“CLIMATE CHANGE – REPORT PAPER”

Research Question:
How evaluations, design and implementation of effective policy – focused strategies
from countries that have successfully adapted to and mitigated the effects of climate change
can be used to influence other countries who are struggling to also alleviate climate change
effects.

Background and Significance

Greenhouse gases are emitted by both natural and anthropogenic processes. According
to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, humans over the last 150 years have
released an exponentially increase of greenhouse gas due to human activities of burning fossil
fuels for electricity, heat and transportation. Global GHG emissions depicted an increase of 19%
between 2005 to 2015 specially from developing countries. Greenhouse gases, such as carbon
dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide is trapped within the Earth’s atmosphere that causes changes
in the radiative balance of the Earth. These changes cause for warming and effects on various
aspects of the climate. Climate change is one of the most important environmental issues of
our time and levels of GHG emissions are dependent on factors of population, energy sources
and economic bases. With the release of GHGs and their increasing concentration in the
atmosphere are impacting the environment, human health and the economy. These impacts
are expected to become more severe unless emissions of greenhouse gases are reduced.
The consequences of increase levels of GHGs are seen to increase average annual
temperatures within the environment. This increase in average temperature causes decrease in
snow, sea ice, glacier coverage and permafrost in the Arctic which increases sea levels and
precipitations levels allowing for increase of flooding. According to the intergovernmental Panel
of Climate Change (IPCC, 2014), during 1901-2010 the global average sea level rose 19
centimetres. Increase in annual temperatures has also increased the intensity of extreme
climatic events such as hurricanes/tornados and has depleted air and water quality. As changes
in greenhouse gas concentrations alters the global climate it also brings consequences towards
the human health, where climate change is seen to affect the food availability and allow for the
spread of disease to be more prominent. As well with increasing climates and greenhouse gas
concentrations, the risk of respiratory problems from exacerbated air pollution becomes a
problem. As climate change has serious implications on the environment and health on both
the planet and people, it also poses as a threat to the global economy. In which agriculture,
tourism and recreational services become affected to the changing weather.
In order to reduce these implications, addressing climate changes is needed across all
nations and must take serious actions from the government, businesses and individuals to
reduce the emissions, build resilience and support and finance these objectives. Such action
account as policies and measures that facilitate what adaptation and mitigation procedures are
needed to be met in order to face the challenges of climate change. Though majority of policy
debates are dependent on the cost of adaptation, instilling proper incentives are important as
more of climate change action is taken by private players (Argrwala et al, 2008). As majority of
policies are sector and country specific, international climate change regimes such as the
United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol depict the
international determination of mitigating and adapting to climate change. However,
governmental sectors within each country vary based on their distribution of power. This
difference in policy views and political structure and systems can explain why climate change is
a major issue on Germany’s political agenda but are not for some countries like the United
States. (Kesling, 2008).

Theory Review
Climate change is a global issue, that effects the health, ecosystem and communities
throughout the world. Organizations such as the EU28 and Paris agreement work towards
connecting countries on mitigating and adapting to the changes in our climate. In 2015, the
Paris Agreement reached a landmark arrangement to combat climate change and accelerate
the intensity of investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future. The agreement aims
to reduce the global temperature well below 2 degrees Celsius. As a lot of countries have taken
this global issue seriously, Germany being the leading industrialised nation and the EU’s
strongest economy has reduced their emissions from 1,251 million tonnes of CO2 from 1990 to
an estimated 805 million tonnes of CO2 in 2019. Depicting a 36% decline of greenhouse gases.
The European model of government – specifically Germany’s uses a parliamentary government
system, where Germany’s Chancellor determines which policies will be included in the federal
agenda. This process will allow issues such as climate change to be passed easily through the
parliamentary system (Kesling, 2008). Germany has not always been active on their concern on
the linkage of fossil fuels and climate change, until the 1970s where Germany’s public began to
protest against nuclear energy. It was until 1971, where Germany’s Chancellor created an
environmental program that allowed for implementing environmental regulation even in the
face of uncertainties, that allows the nation to employ strict actions against climate change.
(Kesling, 2008). From this, large environmental grassroots initiatives began to form such as the
Green Party that focuses environmental concerns at a federal level. (Kesling, 2008).
Germany has a long history of being consumers of fossil -fuel productions but has
transformed themselves into one of the leading nations fighting hard to mitigate climate
change. In the recent decade, with the exception of 2009 global economic crisis, the 2019
emission reduction was Germany’s largest decline since 1990 and since then have become one
of the drivers of European and international climate politics in transitioning towards a low-
carbon society. Most of this reduction was found within Germany’s energy sector, that saw a
decrease of 51 million tons of CO2 from the previous year. Such direct reduction on achieving
ambitious CO2- reduction targets stems from their conversion of using gas-fired power plants
as well as using renewable sources such as wind and solar power instead of coal-fired power
plants. This policy was incorporated into a policy plan by the German government in 2016,
known as the Climate Act Plan 2050. This Action Plan marks Germany as one of the first
countries to propose a long-term low greenhouse gas emission strategy to the United Nations
under the Paris Agreement. Specifically, this agreement focuses on creating targets for
individual sectors with inclusion of envisages monitoring and public participation. With the key
aspect of this plan focusing on restructuring the energy sector, the German government
targeted that expansion of renewable energies and gradual phasing out of electricity from fossil
fuels to reduce by 62% by 2030. Germany has a federal system with two closely linked political
levels. Climate mitigation in the German electricity sector is regarded as a national legislation,
which includes resource and plant specific regulations, energy efficiency standards, and
economic incentives. As the German government has embraced reducing carbon emissions
across the electricity sector, it has led to significant electricity supply variability. In which the
renewable energy that is intergraded into the grid, allows the natural gas being used as fuel to
support renewable alternatives. The German energy transition, also known as ‘Energiwende’ is
one of the world’s most ambitious plans to decarbonize an entire countries energy system. The
goal, in comparison to the 1990s levels, is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2020 and
80%-95% by 2050. The government has set up commission as part of the Federal Ministry of
Economic Affairs and Energy with the participation of other ministries that comprise of the
federal state, stakeholders, trade unions and affected businesses. This commission was what
recommended the phase -out from coal fired power plant to gas-fired power plants. In 2019,
Germany’s first national climate law was passed indicating that reduction of greenhouse gas
emissions is set and targets individual sectors until the year 2030, where another new emission
budget will be set.
In regards, to the other sectors, the German government has united with various
industries to launch a research and development program that focuses on reducing greenhouse
gas emissions from industrial processes. For the building sector, standards of having zero-
energy systems by installing renewable energy sources for new buildings are apply by the
government starting from 2021 in order to reach the goal of reducing emission by 67% by 2030.
Within the agricultural sector, the German government plans to focus specifically on reduction
nitrous oxide emissions that occurs from over-fertilisation by working with the federal state to
tighten the fertiliser legislation in order to ensure proper farm management. As the German
government focuses on progress within the transport and building sectors and industries, the
implementations of generating energy in CO2-neutral will pay a role in the development of
these sectors. The Climate Action Plan 2050 is reviewed and updated every five years. However,
these targets and emission budgets are based on the reduction trajectory obtained from the
EU’s Effort Sharing Regulations. This regulation sets an overall emission reduction target for
each member and failure to meet such targets results in buying emissions at a higher cost from
other members.
An adaptation plan that the German government has formulated was to improve and
maintain their forest’s capacity to act as a carbon sink. In Germany’s national climate law; they
define the ‘greenhouse gas neutrality’ as the ‘balance of anthropogenic emissions of
greenhouse gas and the removal of such gases by sinks”. The government has cooperated with
various forestry managements, conversations, and funding areas in order to expand Germany’s
forest. Asides from political implementations, the German government has focused on public
communication and media coverage. Structurally and culturally, the German government has
been “conducive to open yet civil debates about collectively relevant issues such as climate
change.” These opportunities are open in the country and allows for a variety of different
viewpoints that then will be placed over a consensus rather than a confrontation. However, the
physically effects of climate changes, such as rising sea levels, biodiversity loss or weather
events are minor within Germany’s environment but instead are affected by the indirect,
socioeconomic effects of climate change. However, the media coverage of climate change was
not always emphasizing the threat of climate change but within the current decade Germany
has become dependent on the media as an important source of information in which many
German climate scientist are influenced about what information is being places out into the
media and strategically choosing which information is given out and which are not (Post, 2016).
The cultural mindset of recent generations now emphasizing environmentalism over national
order allows Germany’s Green party to maintain being a major player in the evolution of
climate change policies (Kesling, 2008)

Based from current reports Germany has reduced CO2 emission by 446 million tonnes
within 29 years, which leaves 11 years to reduce another 262 million tonnes in order to each
the 2030 target.

Proposition
Implementation of sector focused mitigations that are based on the goal stipulated in the Paris
Agreement to achieve global carbon neutrality. Joint development from federal states,
municipalities, associations and citizens on strategic climate measures are necessary in the
transformation towards a low-carbon economy.
Conclusion