Curbing Climate Change – one tree at a time

While there are various ways being implemented and suggested to deal with the issue of
climate change, North America and a few countries like Norway, Sweden, Canada, England
and Australia have invested in constructing buildings with wood. This particular type of
wood used for construction is the cross-laminated timber, or CLT. First introduced in 1990s,
it enables architects and engineers to design tall, fire-safe and beautiful wooden buildings.
The energy embodied in the materials for new buildings around the world – mostly steel
and concrete – accounts for 11 percent of global carbon emissions. Typically, coal is used to
heat these materials to temperatures over 2500 degrees Fahrenheit in the manufacturing
process.

Wood, in contrast, is forged from sunlight. A study by scientists from Yale University and the
University of Washington showed that expanding wood construction while limiting global
harvesting to no more than the annual growth could produce a combination of emissions
reduction and carbon sequestration equivalent to eliminating construction emissions
altogether. This could take a big bite out of the carbon problem, roughly equivalent to the
present contribution from all types of renewable energy.

Net-Zero Carbon Emission plans

A recent chain of climate-induced extreme events has shaken the world: heatwaves in
Europe, Dorian and other hurricanes in North America, forest fires in the Amazon,
permafrost in Antarctica, hottest mean average days across the globe. The world has begun
to hit the panic button. The prospect of a 2°C increase in average temperatures is menacing
enough, let alone the drift towards 3°C or more.

UN chief António Guterres refers to it as a climate catastrophe and had asked heads of
states to come to the Climate Summit with a plan to be carbon neutral by 2050, and to
commit to not commissioning any coal-powered plans after that. Growing global demands
are even more radical: carbon neutrality by 2025, decommission coal-power plants, and
eliminate subsidies on fossil fuels.

Many of them are now pushing their national targets forward: Norway has announced it will
become carbon neutral in 2030, Finland in 2035, Sweden and the UK in 2045. The UK,
Norway, Sweden and France have become the first four countries to convert net-zero
emissions into law. The EU is moving towards increasing its emissions reduction target to 55
per cent by 2030. While hundreds of states, cities and towns, companies and campuses
have declared a climate emergency, this is not the same as having zero-carbon emissions
plans.

China and India, among the world’s biggest emitters, have a two-track strategy: moving
relentlessly to increase the share of renewable energy in their overall energy mix and to
become global leaders in solar and wind energy production and usage.

Brazil and South Africa, the two other BASIC countries, they are arguing that countries that
industrialized first must take the lead in zero-carbon efforts. The concern is that the ‘net’ in
‘net-zero’ should not provide the developed countries a cover to shift their carbon burden
to poorer nations.

But while ‘net-zero’ emissions may sound similar to ‘zero-emissions’, the two concepts are
not the same and have different consequences. The word ‘net’ in ‘net-zero’ hides a range of
controversies and loopholes. Key Negative Emission Technologies such as biofuels,
bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, and bio-char are not fully tested.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has acknowledged serious questions about
their technological feasibility. While avionics and agriculture and some other sectors have
still not progressed sufficiently to give absolutely zero emissions, others like cement and
shipping are on the verge of doing so. Therefore, de-carbonization of the economy will not
be even across sectors, and there is space for emissions trading nationally or internationally.

This could also drive land grabs and increase food insecurity for the poor through the large-
scale use of land, biofuels and biomass to absorb rising carbon dioxide emissions. Instead of
requiring real emissions cuts, ‘net’ counting could allow for business-as-usual greenhouse
gas emissions, offset by massive-scale mitigation through the land sector.

Because of such technical limitations to carbon reduction, it is not always easy to judge the
credibility of national targets. Norway, for example, has a radical target to achieve carbon
neutrality. However, it relies heavily on investment in overseas carbon-reduction projects to
achieve this target. Meanwhile, the country continues to export oil.

There are many benefits for Pakistan if it publicly commits to becoming carbon neutral by
2050, scaling down and rolling back coal-powered plants, and doubling its ambition of
generating 30pc renewable energy by 2030. Pakistan need not be a mere spectator in the
global net-zero discourse and can consider joining the Carbon Neutrality Coalition, as have
Mexico and Ethiopia, and build investment partnerships with the members. Proactive
engagement will help Pakistan attract climate finance, propel economic growth and address
climate vulnerabilities. The choice is ours.

The Ocean Cleanup System of Netherlands

The interceptor is a solar powered machine that extracts plastic on its own from rivers.
Rivers 1000 rivers are responsible for 80% of the world’s pollution which means just 1% of
the rivers contribute to 80% of the pollution. 800 species worldwide effected by marine
plastic waste. The Ocean Cleanup System has been used to clean up rivers in Indonesia and
Malaysia with Vietnam and Dominican Republic as its next target.
Solving plastic problem through two ways:
1. Cleaning up the plastic already present in the oceans and rivers
2. Preventing more plastic from reaching the ocean