COP28: Multilevel Action, Urbanization and Built Environment, and Transport

The day recognized the value of multilevel actions in progressing the net zero agenda, whilst also highlighting the imperative need to continue finding solutions to emissions caused by our built environments, with 75% of global greenhouse emissions still coming from cities.

In a summary speech on Day 7, the President of COP28, Sultan Al Jaber, praised the nations involved for uniting in solidarity and demonstrating that multilevel action is not only feasible but also “alive and well”.

Citing the fact that over $83 billion in funding commitments, pledges and investments have been adopted in the first week of COP28, the President both acknowledged this as a shining example of the collaborative spirit at COP28 whilst stating the need to maintain and build upon the momentum required to keep the 1.5 degree within reach.

The President also highlighted that landmark decisions on loss and damage have been delivered in addition to the progress in climate finance, nature, energy and methane, as well as the first ever COP Global Cooling Pledge, and the advancement of the just transition.

Some of the day’s announcements included:

Net Zero Minister, Graham Stuart, announced £140 million would be used to help developing across Africa, Latin America and Asia set green goals and move towards achieving net zero whilst maintaining economic development.

This funding is expected to go toward renewable energy projects that would generate energy for 8.7 million people, create 25,000 new jobs and reduce CO2 emissions by around 800,000 tons. The UK Government has acknowledged that this comes as part of the broader need to not only address emissions at home, but also support developing states in reducing their own emissions and transition to clean energy effectively and efficiently.

This announcement is set against the backdrop of the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak’s, pledge to contribute £1.6 billion towards international climate finance (ICF) projects that seek to prevent and redress deforestation and increase the speed with which the global transition to clean and renewable energy can occur.

52 oil and gas companies have signed up to COP Charter committing them to net-zero operations by 2050 at the latest. This Charter also sets out an end to routine flaring by 2030 and seeks to eliminate upstream methane emissions by 2030.

In line with these commitments, the Charter’s signatories have agreed to take actions ranging from increased investment in renewable energy sources, low-carbon fuels and negative emissions technologies to increasing the transparency associated with measuring, monitoring, reporting and independently verifying greenhouse gas emissions and emissions reduction performance. The Charter also seeks to align industry best practices and enhance decarbonization of operations to reduce emissions as a collective industry and counteract energy poverty by providing stable and affordable energy to more vulnerable groups.

A global platform, based off satellite monitoring, has been announced. This seeks track and measure the methane emissions from waste and has been developed by a multi-party group spanning the Global Methane Hub, Google Foundation, Rocky Mountain Institute, Clean Air Taskforce (CATF), the Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON)/GHGSat, and Carbon Mapper.

The waste map will first be used in 20 cities defined as megacities and will contribute to better understanding and monitoring of a significant source of contemporary methane emissions.

France, Morocco, and the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) launched the Cement and Buildings Breakthrough initiative. The initiative sees 27 countries come together with a view to tackling emissions from the building sector and enabling near-zero emissions and climate-resilient buildings to become the new normal by 2030. The key focus will be upon decarbonizing the building sector and making clean technologies and sustainable solutions the most affordable, accessible and attractive option.

The new program forms part of the overarching Breakthrough Agenda, which has historically provided a guiding framework for actors across government, industry and civil society to communicate with one another and form coalitions that can help develop public, private, and public-private initiatives across the world.

As such, the first Buildings and Climate Global Forum will see construction ministers, local authorities, non-governmental organizations and businesses from nations across the world convene in Paris between 7-8 March 2024 to begin working towards the Cement and Buildings Breakthrough’s targets.

Microsoft has signed “one of the largest-ever nature-based carbon removal offtake agreements’” with Brazilian carbon removal start-up, Mombak. This will see Mombak provide Microsoft with around 1.5 million carbon removal credits via reforestation projects of degraded, unproductive pastureland, replacing this with trees native to the Brazilian Amazon rainforest to facilitate assisted natural regeneration.

Mombak’s agreement with Microsoft is predicted to present an opportunity to remove up to 1.5 million tons of carbon via reforestation, re-establishing 25 forests in deforested areas which will contain around 30 million trees comprised of more than 100 species native to Brazil’s Amazon.

This marks the latest expansion of Microsoft’s carbon removal portfolio, contributing towards their initiative to achieve carbon negativity by 2030 and offset all previous emissions by 2050.

FAB has announced an increase in its sustainable finance target by pledging to invest and facilitate over AED500 billion (USD$135 billion) in sustainable and transition financing by 2030 – a move which increases the bank’s clean financing target by 80%, up from its 2021 target of AED275.4 billion, (USD$75 billion).

The move comes as the latest development in FAB’s green energy strategy, having provided more than $27 billion in green energy, transport and projects financing over the past 2 years. In addition, it forms part of FAB’s larger strategy, having begun to move towards transition financing with a view to involvement with, extractive and other hard-to-abate emissions industries, as well as developing areas like hydrogen.

These commitments were echoed by FAB Group CEO, Hana Al Rostamani, who described the target announced at COP28 as “a floor and not a ceiling”.

Iberdrola and Masdar have announced a strategic partnership agreement worth $15 billion that aims to evaluate the joint development of offshore wind and green hydrogen projects in targeted markets such as Germany, the UK and the USA.

This comes after Iberdrola and Masdar’s positive co-investment in Baltic Eagle and the ongoing construction of the East Anglia 3 windfarm, both of which will contribute to Iberdrolas’ 1,258MW of operational wind projects.

Given that 118 governments have pledged to triple their renewable energy capacity by 2030 at COP28, Iberdrolas Executive Chairman, Ignacio Galn, stated that “immediate action” must be taken by the private sector to provide these governments with the ability to rapidly continue to deliver on these targets.

It is clear that urban development, the built environment and its supporting infrastructure contribute significantly to global greenhouse gas emissions. The sector has an important role in developing solutions to decarbonisation and the global push for near-zero emission and resilient buildings by 2030. Several initiatives announced on Day 7 including the Cement and Buildings Breakthrough initiatives and the Green Procurement pledge if implemented at scale over the next decade will help meet these ambitions. Ensuring appropriate frameworks for monitoring and assessment and collaboration across the ecosystem to scale new technology is key to realising ambitions and an economy that thrives.