Arctic states on track to reach the collective goal on black carbon emissions

At the 12^th Arctic Council Ministerial meeting, which was held in Reykjavik on 20 May, the Arctic Council’s Expert Group on Black Carbon and Methane (EGBCM) released its Summary of Progress and Recommendations 2021. It’s the third report on the status of black carbon and methane emissions in the Arctic States since 2017, and for the first time, the collective emission estimates and projections include all Arctic States. In addition, the report includes data from nine of the Council’s Observer states and the European Union. The good news: The Arctic States are on track of reaching the collective goal of reducing black carbon emissions by 25-33 percent relative to 2013 levels by 2025. Rising methane emissions, however, are a concern that needs to be addressed.

Kristín Linda Árnadóttir, the Chair of EGBCM during the Icelandic Chairmanship (2019-2021) outlines some highlights, key findings and future focus areas on reducing black carbon and methane emissions in this interview.

What is the current state of black carbon and methane emissions in the Arctic States?

The main results in our report regarding black carbon are showing that we are on track on reaching the collective goal, which was set by the Arctic States and entails reducing black carbon emissions by 25-33 percent relative to 2013 levels by 2025. This is a very encouraging result but of course we need to keep up the good work and strengthen our efforts further.

Regarding methane emissions, we unfortunately are not able to present equally positive results. Methane emissions are increasing, and we can even see that there’s likely to be a continued increase until 2025. More efforts therefore are extremely important to tackle methane emissions.

Our recommendations give a good focus on what priority areas are most important regarding reducing methane.

What are some highlights of the report that you can share?

We are of course highlighting that we are on track on reaching the collective goal on black carbon emissions, which is of high importance. It’s also worth emphasizing that all Arctic States actively participated in our work and are committed to reducing emissions from black carbon and methane.

In addition, we have put an emphasis on the linkages with cross-cutting policy areas and governance structures for addressing black carbon and methane. It’s very important that we look at both the linkages to climate change policies and air pollution policies when we are dealing with black carbon and methane emissions.

The main priority areas we are focusing our work on have remained the same since the 2019 report. That will say that the new report also looks into emissions from mobile and stationary diesel-powered sources, oil and gas methane leakage, venting and flaring, residential combustion, solid waste disposal, agriculture and animal husbandry and the management of wildfires. However, it is important to note that the recommendations in different priority areas are targeted towards different levels – from local levels to international organizations and enterprises. We need to acknowledge that each state needs to look at these recommendations through the lens of their own national circumstances and policies.

How does EGBCM’s work relate to and possibly feed into national policies and international frameworks?

The main body of our work is to compile the policies and projects that are presented in the national reports and other relevant documents. We are highlighting what is working in the different states in order to give other countries and organizations the possibility to learn from experiences and successes elsewhere. I would also like to point out that it’s very important to give Indigenous communities the opportunity to discuss and share knowledge on the actions and projects that really work on a local level. Many Arctic communities are isolated, the challenges they face very specific, it’s therefore crucial that we include the Traditional Knowledge of Indigenous Peoples in order to address the impacts of black carbon and methane emissions.

What are emerging issues that EGBCM has identified and that we should keep an eye on?

We are of course working towards strengthening our database to better analyze what strategies and priority areas are working. This time we decided to include emerging issues to every sector chapter in order to make information on what is new in this field easily accessible. For example, though not considered an anthropogenic source of emissions, wildfires are a major source of black carbon emissions and are increasing in size and intensity due to the impacts of climate change on Arctic forests, peatlands, and tundra.

Where do you see EGBCM will focus its attention in future?

I think that we will have to focus even more on methane and what strategies, projects and policies will be needed to reverse the trend we see now. We also need to keep up the good work regarding black carbon emissions and increasingly focus on the implementation of the recommendations made by the EGBCM. We can see in a recently published report by the OECD, The Economic Benefits of Air Quality Improvements in Arctic Council Countries, that it is economically sound and good for environment and health to have even more ambitious goals on emission reduction in the future.