Target to reduce global emissions by 1 Gt

Systemic change concepts

Total emission impact potential over 50 Gt/a

Liquid fossil fuels

The global society and infrastructure, through various transportation and energy needs uses $6 billion per day in liquid fossil fuels.

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A transformative investment of equivalent $6 billion per day can decouple transportation and energy quickly from these fuels.

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Such investments can be made into electrification, wind, solar, geo- and seathermal, wave power and nuclear power.

World military spending

Global military spending was over $1900 billion in 2020. This equals to $5,4 billion per day - in spending to fight other people, but also to mitigate and prevent wars by using 'fear factor' as the solution of choice.

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How about if $5,4 billion were spent per day to ensure an improvement in quality of life globally to reduce the tension and aggression - and thus the need to fight or mitigate and prevent wars?

Global food challenge

Food waste and excess meat consumption account for massive emissions. In practice 1/3 of agricultural land is used to produce food waste and 77% of agricultural land is used for meat production.

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With a 45% reduction in both, enough land can be released back for natural biodiversity and carbon capture purposes.

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This can enable restoring new natural carbon capture areas with an impact of even 50 Gt/a

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Additionally as 1,6 billion tonnes of food is wasted and the economic impact is estimated to be $750-1000 billion value per year.

Plastic challenge

Globally 400 million tons of plastics are produced per year. All plastics can be turned bio-based, into a vast storage for atmospheric carbon, by extensive recycling. The 400 million tons of plastics would store approximately 1 giga tonne of CO2. Via such a transition, bio-based plastics would also become cheaper compared to current plastics as the annual savings from raw material expenses, regardless of annual investments into recycling and bio-based production, would exceed $100 billion.

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Previous work at AFRY/Pöyry

PlasticsToBio:

https://afry.com/fi-fi/osaamisalue/plasticstobio-konsepti

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https://afry.com/sites/default/files/2021-01/AFRY%20PlasticsToBio_2021.pdf

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Reforestation and afforestation: 5 trillion trees

The world has lost 1/3 of its forests during the industrial era driven by construction and agriculture. These forests, and more, can be returned by systematic reforestation and afforestation efforts.

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According to some estimates, the world has ~3-5 trillion trees in 2021.  There is about 4 billion hectares of forest left today.

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In order to recover to lost forests and floral coverage, approximately 5 trillion trees should be planted, how, where and why?

• Trees and bushes should be planted with sufficient fertile soil – and access to natural water (avoid active drainage to prevent water from flowing into rivers and oceans)

• Trees can be planted for example as follows:

• Degraded agricultural land, up to 5 trillion trees

• Melting tundra, permafrost area: 23 MM km2 = 4,6 trillion trees

• Along roads, 64 MM km roads = ~13 billion trees

• Cities, 10000 cities, 1 tree per habitant = 4,3 billion trees

• Along rivers and drainage, >500 000 km = 2,5 billion trees

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Fast growing trees and bushes:

• Eucalyptus, willow, aspen, pin oak..

• Spirea, arborvitae, North privet

• Choose a local, possibly a naturally occurring species!

NB!! A plot of 1000 m2 can hold a building of >5000m2 and 40 trees and still give a home to over 100 people

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Automotive sector transformation

The automotive sector can enable a 700 million ton emission reduction and the solution is circular. Changing existing cars to EV's will increase production emissions significantly, but retrofitting internal combustion engine cars with batteries and electrical motors offers a greater emission reduction potential.

The key industry estimates for 2021:

• The automotive market size is $3,6 trillion

• The repair and maintenance market is $544 billion

• 70 million cars will be sold, instead of regular 80 million

• Ideally number of cars sold per year should drop below 20 million thanks to higher car utilization rate (from 5-10% up to 40%)

• As an example, the emissions of producing a

  • Volvo XC40:   58 000 kg eq / 200 000 km

  • Volvo XC40 Recharge:   41000 kg eq / 200 000 km

• With renewable electricity, 48 000 km for emission breakeven

• Assuming 10 ton emission reduction per car, retrofitting 70 million ICE cars with EV engines and batteries could avoid 700 million tons of emissions and save 30-50 k€ costs per vehicle.

• The lifetime of a car can be extended from 20 to 30/40 years

End of Linear Economy

If everyone knew that the interest rates will grow by e.g. 0,1% per month during next 5 + years until a sustainable balanced circular economy is obtained, people and companies can plan and adapt to the changes.

Investments in favor of circular economy will ensure growth -  products are designed to be durable,  repairable and are recycled. People will find new jobs in services, repairs, refurnishing, restructuring, recycling.

A huge amount of savings are available when no new raw materials need to be purchased again and again. This value can be shared in the society, between producers, industries, recyclers and consumers. Purchase power is still maintained, it may even grow, and people can keep their jobs. Inflation does not grow as living costs become lower.

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Moving into such a plan would require dedication, faith, education, marketing, long-term commitment, global agreements. Initially, though, only one central ban needs to initiate this - and others will need to follow to maintain global economic balance.

Sustainable funding

Green money must be invested to maximize impact. Investments must take into consideration the achievable emission reduction, the material and energy efficiencies.

Finding the right companies with high potential impact and also to guide companies in future-proofing their strategy is imperative.

In general, companies can be given 'school grades' ranging from A to F depending on their climate impact:

A) Net-positive, reuse, circular solution, recycling and bio-based/renewable/CO2 based material companies. Reason for company existence is to decouple fossil materials and emissions and linear economy.
e.g. Reuse models, 2nd hand retail, mechanical, physical and chemical (advanced) recycling, waste management & sorting, recyclable bioplastics 

B) Develop large-scale real solutions to cut emissions and cannibalize their fossil business (incl scope 1, 2, 3). 
e.g. Renewable hydrocarbons for plastic production. Actively reduce burning of fuels. Renewable fuels (investing 10% of their revenue or asset value into the transition annually). Companies using bio-based and recycled raw materials as feedstock. Efficiency improvements.

C) Focus only to reduce emissions (scope 1 & 2). 
e.g. Use renewable energy, but continue to run fossil assets. Marginal investment into renewables, bio-based or circular solutions.

D) Try to appear to do something 
e.g. Companies only using compensation to cut emissions. Green pledges and marketing.

E) Do nothing. Misleading marketing, greenwashing.

F) Add or support new fossil exploration and production capacity. Active promotion of fossil funding and fossil subsidies. Misleading political lobbying.

What 'grade' do you give yourself and how could you improve for next year?