Week one in Glasgow has delivered more climate action than the world promised in Paris six years ago. But progress still falls well short of what’s required to limit warming to 1.5°C.
The Liberals and the Nationals need each other to stay in government. But climate policy gives us an insight into just how precarious – yet effective – that coalition can be.
After some prevarication, the prime minister is heading for the COP 26 meeting, But first, he needs to sort out the position on climate within the coalition.
Click through a timeline to make sense of Australia’s long, tumultuous years of shifting climate policies ahead of next month’s international climate summit in Glasgow.
Nationals’ concerns about the effects on regional Australia are legitimate, but greater forces in favour of a net-zero emissions target will likely push the policy over the line.
Reducing fossil use and increasing renewable energy worldwide are crucial to both sustainable development and fighting climate change.
Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
Energy and climate policies aren’t always headed in the same direction, but if they work together they can tackle two of the biggest challenges of our time.
In the lead-up to the climate conference in Glasgow, and with increasing pressure from the Biden administration, Scott Morrison finds himself beset by the limited flexibility of the Nationals on climate policy.
With wildfires, droughts and extreme storms in many parts of the world, climate warnings are starting to feel personal.
Peter Parks/AFP via Getty Images
It isn’t just the effects of climate change that could destabilize the financial system, it’s also fossil fuel assets losing value. The good news is that central banks can fix it.
A holistic view of climate change risk considers climate hazards, exposure, vulnerability and the responses to these. It also takes into account how multiple risks interact.
It’s meant to stop what’s known as ‘carbon leakage’ – when production moves elsewhere to avoid climate policies – but the solution has economic, legal and environmental consequences.
We were supposed to have a ‘climate election’ in 2019. New research looked at attitudes to climate change in Australia, and may explain why that didn’t pan out.
It’s said the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. Let’s hope that’s not the case with Mathias Cormann’s climate stance when he joins the OECD.
As climate change brings longer and drier summers, Canadians will face greater risks of more serious wildfires, like those that tore through neighbourhoods in Fort McMurray, Alta., in May 2016.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz
David Hall, Auckland University of Technology e Nina Ives, Auckland University of Technology
New Zealand has put just over half of its NZ$50 billion pandemic stimulus towards clean energy, but several fossil fuel powered projects will slow down the country’s shift to a low-emissions economy.