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Development finance facilities: Prospects for APAC
Sponsors and project developers across the renewables and energy transition space are currently facing a challenging macroeconomic environment.
Australia | 出版物 | October 2018
On October 8, 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5ºC (Special Report) (see here).
The Special Report synthesizes the impacts of global warming of 1.5ºC above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways from research across the global scientific community. The context of the report is to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.1
The Special Report not only provides vital guidance for upcoming international climate change negotiations in December; it also informs business and government decision-making around climate risk.
Further, noting the Hague Court of Appeal’s decision on 9 October 2018 to uphold the ruling in Urgenda Foundation v The State of Netherlands (Urgenda), the Special Report is likely to play a strong evidentiary role in future litigation relating to the impacts of climate change.
The IPCC is the leading world body for assessing the science related to climate change impacts, risks and responses and has been instrumental in driving action on climate change.
Following the adoption of the Paris Agreement at COP21 in 2015, the IPCC was invited to produce the Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5ºC. This Special Report is one of three Special Reports to be released by the end of 2019 along with a Methodology Report to refine the 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories. The IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report will be published in the first half of 2022.
The Special Report is highly relevant to commitments in the Paris Agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions with a view to ‘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 above pre-industrial levels’ (see our earlier update on the Paris Agreement here).2
The 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 24) is scheduled to meet in Katowice, Poland in December 2018 to finalise the rules which underpin the implementation of the Paris Agreement and the Special Report will play a strong role in negotiations.
The Special Report states that human induced warming has already reached about 1°C above pre-industrial levels. If the current warming rate continues, the world is expected to reach human induced global warming of 1.5°C around 2040.
The Special Report highlights a number of climate change impacts that could be avoided by limiting global warming to 1.5°C compared to 2°C, or more.
For instance, global sea level rise would be 10 cm lower with global warming of 1.5°C compared with 2°C by 2100. An Arctic Ocean free of sea ice in summer would occur once per century with a temperature rise of 1.5°C, compared with at least once per decade with 2°C. Coral reefs would decline by 70-90 percent with global warming of 1.5°C, whereas larger losses (> 99 percent) would occur at 2ºC. Notably for Australia, this will mean the difference between the partial survival of the Great Barrier Reef and its destruction.
The report finds that limiting global warming to 1.5°C is possible but would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure (including transport and buildings), and industrial systems.
These transitions are unprecedented in terms of scale, but not necessarily in terms of speed. Deep emissions reductions would be required in all sectors, with a wide portfolio of mitigation options and a significant upscaling of investments in those options.
In particular, the Special Report finds that for energy pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C with no or limited overshoot
Solar energy, wind energy and electricity storage technologies have substantially improved over the past few years signalling a potential system transition in electricity generation. In support of this finding, the Special Report states that total annual average energy-related mitigation investment for the period 2015 to 2050 in pathways limiting warming to 1.5°C is estimated to be around 900 billion USD.
In addition, the Special Report finds that for urban and infrastructure pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C with no or limited overshoot
The Special Report finds that for land pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C with no or limited overshoot
Notably, economic, institutional and socio-cultural barriers may inhibit transitions, depending on national, regional and local circumstances, capabilities and the availability of capital.
Although the Special Report appears to have received limited support from the Australian Federal government to date, it can be expected to have an impact in the development of climate policies across local and state government in the next couple of decades. For Australia, these transitions will have their own challenges, particularly in the transportation, agricultural and industrial sectors which, to date, have received little policy attention from the Federal government – the primary focus being on the energy sector.
In addition to its importance in potential climate litigation, the findings in the Special Report provide a strong signal for government and business that transitions in energy, land, urban environment, infrastructure and industrial systems that enable the limiting of global warming to 1.5°C will be required.
The findings are also expected to guide the COP24 international negotiations as well as the development of government climate change policies and business investment and operations decisions globally.
We will be reporting on the outcome of COP24 later this year, and we invite you to visit our COP page for further information here.
It is also worth noting that on 9 October 2018 the Hague Court of Appeal upheld the Netherland’s District Court’s ruling in Urgenda (see unofficial English translation from the Court here).
The District Court decision in Urgenda found that the Dutch constitution reflects a duty of care to address climate change and that the Dutch government must do more to avert the imminent danger of climate change. See a link to our earlier climate change litigation update including a case note on the Urgenda District Court decision here.
The appeal decision found, in upholding the District Court decision, that by failing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 25 per cent by end-2020, the Dutch government was acting in contravention of its duty of care under Articles 2 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protect the right to life, private life, family life, home and correspondence.3
Among other things, the Hague Court of Appeal considered the IPCC’s Fourth and Fifth Assessment Reports and found that a sufficient causal link can be assumed to exist between Dutch emissions and the effects of global climate change.
While the Urgenda decision is not binding on other jurisdictions, it is a landmark case that is likely to influence other judicial systems noting that similar proceedings have been filed around the world in Norway, Pakistan, Colombia, Switzerland, and before the European Union.4
The Special Report, synthesized from thousands of academic studies around the world, provides strong evidence on the impacts of climate change at 1.5°C global warming compared to 2°C and is likely to play a strong evidentiary role in any future climate litigation.
IPCC, ‘IPCC Press Release - Summary for Policymakers of IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5ºC approved by governments’ (2018/24/PR, 8 October 2018) <http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/session48/pr_181008_P48_spm_en.pdf>.
Paris Agreement, Article 2(1)(a).
Urgenda Foundation v. Kingdom of the Netherlands [2015] HAZA C/09/00456689 (Unofficial English Translation from the Court).
Dena Adler, ‘Dutch Court Upholds Landmark Urgenda Decision Requiring Dutch Government to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions’ (Columbia University Sabin Centre for Climate Change Law, Climate Law Blog, 9 October 2018) <http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/climatechange/2018/10/09/dutch-court-upholds-landmark-urgenda-decision-requiring-dutch-government-to-reduce-greenhouse-gas-emissions/>.
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Sponsors and project developers across the renewables and energy transition space are currently facing a challenging macroeconomic environment.
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