New York, March 31 (BNA): The head of the United Nations announced, on Thursday, the appointment of a panel of experts led by the former Canadian environment minister to examine whether companies’ efforts to curb climate change are credible or just a “greenwash”.
Recent years have seen an explosion of pledges by companies – including oil companies – to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to “net zero” amid consumer expectations that companies bear part of the burden of reducing pollution.
But environmentalists say many such plans are unclear at best, and designed at worst to make companies look good when in fact they are fueling global warming.
The 16-member panel will make recommendations before the end of the year on criteria and definitions for setting net zero targets, how to measure and verify progress, and ways to translate this into international and national regulations.
In addition to examining net zero commitments by the private sector, it will also scrutinize commitments made by local and regional governments that do not report directly to the United Nations.
The panel includes prominent Australian climate scientist Bill Hare, South African-based sustainable finance expert Malango Mugogo and former long-time Governor of the People’s Bank of China Zhou Xiaochuan.
It will be chaired by Catherine McKenna, who was Canada’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change from 2015 to 2019.
A recent report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found that more than three billion people worldwide are already at risk of global warming.
The panel will publish another report next week that is expected to confirm that the world is not on track to meet the goal of capping warming at 1.5°C (2.7°F) by the end of the century, which was set in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
“If we don’t see significant, sustainable emissions reductions this decade, the window of opportunity to keep 1.5 alive will close — forever,” Guterres said. “It would be a disaster for everyone.”
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