renewable energy

The richest 1 percent of the world’s population produced as much carbon pollution in 2019 than the five billion people who made up the poorest two-thirds of humanity, reveals a new Oxfam report today. It comes ahead of the UN climate summit in Dubai, amid growing fears that the 1.5°C target for curtailing rising temperatures appears increasingly unachievable.

722 of the world’s biggest corporations together raked in over $1 trillion in windfall profits each year for the past two years amid soaring prices and interest rates, while billions of people are having to cut back or go hungry. 

In “Powering the Transition,” Oxfam details how together, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank are investing almost $5 billion in fossil fuels in the 10 Asian countries that belong to the Climate Vulnerable Forum.

“Oxfam welcomes this new commitment; bringing down the price of storage is an important piece in making energy more accessible to poor communities and helps establish clean energy grids that low-carbon economies need," said Sasanka Thilakasiri, Oxfam’s energy policy lead.

Europeans may still be forced to buy biofuels made from food crops until 2030, as a result of the deal struck by EU member states and the European Parliament this morning on the Renewable Energy Directive (RED II), Oxfam said.

Bangladesh is one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries, yet at the same time it has demonstrated climate leadership. This briefing note examines how appropriate lending by international financial institutions can help Bangladesh to blaze a new sustainable development pathway.

Europe can continue burning food to fuel cars and trucks in the EU, the European Parliament voted today. In the vote on the reform of the Renewable Energy Directive for 2030, MEPs supported rules that would allow member states to force-feed car drivers with biofuels made from food-crops at current levels until 2030.

A proposal by the European Parliament’s industry committee on the use of biofuels risks increasing emissions in transport, pushing up global food prices and negatively impacting people around the world who live from the land, Oxfam and green NGO Transport & Environment warn.

The new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) will be a major new funder of infrastructure in developing Asia. This report sets out a vision for an AIIB partnership with the region’s most climate-vulnerable countries that could forge a new path of economic development.

People around the world are trapped in a ‘toxic triangle’ made up of short-term financial investors, timid governments and fossil fuel companies, which threatens to push up  global temperatures, putting 400 million people at risk of hunger and drought by 2060.