365 Days of Climate Awareness 356 – AR6 Vol 3, Chap. 13: National and Sub-National Policies and Institutions

Long-term, significant cuts in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions cannot be achieved without governmental policy at the national, regional and even local levels, together. National policy is essential for implementing international treaties like the 2015 Paris Agreement, since all UN and other conventions assume the sovereignty of states parties (the legal term for treaty members, NOT the same as signatories. The US is a signatory, but not party, to the UN Law of the Sea, for example: the Senate has yet to ratify). Policy at the national and sub-national level provides the legal basis for action,
including frameworks for different groups and stakeholders to interact.

All illustrations from the IPCC 6th Assessment Report, Vol. 3, Chap. 13. (Top) Percentage of emissions covered by national climate policies, by region; (Bottom) Number of countries worldwide, and by region, which have enacted climate policies. [DEV = Developed countries; APC = Asia-Pacific developing countries; EEA = Eastern Europe and west-central Asia; AFR = Africa; LAM = Latin America and the Caribbean; MDE = Middle East]

Laws aid in climate change mitigation by creating incentives (hopefully powerful incentives) toward the reduction of carbon-intensive processes and activities, including across sectors (such as industry, energy and transportation, or energy and buildings, and of course, many more). Legal policies at different scales, from city or municipality level, to state or province level, to national level ensure comprehensive change. The corollary to this, unfortunately, is that large differences can grow between more proactive and less proactive governments, at all levels. This is painfully apparent at the national and sub-national levels. For example, in the US, climate change is a priority in many states, but completely ignored in others. 

Number of sub-national climate policies worldwide.

Sub-national policies are particularly important because, on the whole (obviously with differences between countries), regional and local authorities have jurisdiction over land use, a major aspect of greenhouse emissions. Policies to re-green territory and use it more sustainably are better executed at the state and local level.

Percentage of countries which have adopted some form of national climate policies, by sector.

At all levels, the media has critical power to help shape the dialogue, no less locally (even despite the gross centralization of modern media, and the death of many local news sources) than regionally and nationally. Biases toward or against certain topics—whether climate change or any other—can be blatant when news reports from different regions or countries are compared. All too often media outlets, especially in these days of fragmented news-as-entertainment, serve as a tool for bias confirmation. Digital, visual, audio and even print media can either retard or advance the cause for climate action, by explaining, minimizing or even ignoring the growing impacts of global warming on our daily lives.

Global fossil fuel subsidies, 2010-2020, as accounted by different organizations. [IMF = International Monetary Fund; IEA = International Energy Agency; OECD = Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development]

Cap-and-trade policies have been proven to be an effective means of reducing emissions, but have been largely stymied in the US. Fortunately, they are not the only tool. Efficiency mandates are also effective, but some of the best policies are forward-looking, subsidizing and prescribing new standards and links between sectors (energy and buildings, energy and transportation) to bring down emissions jointly in several different areas of society at once.

Number of Latin American and Caribbean countries which name adaptation (maroon) and mitigation (green) policies in their climate statements, 2018. NOTE this is not the count of actual policies, merely the mention of need for them in national climate studies.

A brief look forward. This is post #356, nearing the 365 goal in the blog’s title. I began writing these daily posts almost one year ago, when the first (at the time still somewhat rough) volume, The Physical Science Basis, of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report was released. I wanted to spread awareness of the report, and help improve public knowledge of climate science in general, and global warming in particular. I’ve also seen, as we all have, the massive success of short-format Twitter in reshaping public discourse. So I decided on (usually) brief daily posts about limited topics, hoping, over the course of a year, to guide you through a reasonably complete survey of the climate as it is, has been, and is likely to be. I hope you’ve had as much fun reading as I have writing (though some days were more difficult than others)!

I plan two more posts on the AR6 Volume 3 (a few other chapters, like Financing, don’t interest me much, but please, read them if you like!) But I think the series will leak a little past the 365 count, as I have a few other topics I want to address, like the climate impact of cryptocurrency, the US Department of Defense’s posture on climate change, and a segment on Life Cycle Analyses—basically, the studies which answer the question, “how green is it anyway?” I’ll focus on offshore wind farms and electrical vehicles (EVs).

After that, I’m not sure I’ll be writing these posts every day. I’ve got some other projects lined up. But I might toss the ball to you guys. In grad school, my fellowship for two years involved assistant teaching science to 8^th graders, and one of my biggest successes (other than the time I dressed up as Marie Curie for the unit on radiation: one kid blurted out, “Hey Mr. Sutherland, where’d you get the coconuts?”) was the “Ask the Scientist” box, where students could anonymously ask questions about anything they wanted. So, in the spirit of that…if any of you folks have climate-related questions, I’ll take them, and do my best to answer. But I probably won’t be cranking out one per day. Anyhow…that’s enough for now! This is almost as long as my post on water.

Oh, and that reminds me: if you’re a relative newcomer, the entire 356 days (and onward) has been archived on my blog. The catalog is slightly clunky, and the formatting is…primitive. But it’s all there, if you want to look back. After a brief false start, I commenced with scientific basics and worked toward more complex climate issues. Happy (if you choose)reading!

Tomorrow: international cooperation.

Be brave, be steadfast, and be well.

IPCC 6th Assessment Report, Vol. 3, Chap. 13