In October 2018, 48th Session of the IPCC accepted the Summary for Policymakers of the “IPCC special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5℃ above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty”. In C2 of this Summary for Policymakers, it states with high confidence that “Pathways limiting global warming to 1.5℃ with no or limited overshoot would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure (including transport and buildings), and industrial systems”.
This side event featured a keynote speech on the special report on global warming of 1.5℃ followed by brief introductions of on-going transition research and actions in various fields, and discussions on whether the stated “system transitions” are possible.

Programme

At this side-event, first, Prof. Jim Skea, Co-Chair of the IPCC WGIII delivered a special lecture about the IPCC Special Report on Global Warming 1.5℃. Next, Dr. Stefan Lechtenböhmer, Director, Future Energy and Mobility Structures, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, made a keynote speech about possibilities on transition of energy intensive processing industries. Followed by the two presentations, a panel discussion took place, facilitated by Prof. Hironori Hamanaka, Special Research Advisor, Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES). During the panel discussion, Dr. Sergio la Motta, Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA), pointed out the growing importance of technology transfer, and Dr. Yann Briand, Research Fellow, Climate, Energy and Transport Policy, Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project for Transport (DDPP-Transport), Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), mentioned about potentials in transportation sector. In addition, Dr. Jean-Charles Hourcade, International Research Center on Environment and Development (CIRED), and Ms. Hanna Fekete, NewClimate Institute stated how to re-direct finance flow towards realising low-carbon societies. After the Paris Agreement, various actors including business have activated their actions and efforts to tackle climate change. In energy sector, a positive sign have been seen to make it for low-carbon, by introducing renewable energy. However, further technical innovation is necessary in industry sector. Also, finance is indispensable to develop and deploy technologies. In this side-event, current efforts, future directions and way forwards were shared and discussed amongst speakers, panelists and the floor. This side-event was featured by the “NHK world” dated 7th December 2018.