The eternal return of the extractivist model in Colombia - Public Reason

Red alert for climate change

The intensity and frequency of climatic alterations, such as prolonged heat waves or extreme winter cold, further complicate the global struggle against climate change, since the means to face them come from fossil fuels.

Coal especially, but also gas, are the protagonists of the energy crisis that Europe lives and the growing demand in Asia, even countries that signed in Paris Agreement.

Together with them, the world also lives the euphoria of the so -called transition minerals, that is, strategic minerals for the manufacture of solar panels, wind towers and equipment for the conversion, storage and distribution of energy.

The intergovernmental panel report on climate change (IPCC) announced that global warming reached a point without return and warned that, although human activity irreversibly changed climatic patterns, it is still possible to avoid its catastrophic effects.

Moreover, nationally determined contributions (NDCS) to counteract global warming by the countries signed by the Paris Agreement are short in front of recent news on climate change.And the call of the International Climate Adaptation (CAS) summit that took place in January 2021, had asked for efforts to reduce polluting emissions.

Now, in the midst of this red alert, the world's environmental rulers and leaders prepare for the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP26).

The world coal return

Pandemia paralyzed world trade during the past year, to the point that prices and volumes traded with fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal) fell to very low levels.And although a greater rebound of clean energies was expected, today fossil fuels are the most demanded energy resource again.

Among the reasons for the current rise of coal - the dirtiest of fossil hydrocarbons - are: