(Credit: The White House)The G7 recently released its Clean Energy Economy Action Plan, which outlines operations toward reaching net-zero emissions by 2050 and limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celcius.
The plan provides seven specific commitments toward combating climate change through global industry, including incentivizing clean energy practices, ensuring decarbonization through global trade, and further promoting clean energy technologies, goods, and services going forward. They assert a plan that makes decarbonized industrial production the default business case over time and promotes a circular economy of goods and services.
Considering the global nature of the climate crisis, the G7 lays out a concerted, international effort in all aspects of its plan. They aim to work with the World Trade Organization (WTO) to “reform and strengthen the multilateral trading system” and commit to coordinated cooperation in these efforts rather than working at the expense of one another. Recognizing the impact that low-and-middle-income countries (LMICs) have on a clean energy transition, they promise to step up their efforts in providing them with climate financing. Through these endeavors, they uphold that transitioning to a clean energy economy should also work to “reduce poverty and advance shared prosperity.”
The G7 calls on prompt action from international leaders, including the Finance Ministers and the World Bank Group, to implement sustainable, resilient global supply chains and reduce emissions through trade policy. This includes upholding environmental standards above acting at each others’ expense for market gains, according to the plan.
Along with working to make clean energy affordable through incentivization, the G7 Action Plan ensures the further promotion of “open, transparent competitive energy markets" by working with the International Organization for Standardization to develop technical international standards for critical minerals markets. They also plan to work with small to medium start-ups, globally, who are working to innovate towards a net-zero economy.
The action plan intends to promote the production of environmental goods, services, and technologies that meaningfully help combat climate change. The G7 will also “incentivize reducing embedded emissions in clean energy goods and services, in a WTO-consistent manner.”
The G7 Action Plan asserts an ambitious but necessary collective commitment toward transitioning to a clean economy. Their policies are meant to effectively incentivize their partners in achieving net-zero emissions while also lifting workers, supporting marginalized communities, and upholding a rules-based multilateral system.
