EU industrial air pollution cost up to €433 billion per year

Carbon dioxide levels are now higher than at any time in the past 3.6 million years

The atmospheric burden of CO₂ is now comparable to the level it was at during the Mid-Pliocene warm period around 3.6 million years ago, when concentrations of carbon dioxide ranged from about 380 to 450 parts per million, reports NOAA. During that period the sea level was about 24 metres higher than today, the average temperature was around 4ºC higher than in pre-industrial times, and studies indicate that large forests occupied areas of the Arctic that are now tundra.

Levels of the two most important anthropogenic greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide and methane, continued their unrelenting rise in 2020 despite the economic slowdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic response, NOAA has announced.

The global surface average for carbon dioxide (CO₂), calculated from measurements collected at NOAA’s remote sampling locations, was 412.5 parts per million (ppm) in 2020, rising by 2.6 ppm during the year. The global rate of increase was the fifth-highest in NOAA’s 63-year record, following 1987, 1998, 2015 and 2016. The annual mean at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii was 414.4 ppm during 2020.

Analysis of samples from 2020 also showed a significant jump in the atmospheric burden of methane, which is far less abundant but 28 times more potent than CO₂ at trapping heat over a 100-year time frame. NOAA’s preliminary analysis showed the annual increase in atmospheric methane for 2020 was 14.7 parts per billion (ppb), which is the largest annual increase recorded since systematic measurements began in 1983.

Compiled by Reinhold Pape

https://research.noaa.gov/article/ArtMID/587/ArticleID/2742/Despite-pandemic-shutdowns-carbon-dioxide-and-methane-surged-in-2020

Advertisements from fossil fuel firms with tobaccolike health warnings

According to the environmental law charity ClientEarth, many of the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies have used advertising to “greenwash” their impact on the climate crisis.

ClientEarth compares adverts produced by a range of companies with their overall climate impact and progress toward climate-safe business models.

Saudi Arabia’s Aramco said it conducted business “in a way that addresses the climate challenge”, yet it is the world’s largest corporate greenhouse gas emitter and plans to continue exploring for more oil and gas, despite having reserves greater than those of Exxon, Chevron, Shell, BP and Total combined. Shell said it was investing in “lower-carbon biofuels and hydrogen, electric vehicle charging, solar and wind power”, yet in 2020 it earmarked $17bn for fossil fuel operations, but just $2bn to $3bn per year for low-carbon businesses. Equinor has talked of increasing its renewable capacity tenfold by 2026, but renewables are planned to make up just four per cent of its energy mix by that date.

“We’re currently witnessing a great deception, where the companies most responsible for catastrophically heating the planet are spending millions on advertising campaigns about how their business plans are focused on sustainability,” stated Johnny White, one of the lawyers at ClientEarth.

The lawyers are urging policymakers to ban all fossil fuel company advertisements unless they are presented with tobacco-style health warnings about the risks of the climate crisis to people and the planet.

Source: The Guardian and ClientEarth, April 19th 2021

https://www.clientearth.org/the-greenwashing-files

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/apr/19/a-great-deception-oil-giants-taken-to-task-over-greenwash-ads

101 Nobel Prize laureates urge leaders to end fossil fuel expansion

A hundred and one Nobel laureates are calling for governments around the world to sign up to a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty to help tackle the climate crisis.

In an open letter to world leaders, scientists, past presidents, novelists and religious leaders are urging governments to commit to a fast and just transition away from fossil fuels, and a “transformational plan” to ensure everyone around the world has access to renewable energy.

The signatories are experts in the fields of peace, human rights, security, economics, literature and the natural sciences, and say they “are seized by the great moral issue of our time: the climate crisis and commensurate destruction of nature”.

The letter states that “for far too long, governments have lagged, shockingly, behind what science demands and what a growing and powerful people-powered movement knows: urgent action is needed to end the expansion of fossil fuel production, phase out current production, and invest in renewable energy.”

Source: The Guardian, Euractive April 21st 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/21/101-nobel-laureates-call-for-global-fossil-fuel-non-proliferation-treaty

Deteriorated rivers breathe out greenhouse gases

Rivers and streams have been found to release up to 3.9 billion tonnes of carbon annually¹. Whereas carbon emission from rivers is a natural ecosystem process, the emission rates can be significantly increased by human-induced degradation of rivers. This problem is especially pronounced for urban rivers. A study from the Cuenca urban river system in Ecuador showed, for instance, a clear relationship between pollution status and greenhouse gas emissions, and the global warming potential of heavily polluted rivers was up to ten times higher than that of rivers with acceptable water quality². Similarly, a study of rivers in Hong Kong showed that emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide were 2.2, 1.5 and 4.0 times higher, respectively, from polluted rivers than from those in better condition³.

A consequence of such findings is that the protection and restoration of rivers could significantly decrease emissions of greenhouse gases from these water bodies. In the EU, the implementation of river restoration programmes as part of the European Green Deal, the Water Framework Directive and the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 is vital in order to improve the state of European rivers. The urgency of such measures was recently highlighted in a scoping paper by the Living Rivers Europe Coalition⁴, which builds on a position paper by more than 20 NGOs in Europe.

1. https://aslopubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/lol2.10055

2. https://bg.copernicus.org/preprints/bg-2020-311/

3. See https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210323-climate-change-the-rivers-that-breathe-greenhouse-gases, which was the main source of information for this text

4.  https://eeb.org/library/protecting-and-restoring-river-ecosystems-to-support-biodiversity-scoping-paper-on-eu-restoration-targets-for-free-flowing-rivers-and-freshwater-ecosystems/

Big benefits of shore-side electricity

Shore-side electricity can drastically reduce the emissions from fossil-fuel-powered auxiliary engines of ships at berth, according to a new study that has estimated the auxiliary power demand at berth for 714 major ports in the European Economic Area and the UK.

The level of emission reductions depends on whether the auxiliary power demand at berth would be supplied from national grids or from green (CO₂-neutral) electricity. The former could reduce annual CO₂ emissions by 3 Mt, and the latter by 5 Mt. This equals an average reduction of overall shipping emissions by 2.2 (3.7) per cent and requires only 0.2 per cent (6.4 TWh) of the current electricity generation capacity of the EEA and the UK. Using shore-side electricity from the grid can also contribute to substantial annual local air pollution reductions of 86,400 tonnes of NOx, 4,100 t SOx, 1,600 t PM10, 4,300 t CO, 94 t CH₄, 4,800 t NMVOC, and 235 t N₂O.

Link to the study “The CO₂ reduction potential of shore-side electricity in Europe” by B. Stoltz et al: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2020.116425

Lisbon going for electric ferries

Ten new electric ferries will come into service in Lisbon, Portugal, between 2022 and 2024, replacing ferries currently running on diesel. The ships will be supplied by ABB and operated by public ferry company Transtejo. They will have total battery capacity of 1,860 kWh per ship, and each ferry will be able to carry up to 540 passengers, at a maximum speed of 17 knots.

Source: Ship & Bunker, 12 April 2021.

Costs of shipping in the Baltic Sea

Shipping is responsible for a range of various pressures affecting the marine environment, air quality and human welfare. In a new Swedish study, scientists have estimated the annual damage costs of shipping activities in the Baltic Sea to amount to €2.9 billion. When comparing the different pressures, they found that costs due to impacts on marine eutrophication (€768 million) and marine ecotoxicity (€582 million) were in the same range as the costs associated with reduced air quality (€816 million) and climate change (€737 million).

Link to the study “Valuating environmental impacts from ship emissions – The marine perspective” by E. Ytreberg, S. Åström, and E. Fridell: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.111958

Turkey bans open-loop scrubbers

Turkey has become the latest country to ban the use of open-loop scrubbers on ships in its territorial waters, thus joining a growing list of countries taking action against open-loop scrubbers, including China, Saudi-Arabia, Singapore and many European ports and regions.

Source: Splash247, 12 April 2021.

Phase-out shipping emissions

The European Parliament urges the Commission to “lead by example” in phasing out maritime emissions and support eliminating pollution from ships when in port and restrict air pollutant emissions in EU waters.

In a plenary resolution agreed on 27 April, the parliament repeated its call for the shipping industry to contribute to reaching carbon neutrality by making a 40-per-cent reduction in emissions by 2030, and for the EU emissions trading system to be extended to cover the sector.

They also added new demands, not least the urgent establishing of a sulphur emissions control area (SECA) for the Mediterranean Sea. Member states should also support “swiftly adopting” similar controls for nitrogen oxides, says the resolution, and extend both to all EU waters.

Moreover, member states should ban discharges from open-loop scrubbers, and the Commission should propose a gradual phase-out of the technology, which allows the use of cheap high-sulphur oil.

The parliament also called on the Commission to propose mandating zero-pollution shipping at berth and incentivise the use of onshore power supplies.

Source: Ends Europe Daily, 28 April 2021.

Link: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2021-0131_EN.html

Restrict traffic in cities to tackle air pollution

Banning polluting vehicles could cut harmful PM and NOx pollution in cities of over a million residents by up to 23 and 36 per cent respectively, saving up to €130 million per year in health and other costs, according to a new study for the European Public Health Alliance (EPHA). Researchers have studied 28 types of urban policies currently used in cities, from zero-emission public buses to sharing e-scooters, to see their effect on PM and NOx reductions from traffic.

EPHA Acting Secretary General Sascha Marschang said: “A dirty cloud has been hanging over cities for many decades, causing asthma, heart disease or lung cancer. As we fight Covid-19 through vaccines, we must fight this cloud of disease, too. Now is the time for city bosses to grab with both hands some of the generous Covid stimulus funding available to truly ‘build back better’ to really improve people’s health and their environment.”

Source: EPHA, 23 March 2021.

The report “Air pollution and transport policy at city level”: https://epha.org/air-pollution-and-transport-policies-at-city-level/

EP wants air quality law reforms

On 25 March, the European Parliament approved a resolution calling on the Commission to tighten the Ambient Air Quality Directive to bring pollution limits in line with World Health Organization Guidelines (WHO) and to regulate more air pollutants, such as ultrafine particles, black carbon, ammonia and mercury. It also proposes the replacement of the current target values (for O₃, As, Cd, Ni and BaP) with limit values.

The resolution contains numerous recommendations, including improved air quality monitoring; explicit provisions in the directive to guarantee the right of citizens to justice in line with the Aarhus Convention; and strengthened legislation to reduce emissions at source, particularly from road and maritime transport, aviation, industrial installations, buildings, energy production and agriculture.

Link to the EP report: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2021-0107_EN.html

Clean air possible without lockdown

Cities can permanently achieve pandemic-low air pollution levels by accelerating the ongoing switch to zero-emission vehicles, as well as extra walking, cycling, public transport and teleworking.

Cleaner air will return faster by combing both approaches, according to a study for Transport & Environment (T&E), released one year after the first lockdowns were put in place in Europe. The report comes as governments prepare to spend nearly €700 billion in EU Covid recovery funds, a third of which is earmarked for green investments, including transport.

T&E called on mayors and governments to increase zero-emission zones, reform taxes to favour emissions-free vehicles, roll out the right charging infrastructure and zone off more public space for walking, cycling and public transport. It calls on the EU to announce a phase-out date for all fossil fuel vehicles by 2035 at the latest and tighten its 2025 CO₂ standards for cars, vans, trucks and buses.

Source: T&E, 10-11 March 2021.

The report “Blue Sky Recovery”: https://www.transportenvironment.org/publications/blue-sky-recovery-how-keep-lockdown-low-levels-air-pollution-european-cities