Developed countries are largely responsible for global warming. British economists have now converted excess emissions into cash.

Rich industrial nations, which have been heating the Earth’s atmosphere with greenhouse gases for more than 150 years, must support developing countries in climate protection. That’s out of the question. In early 2009, at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, they pledged to raise 100 billion US dollars (93 billion euros) annually from 2020. The topic will again play an important role at this year’s summit preparatory conference in Dubai, which is currently taking place in Bonn. However, it turns out that the rich countries are not fulfilling their promises. However, the aid organization Oxfam alleged in a report that it actually collected a maximum of a quarter of that amount.

The Oxfam report analyzed payments made by donor countries in 2020. They alone say they raised $83.3 billion. Criticism: Most of this amount comes from existing development aid budgets, where there is often little identifiable climate protection benefit. In addition, they are often only about loans, not real grants. Oxfam also complained that the 100 billion pledge was not adapted to worsening local climate change and was therefore too low. In addition, a new fund approved at the climate summit in Egypt in 2022, which is intended to compensate damage and losses to countries specifically affected in climate-related disasters (“loss and damage”), should be immediately funded and used.

Experts are clear: 100 billion is so far not enough to finance the transition to climate-friendly energy systems and adaptation to climate change in developing countries. Two British researchers have now calculated how much money is actually needed to create global climate justice while ensuring that the 1.5 degree limit of the Paris world climate accord remains respected.

Based on this, industrialized countries will have to pay a total of about 170 trillion dollars in compensation payments to poor countries by 2050 to pay off their historical “carbon debt”. That would be almost six trillion dollars a year – that is 6 trillion – or about seven percent of the annual global gross domestic product (GDP). The study was written by economists Andrew Fanning (University of Leeds) and Jason Hickel (London School on Economics) and published in Nature Sustainability.

The two researchers based their calculations on a global “CO2 budget” that, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), could be emitted if the target of 1.5 degrees is reached. That is 1.8 trillion tonnes of CO2. They determined a “fair share” of this for 168 countries around the world, based on their respective populations. Fanning and Hickel then compared this amount to the CO2 load each country had released since 1960 and calculated the subsequent emissions for all countries if reduced to “net zero” by 2050.

It appears that the industrialized countries of the Global North in particular have significantly exceeded their fair share of emissions allocations, by an average of three times. In other words, they take over shares because of other countries. The US, for example, has consumed more than four times the reasonable portion. Homeland of industrialization, Great Britain, 2.5 times, Germany twice. It’s different in developing countries. India, for example, uses less than a quarter of its fair share.

Using CO2 prices under IPCC climate protection scenarios, Fanning and Hickel calculate monetary values ​​for excess emissions from all 67 countries that have exceeded their climate accounting. They generate a total of $192 trillion, with $170 trillion, or 89 percent, coming from the Global North and the remainder from the high-emission countries of the Global South, especially oil nations such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The US has accumulated the largest debt item with 80 trillion, followed by the EU plus the United Kingdom (46 trillion). Economists gave the money as compensation to 101 poor countries that have not yet spent their budgets and will not be able to do so in the future, otherwise the 1.5 degree mark will be violated. For example, India ($57 trillion), Sub-Saharan Africa ($45 trillion) and China ($15 trillion) would be eligible for compensation.

More concretely: Industrialized countries will have to raise an average of about 2,700 dollars per capita and a year in compensation by 2050, which would be 7,200 in the US and 4,800 in Germany. Recipient countries in the Global South will receive $940 per capita per year, with wide coverage as well. For India it will be $1160, for China, whose emissions have increased sharply since 2000, only $280.

Fanning said it is a “climate justice issue that the countries we are asking to rapidly decarbonize their economies, while not being held accountable for excess emissions, must be compensated for this unfair burden.” He and co-author Hickel considered it advisable to use the so-called Warsaw Mechanism for special solutions. This was set up at the 2013 climate summit in the Polish capital to advance the debate on the issue of “loss and damage”. The specific amount of compensation must be recalculated annually, depending on how CO2 emissions develop internationally.

How realistic it is for rich countries to amass enormous sums if they don’t even get the 100 billion promised annually is another matter. Nevertheless, the studies of the two economists should spark debate. And perhaps contributed to the fact that 100 billion is finally in sight.