February 2018: The German Environment Agency (UBA) released the first two studies in a commissioned series examining climate policies and future mitigation opportunities in ten countries. The studies look at: emissions and energy use; current climate mitigation actions with a focus on implementation of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs); and emission reduction potential and barriers.
Country reports are being prepared for Colombia, Ethiopia, Georgia, Indonesia, Iran, Kenya, Marshall Islands, Morocco, Peru and Viet Nam. Reports for Indonesia and Viet Nam have already been already published, with the rest to be published in the coming months.
The reports analyze current mitigation contributions, considering: previous scientific analyses; resulting numbers and figures from implementation of NDCs; and proposed actions based on cost, political feasibility and sustainability criteria. The reports determine whether mitigation contributions of the countries are sufficient to remain within the the 2°C/1.5°C target, as called for in the Paris Agreement on climate change.
The reports also examine mitigation potential up to 2030, the extent to which this potential is being tapped by the NDCs, and the cost of implementing such potential. The reports look at: potential successes and barriers in the political and economic system for implementing mitigation measures, particularly if a long-term decarbonization strategy is in place; how to overcome barriers; and various actors that have a have a commercial stake in climate action measures. The analysis also addresses whether countries have climate action strategies in place and how reporting systems are anchored in national institutions.
As Colombia, Indonesia, Kenya, Morocco and Viet Nam have significant domestic coal mining/electricity production industries, studies for these countries aim to determine how to implement policies, and related economic and social measures, to promote a phase-out of the energy recovery of coal, which also has positive side effects for, inter alia, air pollution control, agriculture and human rights.
The completed Indonesia report assesses mitigation regarding land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) governance and monitoring, and electricity demand and generation. It also looks at the planned increase in coal use, including the economic role and local impacts of coal. The Viet Nam report assesses mitigation in the fields of: energy efficiency; setting the right incentives for upscaling the deployment of renewables; and reducing emissions in the transport sector. It also examines the planned increase in coal use.
The reports are being produced by the NewClimate Institute and the Wuppertal Institute for the UBA, which has been commissioning reports since 2016 in the framework of the two-year project ‘Implementation of Nationally Determined Contributions: Framework Conditions and Transformative Challenges in Selected Focus Countries.’ [Report Series Webpage] [Indonesia Country Report] [Viet Nam Country Report]