Page 28 - Frontier Technologies to Protect the Environment and Tackle Climate Change

Frontier Technologies to Protect the Environment and Tackle Climate Change

the political and economic will to fight climate change appears to be fading, according to the UN
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in early 2019.
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The evidence for this is clear: despite having made promises to make their operations more sustainable,
the world’s biggest companies have continued to rely on fossil fuels to meet their energy demands.
Research shows that the carbon footprint of the global tech giants is growing particularly fast.
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This is partly explained by the exponential growth of data centres worldwide. While investment is
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being made to ensure that the manufacturing and operations of these new data centres may be as
environmentally sustainable as possible (e.g. through water efficiency measures, the use of renewable
energy and sustainability certifications), it is still unclear what impacts the continued operation or
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dismantling of the old data centres will have on the environment and climate. The fact remains that
data centres are consuming vast amounts of electricity and are leaving significant environmental
footprints. Unless these data centres begin to move towards utilizing renewable energy sources in
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their operations, they will remain responsible for a significant portion of global emissions.
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In light of this, at the briefing to Member States on the 26th session of the Conference of the Parties
(COP26), the Secretary-General set the following four main priorities:

1. ‘First, national climate plans – the NDCs – must show that countries are working to implement the
Paris Agreement, and each new NDC should show more ambition than the previous one. The newly
revised NDCs must set clear targets for 2025 or 2030 that will help stick to the 1.5-degree limit.’ 66
2. ‘The second priority is to establish a common direction of travel, with all nations adopting
strategies to reach net zero emissions by 2050. So far, 70 nations have announced that they are
committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. Many other constituencies are doing the
same, such as cities; banks and businesses. But this still only represents less than one quarter
of global emissions.’ 67
3. ‘The third priority is for a robust package of programmes, projects and initiatives that will
help communities and nations adapt to climate disruption and build resilience against the
impacts to come.’ 68

4. ‘The fourth priority is finance. By COP26, developed countries must deliver on the commitment
they took to mobilize 100 billion dollars a year by 2020 with both public and private investments.’ 69

The need to mobilize long-term finance is to ‘align with net-zero emission commitments by 2050, and
incorporate climate risk and carbon pricing in investments.’ The cycle of climate change will never cease
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unless ‘it is widely understood that it is no longer profitable to invest in the gray or brown economy.’ 71

The ramifications of climate change are, moreover,
likely to be exacerbated by the growing pressure
of urbanization. Today, more than 4 billion people
(over half the global population) live in cities and
urban areas; and this number is expected to grow
over the coming years. 72,73 Over 70 per cent of
energy-related CO emissions can be traced back
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to cities, which are responsible for about 60-80
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per cent of all energy consumption. 75

Cities are more and more at risk from the direct and indirect impacts of climate change, which
means that most of the global costs of adaptation to climate change are likely to be incurred by, and
within, cities. These costs will increasingly include those associated with negative health outcomes
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resulting directly from air pollution in urban areas; approximately 7 million people around the world
die every year from exposure to air pollution alone.
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