G-7 target on fossil fuels raises many questions

SUMMARISING a recent Group of Seven meeting in Bavaria, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the leaders had committed themselves to "decarbonise the global economy in the course of this century". They also agreed to limit the rise in average global temperatures to a maximum of 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels.

Effectively, the leaders agreed to back the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations' climate change panel, to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions at the upper end of a range of 40 per cent to 70 per cent by 2050, using 2010 as the baseline, and to phase out the use of all fossil fuels by 2100.

That the G-7 agreed on reductions was not much of a surprise as the US and China had agreed to cut their emissions by 2025 when presidents Barack Obama and Xi Jinping met in Beijing last November; their nations jointly account for over one third of global emissions. Mr Obama agreed to reduce US emissions to 27 per cent below the 2005 levels by 2025, and China would set its peak emission to be 2030 when at least 20 per cent of all energy should come from non-fossil sources.