Le pari fossile sur l’avenir repose sur un château de cartes

The document critiques the 'fossil bet on the future,' claiming that carbon offsets and net-zero goals serve as a 'house of cards' to maintain fossil fuel dependence. It specifically targets the amalgamation of carbon capture, emission reductions, and avoided emissions into single, fungible credit units, arguing that such mechanisms do not actually reduce atmospheric CO2 and may lead to increased warming. The report highlights the role of the Task Force on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (TSVCM) and ART-TREES in standardizing these credits to facilitate financial speculation and the 're-floating' of stranded assets.

• The concept of 'net zero' or 'climate neutrality' is presented as a greenwashing tactic that relies on the scientifically flawed assumption that ongoing emissions can be balanced by carbon capture and removal.
• Carbon offset markets are being used by fossil fuel companies, banks, and investors to protect the value of 'stranded assets'—infrastructure and reserves that would lose value if warming were limited to 1.5°C or 2°C.
• There is a fundamental and dangerous false equivalence between 'avoided emissions' (such as preventing deforestation) and 'carbon capture' (removing CO2 from the air), as avoided emissions do not remove existing CO2 from the atmosphere.
• Current carbon capture technologies, including Direct Air Capture (DAC) and Bioenergy Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS), are largely hypothetical or exist only as pilot projects and cannot currently scale to maintain warming below 1.5°C.
• The Task Force on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (TSVCM) and ART-TREES are working to standardize carbon credits into fungible units to increase market volume and facilitate financial speculation through derivatives like futures and swaps.
• Nature-based solutions, such as monoculture tree plantations, are often used as 'smoke screens' that can lead to land grabbing and the violation of indigenous peoples' rights while failing to provide permanent carbon storage.
• The European Commission is developing a 'Carbon Removal Certification' framework to create a new economic model for carbon farming and industrial capture, which the report views as adding government legitimacy to temporary nature-based captures.

APA

Stabinsky, D., Bhatnagar, D., Shaw, S., Rojas, I., Marien, N., Race, M., Chandrasekaran, K., Gilbertson, T., Jackson, R. R., Kennerley, R., Onodera, Y., Raman, M., Roche, C., Orenstein, K., Lahiri, S., & Goldtooth, T. (2022). Le pari fossile sur l’avenir repose sur un château de cartes. Friends of the Earth International. https://www.foei.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Le-pari-fossile-sur-l-avenir-repose-sur-un-chateau-de-cartes_rapport-2022.pdf

Chicago

Stabinsky, Doreen, Dipti Bhatnagar, Sara Shaw, Isaac Rojas, Nele Marien, Madeleine Race, Kirtana Chandrasekaran, et al. Le pari fossile sur l’avenir repose sur un château de cartes. Friends of the Earth International, 2022. https://www.foei.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Le-pari-fossile-sur-l-avenir-repose-sur-un-chateau-de-cartes_rapport-2022.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{stabinsky2022pari, author = {Stabinsky, Doreen and Bhatnagar, Dipti and Shaw, Sara and Rojas, Isaac and Marien, Nele and Race, Madeleine and Chandrasekaran, Kirtana and Gilbertson, Tamra and Jackson, Rachel Rose and Kennerley, Rachel and Onodera, Yuri and Raman, Meena and Roche, Colin and Orenstein, Karen and Lahiri, Souparna and Goldtooth, Tom}, title = {{Le pari fossile sur l’avenir repose sur un château de cartes}}, institution = {Friends of the Earth International}, year = {2022}, month = jun, url = {https://www.foei.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Le-pari-fossile-sur-l-avenir-repose-sur-un-chateau-de-cartes_rapport-2022.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }