The G7 countries pledged on Friday to decarbonize most of their electricity sector “by 2035”, as well as to end all international funding for fossil fuel projects this year.
We are committed to achieving the most in the carbon -free electricity sector by 2035they said in a statement released after a meeting of climate and energy ministers in Berlin.
To achieve this goal, countries commit to support the acceleration of global coal emissions and in quickly develop the technologies and policies needed for clean energy transfer.
This is the first time that seven industrial powers (United States, Japan, Canada, France, Italy, United Kingdom, Germany) have united in such a goal.
The ministers also promised to end overseas funding of fossil fuel projects without carbon extraction technology through end of 2022. This announcement became possible due to a reversal of Japan, the last country in the group to refuse to commit to this question.
Twenty countries, including other G7 states, have already signed a declaration to this effect last November, during COP26 in Glasgow.
Fortunately Japan, the world’s largest fossil fuel financier, has joined the other G7 countriescommented Alden Meyer, expert for the European think tank E3G.
The G7 states also recalled their common goal of eliminating all direct subsidies on fossil fuels by 2025. Rewarding climate-damaging behavior subsidies […] this is nonsense and this nonsense must be removedcommented Robert Habeck, the German Minister of Economy and Climate, at a press conference on Friday.
According to the NGO Oil Change International, between 2018 and 2020, only G20 countries will fund such projects worth 188 billion dollars, mainly through multilateral development banks.
Source: Radio-Canada