News Excerpt:

Energy ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) industrialised nations have reached a deal to shut down their coal-fired power plants in the first half of the 2030s, in a significant step towards the transition away from fossil fuels.

More about the news:

• The deal was discussed at the G7 ministerial meeting in Turin, Italy.
• The agreement marks a significant step in the direction indicated last year by the COP28 for a transition away from fossil fuels, of which coal is the most polluting.
• The group also discussed potential restrictions on Russian imports of liquefied natural gas to Europe which the European Commission is due to propose in the short-term.

Coal power and emissions in G7:

• Together the G7 makes up around 38% of the global economy.
• G7 members were responsible for more than a fifth of global emissions in 2021, but none were on track to meet their 2030 emission reduction targets.
• Italy last year produced 4.7% of its total electricity through a handful of coal-fired stations. 
• Rome currently plans to turn off its coal plants by 2025, except on the island of Sardinia where the deadline is 2028.
• In Germany and Japan coal has a bigger role, with the share of electricity produced by the fuel higher than 25% of total last year.
• Under new rules unveiled by the US last week, coal plants planning to stay open beyond 2039 will have to cut or capture 90% of their carbon dioxide emissions by 2032. 
• Last year under Japan's presidency, the G7 pledged to prioritise concrete steps towards phasing out coal power generation, falling short of indicating a specific deadline.
• The global capacity of coal-fired power stations grew by 2% last year driven mainly by new plants in energy-hungry China, while there was a slowing in the pace of closures of plants in the EU countries and the US. 
• The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) called on the G7 to adopt “significantly more ambitious plans to cut emissions”.

Alternatives of coal:

• Nuclear energy and biofuels are two other issues at the top of Italy's agenda for the meeting.
• These are options that the G7 nations can pick to decarbonise power generation and transportation.
• The G7 bloc could also indicate the need for a six-fold increase in battery capacity - critical to store renewable energy, which is intermittent - by 2030 from 2022 levels.
• Climate activists said the phaseout deal did not go fast or far enough to address the global warming effect of fossil fuel consumption. 
• All the G7 industrialised nations apart from Japan had already committed to phasing out coal power domestically.