Press Release06.07.2021

Beyond Climate Neutrality

Policy paper on the Glasgow climate summit in November

Ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Glasgow in November 2021, the WBGU today presented a policy paper entitled 'Beyond Climate Neutrality' to Anja Karliczek, Federal Minister of Education and Research, and Jochen Flasbarth, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for the Environment.

In the paper, the WBGU recommends making national long-term strategies a key topic at the Glasgow climate conference in order to provide orientation for current climate policy. Up to now, countries have only been obliged to submit short-term 'nationally determined contributions' (NDCs) to climate-change mitigation. These need to become far more ambitious and to start promoting policies conducive to achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement.

In the WBGU's view, therefore, countries must also be obliged to formulate and communicate long-term strategies that go beyond climate neutrality and aim for global climate stabilization, offering guidelines for strengthening NDCs and a basis for an internationally coordinated sustainability policy. This view was given a valuable boost by a ruling handed down on 24 March 2021 by Germany's Federal Constitutional Court, which imposed on German legislators a constitutional obligation to formulate long-term strategies to reduce CO2 emissions beyond 2030.

Long-term strategies should contain three separate priorities for this purpose: they should first stipulate a rapid and complete phase-out of fossil-fuel use, second, aim at the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of ecosystems, and third, make strategic preparations for the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere. The strategies should aim for multiple benefits with other sustainability dimensions, such as health and poverty reduction. Finally, it is extremely important to take into account the international impacts of the measures laid down in national long-term strategies, such as the consequences of planned imports of green hydrogen. Furthermore, the countries should commit in Glasgow to harmonizing their Covid-19 programmes for overcoming the consequences of the pandemic with their long-term climate-policy strategies.

Aim for climate stabilization

Climate stabilization means the permanent limitation of anthropogenic global warming, preferably to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, in order to prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system. To ensure climate stabilization in the  long term, it will most likely not be enough to achieve global 'climate neutrality', i.e. to create a balance between man-made sources and man-made sinks of greenhouse gases. It will most likely also be necessary to permanently remove more CO2 from the atmosphere than is needed for climate neutrality to counteract high past emissions and remaining warming trends. Because of their historical responsibility, it is above all the industrialized countries that have a particular obligation here. Many countries (including Germany with its Climate Action Plan 2050 and the draft amendment to the Federal Climate Change Act) have so far only aimed at climate neutrality with their national long-term strategies. The WBGU recommends that the goal of global climate stabilization, based on the Paris global-warming limits, should also be explicitly included in national strategies, and that measures and targets should be geared towards this goal.

Develop long-term strategies

Any long-term strategy should primarily exploit national potential for climate-change mitigation and, in doing so, estimate future requirements and potential for the production and import of raw materials and renewable energies. The international impacts of national policies should be taken into account and developing, especially low-income countries supported in implementing their long-term strategies. In this way, the strategies can form the basis of an international discussion on transformation pathways towards sustainability and set the framework for the further development of short-term national contributions to climate-change mitigation. Furthermore, long-term strategies should include synergies with the sustainability agenda. Especially in developing countries and emerging economies, national investment in science systems and spending on sustainability-oriented research and development should be greatly increased; regulatory frameworks and financing mechanisms should be reliably geared to the long term.

Set priorities in long-term strategies

In terms of content, long-term climate-policy strategies should focus on three priorities:

  1. Stop CO2 emissions from fossil sources: The WBGU recommends rapidly and completely phasing out the combustion of fossil fuels and limiting their material use to cases where no sustainable alternatives can be developed. Technology pathways should be chosen in such a way that they do not diminish the possibility of permanently removing CO2 from the atmosphere in the future.
  2. Strengthen the contribution of the biosphere (i.e. all terrestrial and aquatic habitats): The protection, restoration and sustainable use of ecosystems on land and in the ocean should link biodiversity conservation with climate-change mitigation.
  3. Plan ahead for the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere: In order to safeguard the prospects for climate stabilization even if CO2-emission reductions are insufficient, technical options for permanent CO2 removal should be kept open and further researched. However, it would be very risky to rely on the future recovery of emitted CO2 using technologies that are still under-researched.

All three priorities are necessary in order to achieve climate stabilization, although phasing out fossil fuels and strengthening the biosphere are fundamental. However, the corresponding goals and measures are not mutually substitutable and should therefore not be set off against each other.

Use Covid-19 stimulus programmes for climate stabilization

Covid-19 stimulus programmes and climate-policy framework measures should – like all forms of government support and investment – be more closely aligned with long-term strategies and be used for an ecologically and socially compatible transformation of economic and societal systems. Investments are required that have an impact on sectors such as energy, industry, transport, food, agriculture, forestry, fisheries and health. Long-term climate-policy strategies should point the way forward here.