What the world needs now is… a net zero club

With just over eight months to go, we now have a new COP26 president in place and preparations for the biggest international summit the UK has ever hosted are in full swing. Alok Sharma has no easy task. The eyes of the world will be on Glasgow this November for the UN climate change conference.

Expectations are high, with climate change at the top of the
political and public agenda. While positive trends on balance sheets and in the
streets are building momentum for strong climate action, many of the largest
national governments are still not where they need to be. The last major summit
in Paris five years ago, which gave rise to an ambitious global agreement, was
forged not just with the push of ambitious leaders but also under an Obama
–Xi constellation.  

This year, we can expect that several large countries’ new pledges
– their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) – will fall short of what is
needed to put the world on a “well below 2^oC” path. With key political
leaders distracted or actively hindering process, reaching an ambitious “ratchet”
of climate ambition this year will be a huge challenge.

But this COP has to be a success. Since 2015, the urgency
for the world to avert disastrous climate change has only become clearer. The
UK finds itself in a significant position at a pivotal moment in history. This
year of climate action will be the one that sets the path for the next decade
of delivery. We need to pull every lever we can at every level, and there are
many.

One of the most extraordinary trends since 2015 is that ‘net
zero’ targets have gone viral. A number of leading companies have stated their
intentions to reach net zero, although these will need to be verified. So have
cities, including New York, London, Johannesburg, Tokyo, and Qingdao, as well
as well as states and provinces like California and New South Wales. At the
time of writing, 14 countries have net zero targets in law or policy. Two - Suriname
and Bhutan - have already achieved it.

Remarkably, a new
report from the London think tank ECIU shows that 49 percent of global GDP
is already covered by cities, states, provinces and countries that either have
net zero targets or are working toward them.

Many climate action leaders are now thinking how this
groundswell of net zero targets can contribute to success at COP26. The idea of
a ‘net
zero club’ was extensively discussed at the ‘Countdown to COP’
conference recently. Together with the Blavatnik School of Government, we have
today published a
policy brief that lays out why and how the creation of such a coalition would
make COP26 a success.

This club could align country leaders such as New Zealand,
the UK and France, with less well known net zero champions such as Bhutan,
Costa Rica and Sweden. It could include the EU, assuming it also sets a net
zero goal. Crucially, it would see sub-national actors like Scotland and
California and other members of the Under
2 Coalition, join New York and other world cities, globally via the C40
network and locally, in this country, via the UK100 network. It could also
include the corporate leaders, like Unilever, Volkswagen, Microsoft, Google,
and Ikea, which have set net zero goals.

Critically, a net zero club would be a ‘coalition of
coalitions’, building on and linking together the work of existing platforms
like Science Based Targets, the Under 2 Coalition, C40 cities, the Climate
Neutrality Coalition, the Net Zero Asset Owners Alliance and others.

Bringing together such a powerful coalition of the willing would
make visible the world’s direction of travel, signalling a dramatic economic
shift and helping to ratchet up ambitions alongside the UNFCCC process, which
involves only nation states.

A big benefit of this idea for the UK as host is that is does
not have to start from scratch. At the last COP in Madrid, a Chile-led Climate
Ambition Alliance was founded, whose members account for 18 per cent of the
world’s emissions and a third of the world’s GDP.  The UK could take this and run with it,
creating a beefed up version, building on it to get 50 per cent of global GDP
signed up (or, as a stretch target, actors representing 50 per cent of global
emissions).

And the beauty of this idea is that it has the potential to
dramatically raise ambition over the next five years across economies. A UK-led
net zero club (ideally with support from Italy) can continue its momentum, as
the G7 and G20 in 2021 are taking place in the UK and Italy, respectively.
Major countries and key actors not signed up will increasingly feel out of step
if they witness the collective decarbonisation actions of others and see the economic
and social benefits they yield.

A key task will be to convert those ‘working toward’ net
zero to firm commitments. Major economies and actors are in the ‘working
towards’ category, not the ‘committed’ category. This year is the chance for
the UK’s COP26 presidency to play a major role in encouraging the laggards to strengthen
their commitments.

To be a credible leader in setting the bar and the ambition
for the world on climate action this year, the UK first needs to get its own
house in order. Although we have set a net zero goal, we are not yet on track
to meet it. Green Alliance has identified the five
policies that could be implemented right now and we’re tracking progress this year against
them.   A crucial early indicator of the government’s
ambition will be the NDC it commits to. This must be based on net zero, not on
the previous target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent.

If the UK gets it right, COP26 will not only be the biggest global summit the country has ever held, but it will also be the one that is remembered for building on the achievements of the Paris Agreement.

This post was originally published by Green Alliance.

Shaun Spiers is Executive Director at Green Alliance.

Thomas Hale is Associate Professor in Global Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government.