green policy – Page 2 – Eastern European Association of the Greens

Google maps will help tourists to find the most eco-friendly routes

10/07/2021 News

Driving and flying are huge contributors to carbon emissions and climate change. So Google is helping users make more informed decisions about how they travel, CNN informs.

The company is releasing features on Google Maps and Google Flights to show how travel plans may contribute to climate change.

Eco-friendly routes

In addition to showing drivers the fastest way to get to their destination, Google Maps will now show the route that’s the most fuel-efficient.

To provide the new feature, Google incorporated data from the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, which estimates that eco-friendly routing has the potential to prevent more than one million tons of carbon emissions from entering the atmosphere per year. That’s the equivalent of removing 200,000 cars from the road, Google claims.

On the Google Maps app, the most eco-friendly route will display with a small green leaf next to it. The route option will include information about how long the trip will take and how much fuel the driver could save.

Options for bikers

It’s no secret that biking is a more eco-friendly travel option than driving, and the use of biking directions on Maps has increased by as much as 98% over the past year, according to Google. The tech company is focusing on tapping into bike riders with a new feature called “lite navigation” that gives cyclists important details about their routes.

This feature is being introduced after Google heard from cyclists who were sick of following turn-by-turn directions on their phones. Bikers tend to tuck their phones away for most of the ride, after all.

With lite navigation, bike riders will be able to see details about their route without needing to keep their screen on or engage turn-by-turn navigation.

Cyclists will also be able to track their trip progress, see their ETA updated in real time and find details about the elevation of their route.

Bike and scooter sharing

In addition to the biking feature, in 300 cities — including Berlin, New York and São Paulo — Google Maps is introducing a feature that will provide more information about bike and scooter sharing. With this new option, Google Maps users will be able to find nearby docking stations and pinpoint how many vehicles are available at that moment.

To make this feature possible, Google is partnering with bike and scooter companies including Europe-based Donkey Republic, Tier and Voi, as well as Bird and Spin, which are based in the US.

Finding flights with fewer carbon emissions

Alongside price and trip duration information, Google Flights users will now be able to see carbon emissions estimates for nearly every flight in the search results. The estimates are “flight-specific” and “seat-specific,” Google said.

“Newer aircraft are generally less polluting than older aircraft,” the company said in its press release. “Emissions increase for premium economy and first-class seats because they take up more space and account for a larger share of total emissions,” Google added.

The last Norway’s Arctic coal mine will be closed until the 2023

09/30/2021 News

OSLO, Sept 30 – Norway’s state-owned coal company will close its last mine in the Arctic Svalbard archipelago in 2023, it said on Thursday, causing the loss of 80 jobs and ending 120 years of exploitation, Reuters informs.

While Store Norske Spitsbergen Kullkompani (SNSK) has shut its major mines in the islands over the past two decades, it had kept the smaller Mine 7 open, primarily to ensure supplies to a local coal-fired power plant, as well as some exports.

The Arctic islands are warming faster than almost anywhere on Earth, highlighting the risks to fragile ecosystems from climate change, and Norway aims to cut its overall emissions, although it also remains a major oil and gas producer.

Svalbard’s main settlement will temporarily switch its energy source to diesel in 2023 before establishing a permanent renewable electricity supply, negating the need for a local coal supply, SNSK said.

“Now that the contract to supply the power plant has been terminated there will no longer be a basis for operating the mine,” Chief Executive Morten Dyrstad said in a statement.

In the meantime however, Mine 7 will increase its output to a rate of 125,000 tonnes per year from the current 90,000 tonnes, taking advantage of high global prices to boost exports for the remaining two years.

But the volumes are small compared to SNSK’s historical output of several million tonnes annually, and the local economy is now primarily geared towards tourism and scientific research.

Located around 700 km (435 miles) north of the European mainland, Svalbard is governed under a 1920 treaty giving Norway sovereignty but allowing all nations signing it to do business there and to exploit its natural resources.

Russia operates a coal mine at its Barentsburg settlement, supplying a local power plant.

German young people protest over the politicans ignoring the climate change

09/24/2021 News

BERLIN, Sept 24 (Reuters) – In one of the world’s most aged countries, some young people are resorting to drastic measures to voice their frustration at politicians’ failure to tackle climate change.

Outside Germany’s parliament, a group of activists have been on hunger strike since Aug. 30, bringing their demands for more action on climate change in person to the three candidates to succeed Angela Merkel.

Now, two days before the election that will bring her time in office to a close, two of the activists have stepped up their campaign, announcing that they will no longer even drink water until their demands are heard.

“We’ve tried everything,” said Klara Hinrichs, spokesperson for the two remaining hunger strikers. “Thousands of us were on the street with Fridays for Future. We started petitions. I chained myself to the transport ministry.”

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg was in the German capital on Friday as part of a Fridays for Future global climate protest.

The three chancellor candidates, Olaf Scholz of the Social Democrats, conservative Armin Laschet and Green Annalena Baerbock have not gone to see the hunger strikers, urging them to drop their strike and preserve themselves for future battles.

But while the other hunger strikers have now dropped their campaign, Henning Jeschke, now wheelchair-bound and very gaunt, and Lea Bonasera have vowed not to drink until Olaf Scholz, leading in the polls, either comes to them or declares there is a climate emergency.

“To the activists in hunger strike I say: I will stick to the agreement and speak to them after the election,” Scholz wrote on Twitter on Friday. “But now they must save their own lives and stop.”

Germany has long been in the vanguard of climate activism, giving birth to the first Green Party to win national prominence, and all parties are committed to action on climate change.

But its population also has the oldest median age in the European Union, and successive elections have revealed a gulf between the young, most exposed to the long-term impact of rising temperatures, and the old for whom climate change is one of many competing worries.

After a recent television debate, polls found that more than half those aged 18-34 thought Baerbock, the Green candidate, had won, compared to a fifth of older people, who were far more convinced by the SPD’s and conservatives’ candidates.

“The intergenerational pact has been broken,” reads the poster with which the seven original hunger strikers announced their campaign.

But Baerbock, at 40 the youngest of the three candidates for chancellor, also sided with Scholz.

“Don’t throw your lives away,” she told them via newspaper Die Welt. “Society needs you.”

Brussel will ban diesel cars by 2030 and petrol until 2035

06/27/2021 News

25 June 2021 – The government of the Brussels-Capital Region has today announced tightening its low emission zone after 2025. The proposal foresees phasing out diesel cars by 2030 while petrol and gas-powered cars will be banned as of 2035. No date was put forward for banning fossil fuel-powered coaches and heavy-duty vehicles. Fossil fuel-powered buses will be phased out as of 2036, the Clean Cities Campaign informs.

The regional government’s decision to set an end date for fossil fuel-burning vehicles in the city is a welcome improvement, according to the environmental NGOs. However, they call on the regional government to phase out all fossil fuel-powered vehicles by 2030 at the latest, as is already the case in other European cities.

Eva Zemmour, Project Coordinator at Les chercheurs d’air said: “Setting an end date for fossil fuel-powered vehicles in Brussels is certainly good news. But we cannot wait another 10 or 15 years. The health, economic and climate impacts are far too pressing. Capitals like Paris and Amsterdam won’t have any of these vehicles on their roads by 2030. Why then should Brussels wait until 2035?”

According to a new study by Bruxelles Environnement, exposure to fine particles (PM2.5) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2), originating mainly from road traffic, led to 950 premature deaths in Brussels in 2018. Currently, 100% of the Brussels population is exposed to levels of PM2.5 that are considered harmful to people’s health, according to the World Health Organization. The study shows that if all fossil fuel-powered vehicles, including heavy-duty vehicles, were banned by 2030, this figure would fall to 3-4%. Similarly, the number of premature deaths would decrease by 110 deaths per year.

ClientEarth’s director of nature and health Ugo Taddei said: “Every single citizen in Brussels is currently exposed to harmful levels of PM2.5 above the recommendations of the World Health Organization and their health is suffering day in and day out because of it. Phasing out fossil fuelled vehicles will have clear and significant benefits in reducing air pollution and protecting human health. So why wait so long? The Brussels government has a legal and moral duty to protect people and put in place the measures that will ensure healthy air as soon as possible.”

A recent Yougov survey commissioned by the Clean Cities Campaign shows that six out of ten Brussels residents (61%) want to see a reduction in air pollution from traffic and ⅔ of them are asking for more action to be taken at local level to fight it.

Marie-Charlotte Debouche, coordinator of the Clean Cities Campaign in Belgium, said: “Citizens are aware of the impact polluting vehicles have on their health and are asking for more action against air pollution at local level. The Brussels government has certainly taken a historic step for Brussels today, but must now listen to its citizens and revise the current proposal to ban all fossil fuel-powered vehicles from the city by 2030 at the latest.”

Today’s proposal detailing the government’s plans for the Low Emission Zone after 2025 is part of a Royal Decree that will be reviewed by several governmental committees before the summer.

Norwegian activists protest against the new oil exploration licences in the Arctic

06/24/2021 News

A group of environmental activists chained themselves in front of the Norwegian oil and energy ministry on Thursday to protest against the awarding of new oil exploration licences in the Arctic, The globe and mail informs.

Carrying banners that said “No to new oil” and “Norwegian oil is boiling the planet” three campaigners sat in chains in front of the entry to the ministry from about 0600 GMT as ministry workers arrived for work.

Norway on Wednesday awarded four exploration licences to seven oil companies, including three for the Arctic Barents Sea, although fewer oil companies applied for the permits than in previous licensing rounds.

“We’re demonstrating here today because Norway is keeping on handing out new oil licences even though we’re in the midst of a climate crisis,” said demonstrator Halvard Raavand, 30, wearing an “oil free Arctic” black face mask.

Earlier, demonstrators glued images of individuals carrying slogans such as “keep the oil in the ground” on the windows of the ministry.

French investors will be required to declare how green their assets are

06/23/2021 News

France is striving to confirm its position as a global leader in corporate climate disclosures with a new set of binding targets that require investors to declare how green their assets are and set greenhouse emissions goals every five years.

In 2015, when it hosted U.N. climate talks that agreed a major deal to move the world away from fossil fuel, France took the lead in requiring financial institutions and asset managers to disclose their exposure to climate risks.

Since then the debate has moved further into the mainstream and countries and companies around the world are vying for position as environmental champions.

This month, Britain hosted G7 talks that backed mandatory climate disclosure and some policy-makers want a deal to establish global reporting requirements in time for November’s U.N. climate change talks in Glasgow.

France has sought to secure its lead with the world’s first regulations, published on June 2 and taking effect from the 2021 reporting period, to make it mandatory for investors to set greenhouse gas emission goals every five years to 2050 and for quantified targets to protect biodiversity.

The 230 portfolio management firms covered by the regulations will have to declare the percentage of their assets that is green and their exposure to fossil fuel companies.

France was keen to ensure European governments set the ground rules, rather than import U.S.-influenced voluntary recommendations. It says its 2015 rules served as a model for EU regulations on sustainable finance disclosure currently taking effect.

“We don’t want to depend on a framework that comes from the United States,” former state secretary for environmental transition Brune Poirson told Reuters.

BUILDING ON EXPERIENCE

In 2015, France was at the vanguard when it introduced a requirement that institutional investors and asset managers must explain how they factored in climate risks or to give a reason why they could not.

With several years of experience and disclosure regulation entering into force across the European Union, France is seeking to go further than its peers.

AXA Investment Managers, the French insurer’s asset management arm, said that the updated French rules were “more detailed than the European regulation” and should be used as a “user’s guide” to putting the new EU reguirements into practice.

This month’s update also made compulsory the recommendations from the industry-led Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), which a growing number of companies internationally follow on a voluntary basis.

Paris has supported the principles behind the U.S.-influenced TCFD recommendations since they were issued in 2017, but had previously stopped short of bringing them into the French framework.

The shift places it just ahead of Britain, which has proposed UK companies should meet TCFD recommendations from next year.

Central bankers are among those who say mandatory rather than voluntary reporting is necessary to deal with the risk of assets that could prove to be of low value because of their climate exposure.

“Disclosure will help markets to appropriately price climate-related risks and ensure efficient allocation of capital,” Bank of France Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau told an online central banking conference early this month.

“That is why disclosure should become mandatory, at least as a first step for financial institutions, as it is already in France, and for large corporates,” he said.

RULES VERSUS REALITY

While representatives of French asset managers supported France’s approach, they said that the disclosure rules for investors were ahead of those for companies making up their portfolios.

“The lack of data published by issuers is going to keep us from meeting the regulation’s demands in the short term,” Alix Faure, head of sustainable investing at the French asset managers’ association, said.

Independently of governments and regulators, many investors have been pressing for more climate transparency, which has to an extent eroded France’s first mover advantage.

Campaign group CDP, which tracks corporate disclosure, had 19 French companies on its transparency A-list last year, level with Germany but behind Britain which had 21 firms.

“Everyone is catching up, especially in Germany where big German companies have to be more transparent because investors demand it,” CDP capital markets director Laurent Babikian said.

Whereas once climate rules deterred investors that were seeking the highest returns, investing in sustainable and ethically governed companies is now widely seen as a way to reduce financial risk.

A study by France’s central bank in January found French investors have reduced their exposure to companies in the fossil-fuel sector by 39% since 2015, suggesting that 28 billion euros ($33.34 billion) have been channelled elsewhere.

Green pressure groups, however, question whether French leadership has had much impact so far.

“France has self-proclaimed itself as a leader of green finance since 2017, but four years later the government’s incapacity to spur a shift in financial flows exposes its failure on climate policy,” Friends of the Earth France campaigner Lorette Philippot said in a statement.

The Great Barrier Reef is in danger. Climate crisis is the main reason

06/22/2021 News

(CNN) –The Great Barrier Reef has deteriorated to such an extent it should be listed as a world heritage site “in danger,” a United Nations committee said Tuesday – prompting immediate backlash from the Australian government.

UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee recommended the listing, recognizing the climate crisis as the driving factor behind the destruction of the world’s largest coral reef. It called for Australia to “urgently” address threats from climate change.

The inclusion will be voted on at the committee’s meeting in China next month.

Australian Minister for the Environment Sussan Ley said the government will “strongly oppose” the recommendation, arguing the government was investing $3 billion in reef protection. Ley said officials in Canberra were “stunned” by the move and accused UNESCO of backflipping on previous assurances the reef would not be declared endangered.

“The Great Barrier Reef is the best managed reef in the world and this draft recommendation has been made without examining the reef first hand, and without the latest information,” Ley said in a statement.

In a call with UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay, Ley said she “made it clear that we will contest this flawed approach, one that has been taken without adequate consultation.”Spanning nearly 133,000 square miles (345,000 square kilometers) and home to more than 1,500 species of fish and 411 species of hard corals, the Great Barrier Reef is a vital marine ecosystem. It also contributes $4.8 billion annually to Australia’s economy and supports 64,000 jobs, according to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation.

But the reef’s long-term survival has come into question. It has suffered from three devastating mass bleaching events since 2015, caused by above-average ocean temperatures as the burning of fossil fuels heats up the planet.

The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system and a vital marine ecosystem.

The Great Barrier Reef is the world’s largest coral reef system and a vital marine ecosystem.

In October, researchers from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies found the reef had lost 50% of its coral populations in the past three decades, with climate change a key driver of reef disturbance.

In 2019, the Australian government’s Great Barrier Reef Outlook Report downgraded the reef’s condition from “poor” to “very poor.”

The UNESCO committee said it was crucial Australia implemented the recommendations of that 2019 report, which called for “accelerated action to mitigate climate change and improve water quality.”

It said the government’s “progress has been insufficient” in meeting its key reef policy, called the Reef 2050 Plan, and it “requires stronger and clearer commitments, in particular towards urgently countering the effects of climate change.”

Environment Minster Ley agreed climate change is the single biggest threat to the world’s reefs, but said “it is wrong, in our view, to single out the best managed reef in the world for an ‘in danger’ listing.”

Scientists said the UNESCO proposal was a wake-up call.

On its current course, global average temperatures will increase by more than 2 degrees Celsius, which scientists warn no coral reefs can survive, according go the Climate Council. It has recommended Australia cut its emissions by 75% by 2030 and reach net zero by 2035.

Australia has made no commitment to reach net zero emissions by 2050, making it a global outlier. Australia’s current targets are to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 26% to 28% from 2005 levels by 2030, which have been widely criticized as not ambitious enough.

“The Australian government has stewardship of one of the world’s most precious and iconic ecosystems, but its continued support for fossil fuels and its lack of effective climate policy means it’s utterly failing to live up to that responsibility,” said Climate Council spokesperson and climate scientist, Prof. Lesley Hughes, in a statement. “The situation is dire, and our response should match that.

Greenpeace Australia Pacific CEO David Ritter said the reef cannot be protected “without rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal, oil and gas.”

“Just a week after Prime Minister (Scott) Morrison faced the disapproval of the world’s leaders for his poor climate performance at the G7 conference, we are seeing the terrible consequences of Australia’s failure to reduce emissions — and the Reef is paying the price,” Ritter said in a statement.

The report comes as Australia swore in a new deputy prime minister on Tuesday. Barnaby Joyce, a climate change skeptic, is leader of the Nationals — a party that represents rural Australia, which is heavily dependent on fossil fuel mining. Joyce’s position is expected to make it more difficult for the Morrison government to strengthen climate targets adopted by most other major nations.

UNESCO’s List of World Heritage in Danger has 53 entries, which include natural wonders and man-made sites. Jerusalem’s Old City was added in 1982, while Aleppo — the Syrian city bombarded by air strikes — made the list in 2013.

The inclusion is supposed to spur parties into action to save the endangered sites. According to UNESCO’s website, if an endangered site loses the characteristics that make it special, “the World Heritage Committee may decide to delete the property from both the List of World Heritage in Danger and the World Heritage List.”

In the last 15 years the amount of heat in the atmosphere has doubled

06/21/2021 News

(CNN) – The planet is trapping roughly double the amount of heat in the atmosphere than it did nearly 15 years ago, according to an alarming new analysis from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Researchers say it’s a “remarkable” amount of energy that is already having far-reaching consequences.

“It’s excess energy that’s being taken up by the planet,” said Norman Loeb, a NASA scientist and lead author of the study, “so it’s going to mean further increases in temperatures and more melting of snow and sea ice, which will cause sea level rise — all things that society really cares about.

“The study, published this week in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, found that what’s known as the Earth’s energy imbalance — the difference between how much of the sun’s energy the planet absorbs and how much energy is radiated back into space — approximately doubled from 2005 to 2019. The result was “striking,” the research team wrote.

Life on Earth couldn’t exist without the sun’s energy, but it matters how much of that energy is radiated back into space. It’s a delicate balance that determines the planet’s climate.

In addition to higher global temperatures, the most obvious effect of a positive imbalance, Loeb told CNN “we’re going to be seeing shifts in atmospheric circulations including more extreme events like droughts.”

Using satellite data to measure the imbalance, scientists found that the Earth is gaining more energy than it should and causing the planet to heat up even more, also known as a positive energy imbalance.

Approximately 90 percent of the excess energy from this imbalance ends up in the ocean. And warming ocean temperatures lead to acidification, impacting fish and other marine biodiversity. When researchers compared the satellite measurements with data from a global array of ocean sensors, the findings exhibited a similar trend. The remaining energy, meanwhile, stays in the atmosphere.

The cause of this energy imbalance is certainly due in part to human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, the researchers report. It’s also affected by some of the positive feedback loops caused by climate change: as global temperature increases, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere also rises, which further increases the temperature. Melting snowpack and sea ice — natural reflectors of solar energy — is decreasing due to global warming as well.

Another contributing factor is how the Pacific Decadal Oscillation — often described as a longer term El Niño-like climate pattern in the Pacific — stayed in a severely warm phase from 2014 through 2020. Because of this sudden flip from a cool to an extended warm phase, cloud cover over the ocean dwindled, allowing the Pacific Ocean to absorb more solar radiation.

“It’s man-made change that’s shifting the composition of the atmosphere, as well as fluctuations in the climate systems,” Loeb said. “The observations are all kind of blended together.”

Against the backdrop of the West’s historic drought and extreme heat, the study warns that the amount of heat the Earth traps must decline, or climate change will continue to worsen.

Loeb described his team’s chosen time period, 2005 to 2019, as a mere snapshot of what’s to come in terms of climate impacts, adding that more studies and long-term observations need to be done in order to fully grasp the long-term trend.

“My hope is the rate that we’re seeing this energy imbalance subsides in the coming decades,” said Loeb. “Otherwise, we’re going to see more alarming climate changes.”

Drought is the next pandemic

06/18/2021 News

Drought is a hidden global crisis that risks becoming “the next pandemic” if countries do not take urgent action on water and land management and tackling the climate emergency, the UN has said.

At least 1.5 billion people have been directly affected by drought this century, and the economic cost over roughly that time has been estimated at $124bn (£89bn). The true cost is likely to be many times higher because such estimates do not include much of the impact in developing countries, according to a report published on Thursday.

Mami Mizutori, the UN secretary general’s special representative for disaster risk reduction, said: “Drought is on the verge of becoming the next pandemic and there is no vaccine to cure it. Most of the world will be living with water stress in the next few years. Demand will outstrip supply during certain periods. Drought is a major factor in land degradation and the decline of yields for major crops.”

She said many people had an image of drought as affecting desert regions in Africa, but that this was not the case. Drought is now widespread, and by the end of the century all but a handful of countries will experience it in some form, according to the report.

“People have been living with drought for 5,000 years, but what we are seeing now is very different,” Mizutori said. “Human activities are exacerbating drought and increasing the impact”, threatening to derail progress on lifting people from poverty.

Developed countries have not been immune. The US, Australia and southern Europe have experienced drought in recent years. Drought costs more than $6bn a year in direct impacts in the US, and about €9bn (£7.7bn) in the EU, but these are also likely to be severe underestimates.

Population growth is also exposing more people in many regions to the impacts of drought, the report says.

Drought also goes beyond agriculture,said Roger Pulwarty, a senior scientist at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a co-author of the report.

He pointed to the Danube in Europe, where recurring drought in recent years has affected transport, tourism, industry and energy generation. “We need to have a modernised view of drought,” he said. “We need to look at how to manage resources such as rivers and large watersheds.”

Changing rainfall patterns as a result of climate breakdown are a key driver of drought, but the report also identifies the inefficient use of water resources and the degradation of land under intensive agriculture and poor farming practices as playing a role. Deforestation, the overuse of fertilisers and pesticides, overgrazing and over-extraction of water for farming are also major problems, it says.

Mizutori called for governments to take action to help prevent drought by reforming and regulating how water is extracted, stored and used, and how land is managed. She said early warning systems could do much to help people in danger, and that advanced weather forecasting techniques were now available.

She said working with local people was essential, because local and indigenous knowledge could help to inform where and how to store water and how to predict the impacts of dry periods.

The report, entitled Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction: Special Report on Drought 2021, was published on Thursday, and will feed into discussions at vital UN climate talksk known as Cop26, which are scheduled to take place in Glasgow in November.

Reinsurers look at dumping coal from bulk-buy policies in green gambit

06/17/2021 News

LONDON, June 17 (Reuters) – Major reinsurers have already pulled back from providing bespoke cover for coal projects as part of efforts to meet global climate change commitments, but now comes the hard part – finding ways to exclude coal from bulk-buy contracts, known as “treaty” reinsurance.

Reinsurance companies help to share the burden of insurance risks by underwriting frontline insurers. Any restrictions they impose will have a knock-on impact on insurance policies on offer to companies.

Most reinsurers have stepped back from offering insurers bespoke or direct cover for coal projects, but many still underwrite the industry through treaty reinsurance, where hundreds of insurers’ policies are bundled together.

The process of unbundling treaty reinsurance to search for coal exposure is tough, yet pressure is building on the industry from investors and regulators to do more to reflect the growing risks of climate change in how they underwrite. Swiss Re is already doing this.

If more reinsurers do cut back this cover, specialist commercial insurers such as those operating in the Lloyd’s of London market will feel the impact, as will suppliers to the coal industry or those businesses which derive even a small portion of their revenues from coal.

“The first consequence is insurance is harder to get, the second consequence is it’s expensive, the third consequence is there are all sorts of caveats on it and at the extreme you might not be offered it”, said Paul Merrey, insurance partner at KPMG.

A rail contractor to Adani Enterprises’ giant Australian coal project last month, for example, asked the Australian government for help to obtain insurance that it was not able to secure from the market.

Five of the world’s six largest reinsurers – Swiss Re, Munich Re, Hannover Re, SCOR and Lloyd’s of London – have already scaled back bespoke coverage for coal projects. But only Swiss Re, in a statement in March, has said it will go further and tighten its treaty reinsurance stance.

Munich Re and Hannover Re told Reuters they are working with their insurance clients to cut their own exposure further.

“We want to keep the dialogue and push for change together,” said Jean-Jacques Henchoz, chief executive of Hannover Re, though he added that: “It’s not happening in a couple of weeks, it’s taking a bit of time.”

Munich Re and Hannover Re said they were working out how to assess what was inside their treaty reinsurance books.ч