renewables are the new normal and are competitive in many parts of the world is a good sign. And the fossil fuel phase-out – which was not discussed just a few years ago – is now a question of “when, not if.” The fact that growth and cost reductions for renewables and batteries have often been higher than forecasted in the past also gives hope.
Progress 5: Lastly, it is a good sign how quickly transport and industry are transitioning to electrification. There has been a global boom in electric cars, heat pumps, and hard-to-decarbonize sectors such as steel. Unlike in the past, these industries with large CO2 backpacks are no longer “hiding” behind the energy sector, which should decarbonize first – instead, they are looking for ways to do so themselves.
In summary, the report found that many things have moved in the right direction in the last decade. However, the climate crisis is also accelerating and threatening the progress made, making swift action vital.
Viewed from a positive perspective, this means: Change is possible and can happen unexpectedly – triggered by new actors (the global youth) and new strategies (climate lawsuits) that pressure governments and companies to act. According to the New Climate Institute, all of this gives hope that the Paris Agreement’s limit of 1.5 degrees of global warming is still within reach. But change must happen everywhere, simultaneously, very quickly, and in some areas even faster than seems realistic today.” To achieve this, we need to “think the impossible, find new alliances” and unite all of society behind this task.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin signed a new climate doctrine for the country on October 26, which outlines the country’s future climate policy framework. The document is an updated version of the doctrine from 2009 and confirms the acknowledgment of human-induced climate change and Russia’s goal to reach net zero by 2060.
However, the doctrine fails to mention fossil fuels phase-out, with the main decarbonization measures being energy efficiency, further development and use of natural gas, hydro and nuclear energy. In addition, some modest development of new renewable energy sources should contribute to achieving the net-zero target.
The new doctrine contains many references to Russia’s low carbon development strategy from 2020 to 2050. The strategy describes Russia’s climate targets in numbers. It states that electricity generation should:
The document’s publication shortly before COP28 likely pursues two objectives: To outline Russia’s position on national and international climate action and, at the same time, to demonstrate Russia’s willingness for international climate cooperation – despite the war in Ukraine and international sanctions.
Most of the paper is based on the first version of the Russian climate doctrine. It was signed in December 2009 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev during the COP in Copenhagen. According to Igor Makarov, climate policy researcher from the Higher School of Economics in Moscow, the new doctrine retains 90 percent of the text. One new addition is the net-zero target for 2060, although this was already included in Russia’s long-term low carbon development strategy, adopted in October 2021, shortly before COP26.
The Russian government’s first doctrine from 2009 already signaled that it had officially acknowledged climate change and its threats and was ready for international climate policy cooperation. It formed the foundation for all subsequent climate regulations in a country where some politicians – and even scientists – still doubt man-made climate change to this day.
The willingness to cooperate has continued since then, despite the annexation of Crimea and the international sanctions that followed. Russian officials have tried to maintain and expand it, including at last year’s COP27 in Egypt.
Vladimir Chuprov, Executive Director of the environmental NGO “Earth Concerns All” and former head of Greenpeace’s energy program, sees two positive aspects of the new doctrine:
Still, the doctrine also confirms previous plans of Russia to put the main emphasis on emission reduction in nuclear and natural gas development. It also assumes that forests in Russia will be able to sequestrate an increasing amount of CO2 from the air. This hope is also part of Russia’s strategy for low-carbon development. However, many experts consider it unrealistic – also in view of the increasing forest fires and unsustainable forest management practices.
“Overall the energy sector in 2050 is being seen by Russia’s climate strategy documents as still dominated by fossil fuels, which does not support green energy transition,” says Vladimir Chuprov. In the UN climate negotiations, Russia has also traditionally opposed a complete phase-out of fossil fuels to be mentioned in the final documents.
As Vladimir Chuprov notes, Russia’s new climate doctrine does not mention fossil fuels at all. In contrast to the first doctrine, the statement that Russia is concentrating its efforts on reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions by reducing market distortions and implementing stimulating financial and fiscal measures is also absent.
Another important point, which will likely play a large role at COP28, is that Russia keeps mentioning “technological neutrality,” which in practice means that all measures to reduce GHG emissions and increase carbon sequestration should be internationally acknowledged and all technologies should be considered equally. In practice, nuclear energy and large hydropower plants are particularly important to Russia.
Another new phrase in the latest version of the doctrine mentions “independence in assessments and conclusions about the ongoing and expected impacts of climate change,” which, according to Igor Makarov from the HSE, means technological and ideological sovereignty in questions of climate-related policy priorities and actions – something that Russia’s officials speak a lot since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. The doctrine, therefore, emphasizes that Russia wants to decide for itself which climate policy measures to take and which technologies it will use to reduce its emissions.
Finally, the doctrine also mentions criticism and unacceptability of “unreasonable discrimination while adopting climate measures which tackle international trade.” Here, the official Russian position is still critical of the EU’s CBAM, which, however, has become much less of an issue for Russia’s economy and the exports following the sanctions following the war in Ukraine.
Government climate plans are insufficient to reduce emissions to achieve the climate targets. The UN warns that a massive “emissions gap” needs to be closed urgently. Global warming will reach three degrees if the current climate policy is continued and not tightened. The gap “is more like a canyon – a canyon littered with broken promises, broken lives, and broken records,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres at Monday’s presentation of the latest Emissions Gap Report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). The UN Secretary-General called for the world to move away from its “addiction to fossil fuels.”
In order to keep the 2-degree target within reach, between 11 and 14 gigatons of additional CO2 equivalents would have to be reduced by 2030 than the countries have promised in their national climate plans (“conditional” and “unconditional NDCs”). The emissions gap is as high as 19 to 22 gigatons for the 1.5-degree target.
The report calls for the following:
The report warns that if all NDCs were met by 2030, the world would be on a path to 2.5 degrees of global warming by the end of the millennium. If emissions are not reduced more quickly, the global community will have to rely even more heavily on carbon dioxide removal (CDR). However, natural CDR processes could potentially lead to land conflicts – and forest fires could release stored emissions back into the atmosphere. Technical processes such as Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) and Direct Air Capture (DAC) are not yet fully mature. According to the UNEP, political support is needed to develop these technologies. nib
Kenya and France have announced plans to advance the debate on international climate taxes at the climate summit in Dubai. The presidents of the two countries, William Ruto and Emmanuel Macron, plan to set up a “task force” with the aim of developing concrete proposals within two years. As Climatechangenews.com reported last week, the heads of state hope to assemble a coalition from Europe and the Global South in the task force.
The debate on global climate taxes and levies has grown since Macron’s finance summit in Paris in June. The African Climate Summit hosted by Ruto in the Kenyan capital Nairobi in September, for instance, concluded with a call for a global carbon tax system “provide dedicated, affordable and accessible financing to invest in large-scale climate projects.”
International organizations are also examining the topic. In October, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO), announced a dedicated task force to develop consensus proposals for “a methodology for a global carbon price.” The International Monetary Fund (IMF), in turn, argued in its latest Fiscal Monitor that carbon taxes should be an “integral” part of all national climate packages.
The UN Organization for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) recently published a study showing the sums that could be raised through global taxes:
The Hamas massacre of Jews on October 7 and Israel’s military response have sparked a global battle for moral authority in the Middle East conflict. This dispute has also reached the global climate movement and is dominating the preparations for the UN Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai.
This is fatal. Not only because this battle of opinions increasingly uses anti-Semitic stereotypes by portraying Israel as a colonialist imperial power, coupled with an inability to distinguish between the Israeli government and Jewish people. But also because the dispute over the Hamas massacre and the resulting Israeli war in Gaza also threatens to overshadow the negotiations at the World Climate Conference.
The climate crisis risks being sidelined at the UN Climate Change Conference in Dubai. International civil society networks are campaigning to turn the COP into a “Palestinian COP.” Some networks are currently working to mix the climate policy negotiations in Dubai with indiscriminate criticism of Israel and its settlement policy – which is certainly deserving of criticism.
The multiple crises – from the climate to poverty, hunger, Ukraine and the Middle East – are becoming a confusing melange. It is obvious that we must recognize the simultaneity of the crises. However, this does not mean that we can solve them all indiscriminately in the same way – on the contrary. Anyone who overloads COP28 in Dubai with the debate on the Middle East conflict on top of all climate policy challenges is hampering potential progress. This is not a plea to ignore other crises, but rather a call for an honest analysis with differentiated answers.
This overshadows the actual challenge at COP28: Committing the global community to a binding fossil fuel phase-out and thus preventing an extension of the fossil fuel business model that has been the root cause of so many crises and wars.
This is not only fatal because the oil and gas multinationals are sniffing the morning air again right now. It also neglects the fact that fossil revenues are what finance conflicts and terror worldwide. The Iranian regime has been financing Hamas and Hezbollah with oil dollars for decades.
The October 7 massacre was a turning point. More than 1,400 people were murdered and hundreds kidnapped with unimaginable cruelty. Hamas is taking cover in hospitals and kindergartens, holding defenseless Palestinians hostage. Their cynicism is boundless.
Israel has a duty to protect its people from this terror and to defend itself. However, it must also be acknowledged that Israel’s attacks have caused unbearable suffering in the Gaza Strip and that the humanitarian situation is a disaster. But this is also in Hamas’ interests. While Hamas tramples on international law – including that of the people in Gaza – by preventing them from fleeing, Israel must abide by international law in its fight against terror. It must do everything it can to improve the humanitarian situation of the people in the Gaza Strip. In this respect, Germany has a particular responsibility to stand by the side of the Jewish people while naming any mistakes made by the Israeli government as such.
A vigilant civil society must criticize the terror of Hamas and the mistakes of the Israeli government. If a climate movement that has acquired great expertise and merits in the fight against the climate crisis now responds to a complex conflict with short-sighted answers, it neither does justice to the struggle for a better climate in the atmosphere nor the Middle East.
In recent years, the climate movement has developed a branch that not only calls for an end to the fossil age, but also to capitalism and the market economy by calling for “system change.” It calls for an anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist fight with liberation movements worldwide. Representatives of precisely this branch are now unilaterally taking sides with the Palestinians – and are becoming blind to totalitarianism.
This shows that Antisemitism is, unfortunately, no longer a purely right-wing phenomenon. It has also taken root in the left-wing spectrum. This is repeatedly denied in self-perceived progressive circles. Antisemitism is labeled as criticism of Israel, anti-Zionism or decolonialism. At its core, however, the Israel-critical debate is often anti-Semitic.
To avoid misunderstandings: Of course, Israeli policy can and must be criticized. Contrary to what is normal in the region, this is also possible in Israel, and many people there make use of this right. I have great respect for the people of Israel, who mourn the victims of terror and who simultaneously stand up for peaceful solutions and the coexistence of two states.
Yet, we see a desire for simple answers to the complexity of multiple crises, from climate to war. Around the world, pathetic solidarity with the Palestinian cause flourishes and the slogan “end settler colonialism – end climate colonialism” threatens to become a battle cry for COP28. Many no longer see shades of gray, but only one aggressor. This represents a significant challenge for international cooperation – including within the climate movement.
The pressure to take a side is growing by the hour in all international networks. And it’s the bewildered German climate and environmental organizations that are currently standing up to this one-sidedness. Sadly, they are quite alone in the international climate movement. Alongside many civil society actors, it was the environmental umbrella organization DNR and Fridays for Future Germany that jointly called for a large demonstration against Antisemitism and solidarity with Israel on October 22.
It will now be crucial in Dubai to focus on the climate crisis while standing up against populist answers to complex crises. As at previous climate conferences, German civil society will also campaign for the protection of minorities – and make it clear that there is no room for Antisemitism, hate against Muslims, racism and one-sidedness when it comes to saving the global climate. Neither the planetary nor the human limits of this planet can be met by shortcuts and populism.
Prof. Dr. Kai Niebert researches and teaches as a sustainability scientist at the University of Zurich and is President of the German Nature Conservation Ring (DNR). He is a member of the German Council for Sustainable Development and will attend the climate negotiations in Dubai as a member of the German delegation.
