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Germany, Italy push G7 into watering down pledge to end overseas gas finance
(Climate Home News, 28 Jun 2022) The G7 group of wealthy countries has weakened a pledge to end finance for foreign gas projects, under the urging of Germany’s leader Olaf Scholz.
At Cop26 last year, six G7 countries agreed to end public finance for fossil fuel projects overseas by the end of 2022 – a commitment which was reaffirmed by G7 environment ministers at a meeting in May, when hold-out Japan joined them.
But G7 leaders meeting in the Bavarian Alps in Germany this week introduced new loopholes to the pledge. In a joint communiquepublished Tuesday, they “stress[ed] the important role increased deliveries of LNG [gas] can play” in accelerating the phase out of their dependency on Russian energy and “acknowledge[d] that investment in this sector is necessary in response to the current crisis”.
“In these exceptional circumstances, publicly supported investment in the gas sector can be appropriate as a temporary response,” the statement adds.
German chancellor Scholz told a press conference: “When it comes to financing fossil sources of energy, this is something that has to come to an end. The future does not lie in gas.” But, he added: “In the short-term, gas is going to be necessary and there can be investments in the transitional phase which are going to have to be supported”.
Climate Home News, 28 Jun 2022: Germany, Italy push G7 into watering down pledge to end overseas gas finance
