Extreme weather sweeps the Earth more frequently, which is attributed to climate change, with global warming as a recognized culprit. The burning of fossil energies, the dirty ones, such as coal and petrol, creates greenhouse gases, smothering the globe to fever. Decarbonization has become the key mission to cool the planet.
The November summit on climate change, COP26, reiterated the 1.5℃ goal set in the Paris Agreement, a global treaty signed in 2015 by hundreds of sovereign parties to address the serious issue of global warming. All attendants in the Glasgow conference agreed on the significance of sticking to the benchmark, limiting global warming to the preferably 1.5℃, compared to the pre-industrial average.
Decarbonization has become the widely recognized common good and has been embraced by nations and corporations. National leaders and heads pledge to reach carbon neutral and net-zero in the following decades; business executives are promising negative carbon by absorbing what they had exhausted.
However, it is not an easy job, especially involving a planet of nations, businesses, and lives. Leaders from underdeveloped African leaders argued that they should not pay the bill to cool the globe heated by the developed nations which have become rich by burning coals. Such propositions are true and moral.
Increasing energy cost and crunch are the immediate challenges for individuals, especially during the freezing winter days.Currently, coal, dubbed “dirty”, is the most accessible and economical energy in lots of regions, especially the less developped. Without a sustainable approach to greenify the energy portfolio, the humane cost would be deadly.
National goals and policies are an indispensable force to drive decarbonization. International entities, such UN, are monitoring and promoting the implementation. Businesses are contributing to the implementation. It might become a future trend that publicly traded companies disclose the risks of global warming in their operations, and their efforts to mitigate.
Greenification has become a universally correct approach, but to materialize it requires wisdom from all sectors and parties.
