Bloomberg Green Newsletter

Bloomberg Green Newsletter

2020 was a monumental year for just about every kind of news, and climate news was no exception. As the world reeled from the shocks of the coronavirus pandemic, racial tension, and economic collapse, it also dealt with deadly heat, hellacious wildfires, and the most active Atlantic hurricane season in recorded history.
We may also remember 2020, however, as the year the world started to reverse centuries of damage to the climate. Just before the start of the year, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a new Green Deal, which would go on to become the centerpiece of the European Union’s economic recovery plan. Several more of the largest global economies—including China, which is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than any other country—also came out with net-zero pledges. As oil and gas prices plunged due to the pandemic, NextEra Energy Inc., the world’s largest supplier of wind power, overtook Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp. to become the world’s most valuable energy company, bar none. And in November, the U.S. voted to make Joe Biden, who adopted climate change as one of his signature campaign issues, its next president.
As we put this year into the rearview, we at Bloomberg Green decided to take a moment to reflect on and begin to process the most important climate stories of this insane, overwhelming, anguished, historic year. This newsletter will be taking a break for the rest of 2020, but we’ll see you again in 2021.
Disasters got worse
Fires were especially bad this year—particularly in northern California, where I live. But we also experienced an unprecedented Atlantic hurricane season, and it was hotter than it’s ever been in some places. Phoenix set triple-digit heat records, and Siberia hit 100 degrees. There was a record number of climate disasters that cost us $1 billion. Climate migration had already begun, but more than ever, people started to wonder: Is it time to move? 
Emily Biuso, editor
Oil and gas companies took heat from investors over emissions
In August, Exxon Mobil disappeared from the Dow Jones Industrial Average; it had been a member since the company was Standard Oil of New Jersey in 1928. That same month, energy (read: oil and gas companies) shrunk to become the lowest-weighted component of the S&P 500; in 2008, it was the component's second-largest sector, right after information technology. In obvious way, this is the bottom for the oil and gas sector. More important to me is what its path up from the bottom—if there is one—will look like. For European supermajors, it runs through commitments to significantly or even wholly reduce greenhouse gas emissions while also coming to terms with a future of falling oil demand. For U.S. oil majors that path is less clear, but capital is having its say. Exxon, long dismissive of both specific emissions reduction strategies and climate change in general, now faces two activist campaigns calling for, among other things, a reckoning with what investors see as an unsustainable emissions trajectory. The company is listening—this month it announced plans to significantly reduce its upstream emissions intensity.
Nathaniel Bullard, Sparklines columnist/BloombergNEF chief content officer
Clean energy fantasies got closer to reality
Before 2020, the idea that America could—or would—fully rid its electrical grids of carbon emissions was practically a moonshot. But in 2020, that moonshot became something of a national calling. Joe Biden, as a presidential nominee, didn't just take the unprecedented step of making climate change a centerpiece of his campaign, he proposed greening the country's grids by 2035, outpacing the targets of California and other progressive states. None of that will be easy. While many large U.S. utilities have pledged to hit net-zero emissions in the next three decades, some say the technology necessary to achieve Biden’s goal doesn't yet exist.
Brian Eckhouse, reporter
Voters showed up for the climate
The 2020 U.S. presidential election made at least one thing clear: voters care about climate change. President-elect Joe Biden put environmental-friendly policies at the forefront of much of his campaign—including the crucial final weeks—just as young, first-time voters have been begging the world to take the climate crisis seriously. Once he takes office in January, Biden will have to confront the legacy of the present administration, which rolled back numerous environmental regulations put in place during the Obama administration, when Biden was vice president. Accomplishing these campaign promises will be especially difficult if Republicans are able to maintain control of the Senate. But either way, the voters have spoken.
Elizabeth Elkin, reporter
 

For futher informaion: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-28/bloomberg-green-s-biggest-climate-change-stories-of-2020

Фонд кардинала Поля Пупара
РАНХиГС
Национальный банковский клуб Ассоциация российских банков
FederBio
Российский союз промышленников и предпринимателей
Московская ассоциация предпринимателей
National Union of grain producers
Russian Orthodox Church
Globethics