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This plan is based on the DDPP - Canada, led by a consortium consisting of the IDDRI, SDSN and Carbon Management Canada.


Description

Summary

This seed proposal is a summary of the Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) - Canada, created by a Climate CoLab Fellow. We invite other CoLab members to link to this proposal or to use it as a starting point for creating new proposals of their own. The Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project has not reviewed or endorsed this summary.

The Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) is a global collaboration of energy research teams charting practical pathways to deeply reducing greenhouse gas emissions in their own countries. It is focused on what is needed to limit global warming to 2°C or less.

The DDPP framework has been developed and utilized by a consortium led by the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI) and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN). It currently consists of scientific research teams from leading research institutions in sixteen of the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitting countries.

The Canadian DDPP team has been active in climate policy for a number of years, including developing many of the National Roundtable on Environment and Economy low carbon reports, including Getting to 2050, Achieving 2050, Framing the Future and Parallel Paths. The team has also worked with a number of Canadian jurisdictions, industry and non-governmental organizations to envision both short-term and longer-term policy pathways. This experience has enabled them to draw upon a long history of analysis and modelling to focus on Canadian deep decarbonization to 2050.

Despite global trends towards progress in reducing the emission intensity of electricity production, buildings and transport, significant gaps in global technology exist that pose a challenge for Canadian deep decarbonization efforts, especially in primary extraction but also for emission intensive industries.

The ultimate objective of the Deep Decarbonization Pathway Project (DDPP) Canada is to help the country to adopt and implement long-term policies to achieve deep decarbonization by mid-century. An intermediate objective is to support a positive outcome of the UNFCCC international climate negotiations at COP21 in Paris by 2015 by helping national decision makers and the international community to understand what deep decarbonization implies for individual countries and regions.

To accomplish these goals, the DDPP Canda team proposes a coordinated effort in which research team analyses must do to achieve an emissions trajectory consistent with the 2°C target.  These Canadian decarbonization pathways strives to:

•    Provide information that Canadian decision makers want and are useful for COP21

•    Model the infrastructure and technology path and cost for Canada to achieve its target

•    Make mitigation options and costs transparent in Canada

•    Identify priority areas for Canadian technology R&D and commercialization

•    Build a foundation for on-going joint analysis of national mitigation pathways


Which proposals are included in your plan and how do they fit together?


Explanation of the emissions scenario calculated in the Impact tab


What are the plan’s key benefits?

Deep decarbonization pathways fill a key gap in climate policy. Within countries, they provide a critical, missing long-term framework for informing and coordinating policy and business decisions. Internationally, they provide a transparent benchmark for evaluating national commitments.

DDPP’s assessment is that Canada’s INDC is on one of several possible emissions reduction pathways consistent with a 2°C objective. With the INDC 2030 target achieved, it may then be another policy and technology stretch to reduce emissions from a forecast level of 16 tonnes per capita in 2050 to the UNSDSN DDPP goal of 1.7 tonnes per capita in 2050. However, it would also not likely be the cost-effective pathway to 2050.

Canada is likely on the right path in electricity, buildings and personal transport, but policy signals need to be tightened and broadened. 

 

 


What are the plan’s costs?

Unknown, funded by IDDRI and SDSN.


What are the key challenges to enacting this plan?

Canada’s current policy path may be insufficient to the challenge in heavy industry and the oil and gas sector. For the industry and the oil and gas sector, stronger polices to drive down emissions are needed, which will send innovation signals. Furthermore, Canada’s currently fragmented subnational policies are a long-term decarbonization risk. Looking forward, Canada needs to better understand its land-use emissions and their associated abatement potential. With decarbonization, there is a high probability that significant quantities of lower-cost emission reductions will be needed to push towards net-zero and net- negative emissions. This is a high priority frontier of Canadian climate policy knowledge. Indeed, understanding net negative emission sources is a trend that will only grow in importance in a deeply decarbonizing world


Timeline

Ongoing


Related plans


References

This proposal is a summary of the Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP): http://www.deepdecarbonization.org

and the

Deep Decarbonisation Pathways Project (DDPP) in Canada. http://www.cmcghg.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Summary-Final-Canada-DDPP-Country-Report-July-14.pdf