Cat Abreu

Oil and gas proponents are celebrating this misleading headline from the Globe & Mail. | Catherine Abreu Oil and gas proponents are celebrating this misleading headline from the Globe & Mail. That tells me all I need to know about about its implications for Canadian climate policy. The Canadian Climate...

Oil and gas proponents are celebrating this misleading @theglobeandmail.com headline. That tells me all I need to know about about its implications for Canadian climate policy. Here's what the @climateinstitute.bsky.social's latest report is actually about. www.linkedin.com/posts/cather...

How do we drive large-scale systems change? Join me & global leaders convened by the National Academy of Medicine @nam.edu to explore the structural levers that can move us from climate-health ambition to action.
Learn more & register at nam.edu/event/the-ho...

And that’s a wrap! I leave you with this from António Guterres:

“The fossil fuel age is failing. We are in a new energy era where cheap,clean,abundant energy powers a world rich in economic opportunity. But it won’t happen on its own. Not fast enough. Not fair enough. It is up to us.”

6. Unleash the full force of
finance & drive investment to where it’s needed.

This is a big one! Reform the global financial architecture, address debt, enhance equity financing

A more than fivefold increase in annual clean energy investment needed in emerging economies by 2030.

5. Use trade and investments to supercharge the transition.
-cut tariffs on clean energy
-use South-South cooperation to unlock investment
-modernize investment treaties, starting with Investor-State
Dispute Settlement provisions, which fossil fuel interests are weaponizing to delay the transition

Just Transition - Climate Action Network Are we just in a transition or do we need to be in a just transition? A fundamentally important difference. We have seen too often the blue-collar workforce being left behind with rapid unemployment i...

4. Invest in just transitions.

Equity, social protection, education & training for workers. Inclusion of Indigenous Peoples, women, young people. These are the principles that must lead the transition.

It’s a big year for just transition! Learn more: climatenetwork.org/resource/jus...

3. Satisfy growing demand with clean energy.

More communities are getting access to the energy they need. But it’s the data centres that are generating a lot of demand growth.

Today Antonio Guterres called on every major tech firm to power all data centres with 100%
renewables by 2030.

2. Build the energy systems of the 21st century.

For every dollar spent on renewables, just 60 cents goes to grids and storage. These investments need to be on par to build the infrastructure of the future.

1. Use national climate plans to go all out on energy transition.

Countries new climate plans under the Paris climate treaty are due this year. These plans need to build roadmaps for countries to accelerate their transition from fossil fuels to renewable.

So here’s the Secretary-General’s six point plan for the movers and shakers in this audience to double down on clean energy and make the transition faster and fairer:

Meanwhile, 80% of this good good renewable energy growth has happened in OECD countries and China, 10% in Brazil and India, leaving only 10% for the rest of the world.

Africa has some of the best RE potential and the greatest energy access needs in the world yet has only seen 1.5% of this growth.

Fossil fuels are being subsidized by more and more public money while investments shift to renewables and fossil elites convince governments to throw good money after bad. Consumptions subsidies for coal, oil and gas have a 9 to 1 advantage over subsidies to affordable clean energy.

BUT. There’s a big but. Well, a couple.

The transition away from fossil fuels to renewables isn’t fast enough, and it isn’t fair enough.

Fossil fuel elites are buying politicians to maintain business as usual (he said it more tactfully), and RE isn’t reaching all who need it.

Some countries are saving a bunch of money with clean energy. Why? Because it reduces their reliance on expensive volatile fossil fuel markets. Gas prices increased 5x in the UK in 2022 alone!

‪Some countries are making a bunch of money from clean energy. ‬

‪GDP growth from renewables in 2023:‬
‪🇮🇳 India - 5%!‬
‪🇺🇸US - 6%!!‬
‪🇨🇳China - 20%!!!‬
‪🇪🇺EU - 33%!!!!‬
‪(Side note: so depressing not to see 🇨🇦Canada on this list given our wealth of renewables resources) ‬

Cheap renewable energy means better energy access for those who need it, and huge job growth.
In 2023:
👷🏾‍♀️Clean energy jobs reached a total of 34.8 million, of which
16.2 million are in renewables.
💰Clean energy added around USD $320 billion to the global economy,
accounting for 10% of GDP growth

Plummeting costs mean that solar and wind are now the fastest growing sources of electricity in history.
🎯In 2024, renewables made up 92.5% of all new electricity capacity additions and 74% of electricity generation growth.

The room is packed full of ambassadors from all over the world. We start by hearing about how incredibly affordable renewable energy is.
☀️Solar energy is now 41% cheaper than coal, oil, or gas.
💨Onshore wind energy is 53% cheaper than fossil fuels

I’m in New York for UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ special address on climate. He has a hopeful story amidst the chaos and loss of climate disaster. Stick with me to follow his speech, and check out the report his comments are based on!

www.un.org/en/climatech...

Announcing the Canadian Youth Climate Assembly! 36 people aged 18-25 will assemble this summer to identify what young Canadians want Parliament to do on climate. I'm thrilled to be part of the Advisory & Oversight Committee.

Spread the word! Find out more & apply to participate at www.climacan25.ca

And why, dear G7 leaders, do you think that "the world has experienced record-breaking wildfires across every forested continent over the past decade"? Maybe a little thing you used to call clim*te ch*ange before it became the crisis that dare not speak its name? www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/stat...

So while I understand the temptation of an all-of-the-above approach -“we have real green energy and our fossil fuels are somehow green, too!”- it’s just not how it shakes out for the climate. (Plus, it’s Norway & Saudi Arabia whose o+g is actually “cleanest”. Canada isn’t even winning that race.)

Canada’s uncounted emissions Canada doesn’t count emissions from its oil and gas exports. So we did.

And that’s not even counting the emissions when it gets burned. Canada exports more emissions every year than we produce ourselves.

newsinteractives.cbc.ca/features/202...

The oil and gas industry has been “decarbonizing” for decades and, while we’ve seen some incremental decreases in emissions per barrel, the overall pollution from this one sector alone has ballooned to over a third of Canada’s entire emissions.

That’s where our focus needs to be, not on wordplay that obfuscates governments and industry carrying on with business as usual.

With respect, our climate doesn’t understand semantics. In 2023 the world agreed to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels to energy efficiency & renewables b/c that’s the action our atmosphere understands and needs to preserve a climate resembling the one human civilization developed in.

Thanks, Daniel. I think we agree the energy transition needs to lead with energy efficiency followed by renewables, requires creative solutions where EE and RE won’t meet the need, and isn’t served by governments jumping to CCS just for the sake of preserving existing fossil fuel systems and profits

3) Why the hell are we even talking about this when cheap renewable energy is already here and all the other sectors of Canada’s economy are starving for the political attention and resources tied up in keeping alive an industry that is already in transition, whether they like it or not

2) The vast majority of oil and gas emissions come from burning the stuff, not producing it, and we can’t CCS our way out of that pollution

Sure, except
1) Using carbon capture and storage (CCS) to continue the production of fossil fuels is an absurd waste of a limited technology that should be applied only where absolutely needed to cut emissions that can’t be cut through other means