First the French, now the Norwegians . . . According to a recent Reuters‘ announcement, ‘Norway says aims to go carbon neutral by 2030‘:
The plan includes offsetting Norwegian emissions by spending around 3 billion crowns ($553.1 million) per year to combat deforestation in developing countries. Forests act as a sink for CO2, the main greenhouse gas blamed for causing global warming.
Under the Kyoto Protocol curbing greenhouse emissions, countries do not get credit for the effect of their own forests, but they can get credits by planting trees in developing lands.
“The parties now think it is realistic to assume reductions in Norwegian climate gas emissions of 15-17 million metric tons of CO2 equivalents by 2020 when forests are included,” the government said in a statement.
Three million metric tons of that reduction would come from Norway’s forests absorbing carbon, it said.
The initial target was to cut 13-16 million metric tons of CO2.
Achieving the target will require cutting Norway’s total emissions by two-thirds domestically, the statement said.
Environmental groups said the deal was too vague, and Oil and Energy Minister Aaslaug Haga acknowledged: “We don’t know how we will achieve the goals yet, and that is challenging.”
A “significant sum” of money will be earmarked for investment in renewable energy, mass transport and measures to reduce emissions from the transport sector, while tax on diesel fuel will rise by 0.1 crowns ($0.018) per liter and on gasoline by 0.05 crowns, the government said.
“Both carrot and stick will be used to promote more environmentally friendly behavior and to reduce climate gas emissions,” the centre-left coalition said.
Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen of the Socialist Left (SV) party said the policy would lead to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions both in Norway and abroad.
“The agreement gives Norway a far-sighted climate policy that can stand independently of shifting governments,” Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said in the statement.
MOON LANDING
Stoltenberg, who heads the Labour Party, has said Norway’s policy on cutting CO2 emissions is the world’s most ambitious and he has likened the challenge of fighting climate change to a “moon landing” for the 21st century.
Norway, with a population of just 4.7 million, is the world’s fifth-biggest exporter of oil and Western Europe’s biggest exporter of natural gas.
Endowed with rivers and waterfalls, it gets almost all its own electricity from non-polluting hydroelectric stations. But the Nordic country aims to begin burning natural gas for power generation in the future to satisfy growing demand.
The government wants emissions from such power plants to be captured and buried, a technology still under development.
“The agreement implies technologies that are not known yet,” Stoltenberg told a news conference.
The government said it would spend an extra 70 million crowns ($12.91 million) this year on research into renewable energy and carbon capture and storage this year, and funding for such research would rise to at least 600 million in 2010.
My first reaction was Wow! Kudos to the Norwegians. If they can do it, why can’t the rest the world, and the U.S. especially, follow? Upon closer look, I am uncomfortable with their plan however. Too much is left up to chance, including relying on not yet existing technologies. Also too much of their anticipated reductions will be the result of carbon offsets – reforestation in developing countries. They could be more specific with possible reductions from existing solutions. So, yes, I agree with the environmental groups. The plan is way too vague.
Well it is hard not to have admiration for the energy plans of a number of countries when you are living in the U.S. To be fair to the Norwegians, the technology doesn’t exist yet to that would allow people the standard of living that many of us mega-consumers are accustomed to. And there is no politician in the world who is going to say, “Our policy is to cut back to a simpler way of living.”
Yes, I applaud the intentions of the Norwegians, and the French, and other European countries.
In response to your last statement, I would say, why not open a public debate on ‘how do people want to live in the future?’. We all assume people do not want to change. While there may be some truth to that, I still feel there is room for a national dialog. Other options besides status quo need to be explored, not just because of climate change imperatives, but also in the interest of increased national happiness . . .
I’m not sure either about “how” they will achieve this target in reductions, but I still think it’s a big step in the right direction. It’s setting a much needed pace. It implies movement “toward” a better future verses the “stagnancy” from doing nothing we’re witnessing here in this Country. And it is challenging for all countries for myriad reasons respective to those individual countries, certainly not just Norway. I expressed my ambivilence about one option, carbon sequestration, on another blog because not enough research has been done. All carbon sequestering means is relocation of a horrible poison from the air to the ground. There are definite adverse consequences to leaking or seeping CO2 in the ground, i.e. contamination of our ground water supplies.
“The agreement gives Norway a far-sighted climate policy that can stand independently of shifting governments,”.
Now this seems optimistic. (if I’m understanding it correctly). It will transcend government, meaning circumventing political persuasion for the sake of the goal rather than allowing individual party rhetoric to derail what appears to be such a good idea?
In the end I’m no expert on any of this. But it reads as though we’re moving out of “talking” about it so damn much and toward “doing” something to address helping this one beautiful planet we call home. Doing finally equaling action. That in and of itself feels much more hopeful to me. There is still so much to be addressed.
Elizabeth Tjader
Endowed with rivers and waterfalls, it gets almost all its own electricity from non-polluting hydroelectric stations. But the Nordic country aims to begin burning natural gas for power generation in the future to satisfy growing demand.
Norway already has the second highest power consumption per capita in the world, as you can see here.
24,644kWh per person. If they want to blame it on climate, well Sweden uses 15,424, Denmark 6,631, and Russia 5,642kWh. The world average is 2,655kWh.
I don’t know how high they expect to go, but I reckon they use enough already. Instead of putting in gas plants they should invest the money in efficiency, they’d get greater returns in greenhouse gas reduction terms than in paying other people not to cut down their forests.
Paying others to cut down their forests to reduce your own carbon emissions is a good one, that is. I can just imagine these guys at a bar.
“Hey buddy,” they say as they lean their ruddy face over their glass and look at you with glazed and unfocused eyes, “I don’t wanna get drunk tonight, can I pay you not to drink?”
I agree with you Kyle. It sounds good, but how they decide to go about it is another story.
Still, they have lofty goals, and that’s a start as Elizabeth reminds us.
I give them a C
How can you grade them when they haven’t finished their project yet?
“How that’s CO2 reduction project going, Norway?”
“Um…. the dog ate my homework… while I was on Nintendo.”
I am not grading them on their final project, only on their proposal
I think it is a case of good news / bad news, and blogged it also:
“The more cynical amongst us may also note that Norway is the world’s third largest exporter of oil and natural gas. Record prices in these commodities have lead to a predicted budget surplus for 2008 of $80 billion, making such lavish schemes easier to fund. We assume that it is ok to continue earning record profits from fossil fuel production as long as other nations do the actual polluting?”
Full post (if you are interest: http://www.talkclimatechange.com/2008/01/19/norway-co2-neutral-or-co2-exporter/
I think of it from the perspective of a chef. It’s easy to write a nice recipe. But what does it turn out like? That’s the real test of a recipe. The proof of the pudding’s in the eating.
Of course, if you’re a glutton then everything tastes nice to you. Which is possibly why the second-highest users of electricity in the world think this is such a fine proposal.
Mark, thanks for joining us and for leading discussion on your own blog as well. This makes me think about the importance of all of us citizens contributing to a more balanced truth. I just wish more citizens would feel empowered to contribute.
Kyle, I like your image of the chef. Another image I have is of the composer, writing a score to be played by a whole orchestra. Not only does the score have to be good and sound good, but it sounding good depends also on all the participants each performing well their own instruments, and playing well together, under the direction of a great conductor.