To cut methane emissions we have to spend 10 times more than today
Methane emissions have a climate-altering power 82.5 times greater than CO2
(Sustainabilityenvironment.com) – One of the merits of the COP26 in Glasgow was to turn a spotlight on the importance of taking action against methane emissions and not just CO2 emissions. And act as a springboard for international initiatives such as the Global Methane Pledge, launched by the EU and the US, which aims to cut CH4 by 30% by 2030. Methane, in fact, is a greenhouse gas with a climate-altering power 82.5 times greater than that of carbon dioxide in the first 20 years in which it remains in the atmosphere, and is therefore crucial to keep the goal of 1.5 degrees of global warming within reach. Are we doing enough to reduce it?
In a report just published, the Climate Policy Initiative gives a clear answer: absolutely not. Global spending on cutting methane emissions must increase tenfold quickly, to $110 billion a year, if we want to have a chance to meet the most ambitious target of the Paris agreement.
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“Although methane is responsible for almost half of global warming net to date, our findings show that funding for methane abatement measures accounted for less than 2% of total climate finance flows, or just over 11 billion dollars, in 2019/2020“, write the authors of the report.
Second aspect to consider: the finance for the mitigation of methane emissions is not only small, it is also poorly distributed. The oil and gas sector has the highest potential to reduce methane emissions by the end of this decade. But it is also the one that has received the least investment of all: less than one percent of the total, about 100 million dollars in the last two years. Almost 2/3 of the money, however, was reserved for the waste sector.
