In the statement, the G7 members called on other states to join the commitment. However, they did not set any specific deadlines that go beyond the measures agreed last year with the goal of a decarbonized power supply by 2035.
As a new deadline, Great Britain and France had proposed ending “unchecked” coal-fired power generation – in which no measures are taken to offset emissions – in the G7 countries within this decade. However, due to the energy crisis triggered by the war in Ukraine, this goal was rejected by other members, including Japan and the United States. The group of seven industrialized countries, which also includes Germany, Italy and Canada, is aiming for net zero emissions by 2050.
After a UN climate report last month warned that without “rapid and far-reaching” measures for global warming, the target limit of 1.5 degrees could be reached in about a decade, the environment ministers were under pressure in their deliberations to announce ambitious steps.
At the meeting in Japan, the G7 countries also agreed to end plastic pollution in their countries by the year 2040 and to actively promote the agreement on the protection of nature agreed in Montreal.
The Federal Ministry for the Environment and the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs described the final declaration as “a strong signal in the fight against species extinction, plastic waste and the climate crisis”. “The G7 thus set the course to initiate urgently needed progress in the United Nations, in the G20 and at the next world climate conference COP28,” said a joint statement published on Sunday.
Federal Environment Minister Steffi Lemke (Greens) said: “The G7 countries have a special responsibility in solving these crises because they cause a large part of the global consumption of resources and the associated damage to the climate and environment. This responsibility, which is also an obligation , the G7 countries accepted in Sapporo.”
The director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), Fatih Birol, was also satisfied with the results. The G7 final declaration takes into account “our current concerns about energy security”, but also offers “a roadmap for dealing with the climate crisis”, said Birol. Overall, states have “taken a reasonably positive step in the right direction,” according to Greenpeace campaign manager Daniel Read. However, they failed to “set up sufficiently ambitious action plans to drastically reduce emissions”.
