Climate Change Solutions - Sensible or Misguided?

The landmark Paris Agreement to address climate change officially entered into force in November 2016 and has now been ratified by 185 of 197 parties to the convention. The agreement sets a course for all countries to limit global temperature rise to below 2°C and preferably to below 1.5°C. The latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns that global warming is becoming irreversible and that the societal impacts of climate change are calamitous. The IPCC report also carries a positive message that it is still possible to limit global warming to a 1.5°C increase and describes various mitigation pathways that countries could use to reduce their emissions. But are these mitigation pathways well-founded and coherent? Do they have a possibility of achieving the desired net zero emissions by 2050? Are countries developing the right strategies and taking immediate action to address the decarbonization of their energy systems? What are the policy-relevant indicators on how fast and by how much emissions can be reduced? Are there monumental changes in the energy system driven by technology, competitiveness and social innovation that will fundamentally impact climate policy? To address the above questions, this study will review the history of climate change agreements and will examine the IPCC’s illustrative strategies to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C. Discussion will also centre on emerging technologies for displacing fossil fuels, including nuclear energy, renewable energy (non-biomass), bioenergy, natural gas as a bridge fuel, carbon capture utilization and storage, and CO2 retention and negative emissions. It will be shown that despite enthusiastic support for climate mitigation, there are many serious policy and engineering obstacles to greenhouse gas reductions by mid-century. We argue that emissions from bioenergy should be treated in the same way as emissions from fossil fuels and this leaves many developed countries in a deep hole for reducing emissions. Based on the analysis in this study, we recommend that Canada pursue strategic policy directions and the design of unique and rational innovation programs.