The government has launched a consultation document on Malta’s 30-year strategy to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. Carbon neutrality, or net-zero emissions, is achieved when the greenhouse gasses still being annually released by human activity equal the volume being sequestrated from the atmosphere by additional human endeavour. The main greenhouse gasses are carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide.
Notwithstanding its apparent comprehensive overview of the challenges ahead and appreciation of the complexity of ecosystem interactions, the strategy has quite a number of fundamental flaws.
The first is that it claims adherence to the 2015 Paris climate agreement and the 1.5°C to 2°C temperature increase over pre-industrial times (1800) targets. The Paris Agreement has failed and the 1.5°C threshold caused by greenhouse gas emissions will likely be crossed. By the time the world’s governments take any meaningful action it will be impossible to avoid the 2°C increase by 2030. This sets the scene for an increase of 4°C or higher by the end of the century with cataclysmic consequences.
Secondly, the 30-year timeline appears to be a strategy to kick the can down the road. Science and, more importantly, common sense, dictate that we reach carbon neutrality in the next 10 years. It is therefore vital to immediately stop all natural land conversions and restore habitats and biodiversity globally and in Malta. Otherwise, all the fine words in Malta’s consultation document and the EU Green Deal will come to nought.
Thirdly, it is imperative for the political class in Malta to wean itself off the attachment to the economic growth model. The new political buzzword is ‘decoupling’. Minister Aaron Farrugia has stated that, with its low carbon development strategy, the government wants to set a strategic direction “with a set of measures where economic growth is decoupled from natural resource use and environmental pressures”.
All economic activity arises in the biosphere and exploits the web of life. Under the economic growth model, environmental degradation locally or elsewhere is unavoidable. It is for this reason that economies must move to a model where the key is economic balance that does not overshoot the planetary ecological boundaries and where growth and de-growth are just a function of the balance that we must keep in order to live on a healthy planet. This should be the economic model of the 21st century.
Fourthly, Malta’s strategy assumes that nature is going to stand still while humans talk, posture and deny. It ignores carbon budgets, feedback loops, tipping points and cliff-edge ecosystem collapse and allows the shipping and aviation industries to get away with token emission reductions.
Fifth, the EU and Malta’s strategies say next to nothing credible on the sequestration of the excessive greenhouse gasses already in the atmosphere. Nor do they compensate for all the greenhouse gasses still to be emitted in the next 30 years, placing reliance on yet-to-be-developed, untested and potentially dangerous technologies, rather than collaborating with nature.
Finally, why should we trust this Maltese government when the reality is that there has never been a political party in government that has walked the talk when it comes to environmental protection? Quite the opposite.
The EU 2030 greenhouse gas emissions reduction target of 55 per cent, and Malta’s comparable 19 per cent target, is calculated on emission levels of 2005 – more than 15 years ago – that were 20 per cent less than they are today. Such window dressing ploys are immoral.
The lack of political will to act with honesty and integrity will be our nation’s undoing.