🌱 As climate was very much the flavour of the week, maybe now is a good time to have a look at where the real problems are when it comes to curbing greenhouse gas emissions. Especially since the EU is ratcheting its target up from 40% by 2030 to 55% (probably). Thread./
🚧 Cement. Manufacturing produces 8% of global emissions. EIGHT-PER-CENT. That's only a little less than the EU's total contribution. Heidelberg Cement is aiming to reduce its output to "just" 500kg of CO2 per tonne produced by 2030. These are big numbers, needless to say
🏠 Buildings. 36% of EU emissions come from them. New rules on new builds will ramp up efficiency but old buildings need renovating. That is costly and inconvenient for most people. A real public awareness boost is needed to increase rates to their required level
🚢 Shipping. 3.7% of the EU's total and growing. The sector will be added to the bloc's carbon market but new tech needs to be deployed. There are no hydrogen, ammonia-fuelled ships in service yet, and vessels have lifetimes that last decades not just years
🚜 Farming. ~10% + falling. But there are diminishing returns as new techniques can only achieve so much. It's a politically-charged sector where any notion of degrowth is a hard sell. It's also likely on a collision course with the EU's planned reliance on carbon sinks, land use
✈️ Aviation. 3% of EU total, increasing but COVID-hit. Same tech issues as shipping, also little attention paid to non-CO2 impacts. Commission assessment did not mention them
By no means an exhaustive list of course, just a few options either off the radar or inherently difficult to clean up
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🧀 CHEESE WAR UPDATE:
EU court says Denmark is breaking the law by allowing its cheesemakers to sell products called 'feta'. Feta is a protected foodstuff that can only be made in certain areas of Greece
Denmark had claimed that its 'feta' was only for sale in non-EU countries, so no rules were broken. The court confirms that this is bogus and protected food norms still apply
Still no statement by Danish @Statsmin Fette Medriksen
If this isn’t a resigning matter I don’t know what is
💶 Auditors say the EU Commission overstated its climate spending by *€72BN* between 2014-2020. The watchdog fears that this discrepancy could be repeated for the current period [...]
The Commission said €216bn - 20% of the budget - had gone toward climate action. But spending was often overstated according to a new report. The main sector where the figure is overblown? Agriculture, by some *€60BN* [...]
By applying "more reasonable coefficients" the auditors say that just 13% (€144bn) was spent on climate action in that budgetary period [...]
🇫🇮 Finland aims to be carbon-neutral by 2035. But nurturing nature (~75% of the country is forest) and exploiting it at the same time is proving to be a difficult or even impossible ask
🌲 New data suggests Finland’s forests emitted more CO2 than they absorbed last year. Logging and slow tree growth probable causes. You can’t build climate targets on carbon sinks if your sinks aren’t doing their job
🌳 This is what happened to the Amazon last year. There, a mixture of logging and fires (deliberately set to clear land for farming) are the causes
🌱 THREAD on the cartoon/comic world’s climate change progress.
1. Tintin. Massive carbon footprint. Constantly travelling via inefficient means, just look at that plane tech. Also is potentially in the pocket of petrostate officials
2. Asterix. All-boar diet isn’t great and the Gauls are always chopping down trees to make palisades. The village arguably delays the Roman industrialisation of agriculture though. More progress needed
3. Flintstones. Mobility is pretty sustainable but Fred’s job at the quarry suggests heavy industry emissions and I don’t see any CCS tech deployment in Bedrock