It’s Friday, May 28, and the G7 countries have made a new climate commitment.
Seven of the world’s most powerful economies came together last week in a new effort to combat climate change. The environmental ministers for Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States, also known as the G7 nations, have pledged to phase out international financing for coal projects. This includes eventually ending the financing of coal-fired power plants in poorer nations, which Japan had previously supported.
“It gives a very strong signal to the world that coal is an energy of the past and has no place in our future energy mix — it sets the stage for a radical transition towards clean energy,” Barbara Pompili, France’s environment minister, said in a statement. “That was a difficult decision for Japan, in particular, and I am very pleased that Japan was able to take this decisive step.”
The world is still very far from reaching the goals of the Paris Agreement, but some major emitters recently strengthened their commitments to limit Earth’s warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels at President Joe Biden’s climate summit. And the G7 nations didn’t just limit their climate discussions to phasing out coal financing, they also committed to protecting 30 percent of the world’s land and 30 percent of oceans by 2030.
The Smog
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