Interview with Dr. Hoesung Lee, Former IPCC Chair

Interview with Dr. Hoesung Lee

Dr. Hoesung Lee is Former Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

ADPC recently held an exclusive ‘Climate Talks’ discussion with this esteemed expert on IPCC’s 6th Assessment Cycle Reports, which range from physical evidence, adaptation and vulnerability, to mitigation of climate change impacts.

The question to lower-income countries would be: ‘How much adaptation is possible?

You set out on this cycle of reports with the objective of highlighting the consequences of climate change and offering ways to help prevent it. Have you succeeded in reaching those goals so far?

First of all, we need to be realistic about what we have achieved and what we wish to achieve. Our studies and assessments have clearly indicated that we are not on track to limit warming by 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Emissions are now at their highest in human history, and cumulative emissions expected from the existing infrastructure, mostly electricity production, are way over the cumulative emissions permissible to limit warming.

Secondly, to limit warming to 1.5 degrees, global emissions must peak before 2025 and then reduce to about 43 percent of this amount by 2030, relative to 2019 levels.

If we want to limit warming to 2 degrees Celsius, then by 2030, the rate of reduction should be about 27%. But in both cases, net zero has to be achieved by mid-century for 1.5 and the 2070s for 2 degrees.

These modeled scenarios imply that carbon dioxide removal will be unavoidable to achieve net zero. This is to counter the emissions from the hard-to eliminate sectors such as aviation, agriculture and some industrial processes. We are in a phase of both challenge and opportunities.

This third report highlights the pressing issues that need to be considered while combating climate change. What are the main points that you would like to underline, which require action?

Energy must be transformed from its current carbon-intensive structure to low carbon-footprint structures, which means that, by 2050, we must be able to achieve net zero emissions globally.

That implies that a very fast reduction of annual emissions, by close to 7 percent per year, is needed. This is a necessary pathway that we must embrace to achieve climate stabilization.

You have been the Chair of IPCC for the past 7 years; would it be true to say that collaboration between the authors and contributors is now at its optimum and the message has never been stronger?

Optimum is maybe difficult to define, especially when it deals with the collaboration between the different scientific disciplines, but I want to say this:

Though it is always a challenge to sustain an effective interdisciplinary approach, I found that authors working on the IPCC assessments found a great deal of enthusiasm for the intellectual synergies in this atmosphere and framework of assessing vast literatures.

They indicated a strong desire to understand the horizon as well as the big picture, and we do have a variety of successful examples of such interdisciplinary approaches.

Our assessment reports contain examples of cross-chapter boxes or cross-working group boxes; examples include biodiversity over matters related to economics.

I found that collaboration was coming from among the authors, to improve the integrated natures of these climate change problems and solutions.

If we look back at COP26 in Glasgow, it was dubbed the ‘Conference of Adaptation’ and you have been a great advocate of creating coherence between mitigation and adaptation.

How is IPCC trying to enhance the understanding of their costs and benefits, especially in the context of development?

Adaptation, mitigation, and development are very closely interrelated. Development provides the capacity for adaptation and mitigation, and in turn, adaptation contributes to development, which further provides the capacity for mitigation.

Adaptation costs will be higher when global warming is higher. The best enabler of adaptation is mitigation. Many ecosystem-friendly adaptation measures will be possible only when global warming stays below a certain level.

There is a slight difference between adaptation and mitigation benefits – adaptation benefits can mostly be captured locally, whereas mitigation benefits are globally shared with only some local benefits.

Therefore, action means how one can make infrastructure decisions and investments to increase resilience against climate extremes and rising global temperatures, increasing the speed of transformation towards net zero.

This requires long-term planning and finance roadmaps, and this will only be possible with very strong public and private sector partnerships.

For lower-income countries, would you agree that interactions between nature, climate, and humans also require interactions between mitigation and adaptation?

They apply regardless of income classes. Therefore, the question to lower-income countries would be: ‘how much adaptation is possible?’ given the requirements for countries to accomplish so many other things.

Here I want to emphasize that adaptation is a part of, and a very important element of, a development portfolio. Constraints for adaptation are really the availability of finance.

If we have a development strategy on the basis of ‘business as usual’ climate, then that development will never deliver the desired development goal.

Adaptation, especially in lower-income countries, requires financial assistance from various sources as a way of not only having effective adaptation, but also of achieving development goals.

A number of countries have made pledges to reach net zero and lower emissions, especially through their energy sectors. The world is trying to recover from a pandemic at the same time and there is an energy crisis in Europe.

What does that mean for the commitments of those countries

Well, that’s a very important question. We need to differentiate between the systemic and transient changes.

We have observed rising and fluctuating oil and gas prices for the last two decades and CO2 intensity and content has decreased globally. For the last 10 years, it has decreased 0.3 percent annually and the energy intensity per unit of GDP produced has also declined.

These two important elements – carbon intensity and energy intensity – declined regardless of fluctuating oil and gas prices. Two years ago, oil prices dropped to about US $40 per barrel and people talked about the demand peaking.

I think the recent incident revealed the vulnerability ingrained in current energy systems, in terms of energy security and global supply chains surrounding the energy supply structure. Current incidents will obviously cause, in my understanding, a systemic change toward a reduced supply chain and more localized production.

Now these changes will be in line with net zero transformation pathways, which means more renewable energy use and more technologies to reduce carbon footprints.

The impact of current incidents on systems and behavioral changes will turn out to be a blip in the journey towards net zero, and recent changes will only reinforce the reason for achieving net zero as soon as possible.

Moving forward, how do you see the role of bioenergy in the context of meeting our climate goals?

And, what are some of the challenges in terms of land use and food security, as well as any other challenges or considerations we should be thinking of?

The biggest challenge for bioenergy is sustainability. When scaled up, there is great concern about how such a strategy will collide with the scarcity of land and water.

It will also collide with the desire to preserve biodiversity. Biotechnology itself has an ingrained risk, and sustainability issues arise from its scaling and cost.

When we look at bioenergy, we need to look at the specific choice from the nexus of energy, water, and land.

Considering the economics of climate change and given the vast population of Asia, is the single biggest hurdle in establishing effective sustainable adaptation measures the funding of these measures?

Funding is the critical element of every activity, regardless of adaptation or mitigation, especially for countries in Asia.

A great deal of climate impacts will be expected to appear in this region in a number of sectoral analyses.

Therefore, it is very important that the public and private sources of capital are mobilized for this region, and I believe that multilateral development banks will have a greater role to play to help with its adaptation funding.

If we are looking for signs of progress in dealing with climate issues, would you say that the advances in technology are offering positive opportunities across sectoral mitigation development?

Definitely, yes. There are generally two types of energy policies – the first one would be so-called ‘technology push’ policies such as R&D support and support for training and development, and there are also ‘demand pull’ policies such as technical standards and taxes.

The purpose of those ‘demand pull’ policies are to create incentives and market opportunities. Also, an important element is the transfer of such technologies to the lower-income countries so that those countries will be able to apply them for better adaptation and mitigation activities.

Technology development has a positive spillover both for domestic and international economies, so it’s a good strategy for the development program as well.

Specifically, this Working Group III Report highlights the importance of digital technologies in contributing to the mitigation of climate change; especially when accompanied by dematerialization and smart supply chain management, we should expect a very large dividend of reduced carbon footprints.

Do low-income Asian countries have the economic and technological capacity to fulfill the requirements of the IPCC?

IPCC only provides the available options and actions that countries should consider when they develop climate-related policies.

I’m sure our report will be beneficial to our member Governments’ decision-making towards a better climate domestically as well as globally.

Adaptation, as I said before, is a very important element for domestic development strategies.

Our Report contains a great deal of technical, economic, and environmental elements which can facilitate very appropriate decision-making processes for our member Governments.

I hope our report will be beneficial and useful to decision-makers around the world.

Your next report will be a synthesis of this recent cycle of reports, but presumably you’re already planning the next cycle.

What can we expect to be your areas of focus?

First, the 6th Assessment Cycle clearly indicates that this increasing trend of urbanization generates both a challenge in terms of mitigating climate change as well as adaptation, but also opportunities.

A lot more scientific assessments need to be undertaken about this increasing trend of urbanization in terms of climate change actions and developing strategies.

Second will be a better understanding of the regional information and the decisions being made by local and sub-national governments, which all require very detailed information about climate extremes and other matters related to climate changes and their abilities.

Therefore, the general direction will require a further understanding of climate issues.

Dr. Hoesung Lee spoke to Vidya Rana, Senior Communications Manager, ADPC.