Background

The IPCC and the Stern report have both shown that the changes in the global climate will have enormous and costly consequences. New studies show that climate change is much worse than previously thought. Bellona is working to promote three solutions to the climate crisis: energy efficiency, renewable energy and CO2 sequestration. This is why Bellona has made the Climate Plan App. You can read more about climate change and our work, on our website.

www.bellona.org

Bellona's work on climate policy

Bellona has for many years worked to promote policy decisions leading to emission reductions. In 2007, the Bellona Foundation presented a sector-based strategy to cut Norway's greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent. In 2009 Bellona presented an overall climate plan for Norway. This plan shows that it is possible to reduce Norway’s greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent by 2020. In 2010 the Norwegian Climate and Pollution Agency (KLIF) published the Climate Cure 2020 report investigating the measures and instruments available in different sectors to reach the Norwegian targets for greenhouse gas emissions for 2020.Following the report, Bellona held an extensive series of seminars together with the industrial actors on the policies available in the various sectors. This work resulted in a comprehensive response to the Climate Cure 2020 report, and an interactive graphical model. Bellona developed this to help communicate what measures must be implemented in different sectors, the costs involved, and the measures needed to reach the climate goals in the climate reconciliation.

The My Climate Plan application builds on the first version that was developed in 2010. Both are based on data from the Climate Cure 2020 report. In addition, Bellona has gone through the various measures and linked these to the appropriate policies that must be implemented for the measure to be executed. In April 2012 the Norwegian Government presented it’s White Paper on Climate Efforts. The Government keeps the targets of the 2008 agreement on climate policy, but in Bellona's opinion the white paper does not contain proper measures needed to achieve the goals by 2020. With the Climate Plan App you can create your own climate plan and see what needs to be done to achieve the goals.

Bellona's climate plan from 2009 | Bellona's submission to the Climate Cure 2020 | Bellona's comments on climate policy from 2012

Numbers and assumptions

This application is based on publicly available data from the study Climate Cure 2020 (www.klimakur.no). In 2008 The Norwegian Ministry of the Environment gave the Climate and Pollution Agency the responsibility to lead the study on how the objectives of the 2008 Agreement on Climate Policy could be reached by 2020. According to thisAgreement, Norway will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 15 - 17 million tons of CO2 equivalents by 2020, compared to a baseline scenario. This baseline scenario was presented in the national budget for 2007 and is a projection of the expected amount of greenhouse gas emissions, based on the adopted policy. It is not an approved development, but an assumed development. The baseline scenario for 2020 assumes that greenhouse gas emissions will increase to about 59 million tons of CO2-equivalents.

The forest binds CO2 through photosynthesis. The 2008 Agreement estimates that photosynthesis will reduce emissions by 3 million tons of CO2- equivalents, out of the 15-17 needed to reach the targets. The remaining reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (12-14 million tons of CO2 equivalents) reaching a level of 42-44 million tons of CO2- equivalents must be achieved through other measures.

In this application, we have made some adjustments to the baseline scenario. The Climate Cure 2020 found that the baseline estimates from 2007 were too high regarding greenhouse gas emissions from the use of fossil fuels for heating buildings (970 000 tons of CO2- equivalents). The baseline scenario has been reduced accordingly. The Climate Cure report included two measures already initiated (reduction of nitrous oxide emissions from fertilizer industry and reduced steam consumption in the petrochemical industry). These measures have been taken out of the industrial sector, and their emission reduction effect (323,000 tons CO2- equivalents) has been subtracted from the baseline. Altogether this leads to a baseline scenario in the Climate Plan App at a total of 58.6 million tons of CO2.