The energy and environment ministers of the G7 countries agreed on Sunday, 16, to accelerate the move away from the use of fossil fuels, but without setting a new deadline for the phasing out of polluting energy sources such as coal.

In a statement issued after two days of meetings in northern Japan, ministers from the world's seven largest economies proposed actions to keep global warming below the 1.5C threshold.

"We emphasize our commitment in the context of the global effort to accelerate the phasing out of fossil fuels to achieve net-zero emission energy systems by 2050 at the latest," the ministers said in a statement after their meeting in Sapporo, northern Japan.

The group offered no new deadline beyond what was adopted last year, when it proposed phasing out much of the use of fossil fuels in its electricity sectors by 2035.

France's energy transition minister, Agnès Pannier Runacher, said the call for a "phase-out" of fossil fuels was a "firm step forward" ahead of the upcoming G20 and COP28 summits.

Britain and France have proposed eliminating coal from G7 energy matrices in the current decade, but the target has been rejected by other members, such as Japan and the United States, who have cited the pressure on energy supplies caused by the war in Ukraine.

The G7 is under pressure to show unity and step up its actions, following the latest alarming report by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), published last month.

According to the IPCC, global warming caused by human activity will raise average temperatures by 1.5°C compared to the pre-industrial era already between 2030 and 2035.

Plastic pollution

The ministers also announced the goal of ending plastic pollution in their countries by 2040. "We are committed to ending plastic pollution, with the ambition to reduce additional plastic pollution to zero by 2040," the statement said.

Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Canada and the European Union are already part of an international coalition that committed to that goal last year. It is the first time, however, that the United States, Italy and Japan have joined this goal.

But the challenge is great. The amount of plastic waste has doubled in the past 20 years, with only 9 percent of it being recycled, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Several NGOs feared that the ministerial meeting would lead to a backlash in terms of climate commitments, not least because of the host country's conservative positions.

Investments in gas

Highly dependent on fossil fuel imports, Japan wanted to use the occasion to claim new investments in the gas sector in the name of "energy security," amid the upheavals stemming from the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In 2022, the G7 decided to tolerate gas investments as an "provisional" response to "exceptional circumstances" related to this conflict.

Sunday's statement includes similar approaches, but also sets out several parameters around these investments, highlighting the "primary need" for a "reduction in gas demand."

The G7 also reaffirmed its commitment to work with other developed countries to raise $100 billion a year so that emerging countries can combat global warming. The promise dates back to 2009 and was to be fulfilled by 2020.

Source: RPA news