The G7 is an inter-governmental political forum consisting of several countries which include Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. The group pledged on June 13th to rapidly scale up technologies and policies which will accelerate the transition away from coal power. This includes ending new government support for coal power by the end of 2021.
Here is a brief summary of the event -
- The countries in the group confirmed pledges to increase climate finance contributions as part of efforts to reduce emissions and accelerate the move towards clean energy.
- US President Joe Biden pledged after the summit to put $2 billion dollars “to support developing countries as they transition away from unabated coal-fired power.”
- The nations vowed to focus on other technologies, including carbon capture, to help speed up the transition away from coal.
- Focus on “accelerating progress on electrification and batteries, hydrogen, carbon capture, usage and storage, zero emission aviation and shipping, and for those countries that opt to use it, nuclear power.”
The G7 said, “Coal power generation is the single biggest cause of greenhouse gas emissions,” adding “continued global investment in unabated coal power generation is incompatible with keeping 1.5°C within reach.”
It continued, “We stress that international investments in unabated coal must stop now and we commit now to an end to new direct government support for unabated international thermal coal power generation by the end of 2021.”