13 May 2021 Net Zero Producers Forum
Net Zero Producers Forum
THEME: Environment
CONTEXT
Saudi Arabia will join the United States, Canada, Norway, and Qatar in forming ‘Net Zero Producers Forum’ for oil and gas producers to discuss how they can support the implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate change.
Net-zero
• Net-zero is also referred to as carbon-neutrality.
• It does not mean that a country would bring down its emissions to zero. Rather, net-
zero is a state in which a country’s emissions are compensated by absorption and
removal of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
• Absorption of the emissions can be increased by creating more carbon sinks such as
forests, while removal of gases from the atmosphere requires futuristic technologies
such as carbon capture and storage.
• This way, it is even possible for a country to have negative emissions, if the absorption
and removal exceed the actual emissions.
• A good example is Bhutan which is often described as carbon-negative because it
absorbs more than it emits.
Relevance
As the four countries represent 40% of the global gas and oil production, the forum will help develop net-zero emission strategies, which include methane abatement, advancing the circular carbon economy approach, development and deployment of clean-energy and carbon capture and storage technologies.
The forum also focuses on going beyond the reliance on hydrocarbon revenues by finding other measures that meet each country’s circumstances.
Yojna IAS Current Affairs Team
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