On Wednesday (3), the Senate approved a bill that obliges Brazil to neutralize 100% of greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2050. The proposal is identical to the one announced by the government earlier this week, but still has not been formalized.
The intention of the president of the House, Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG), is to present it at COP26, the United Nations Conference on Climate Change, as one of the actions carried out by Congress in defense of the environment. The text, however, still needs to be voted on in the Chamber.
Despite the similarity to what was promised by the Environment Minister, Joaquim Leite, the Senate bill had been in process since 2019 and had already been discussed last week.
According to the proposal, the targets (called NDCs for nationally determined contribution) will be defined based on the Brazilian Inventory of Anthropogenic Emissions and Removals of Greenhouse Gases not controlled by the most recent Montreal Protocol.
The text also states that they should be progressive and more ambitious compared to all previous NDCs.
In addition to the 2050 target, the project updates the PNMC (National Policy on Climate Change) with the commitments made by the country in the Paris Agreement.
The text also includes among the policy guidelines the encouragement to the development of research, products and businesses related to the bioeconomy and the priority treatment for public policies aimed at the demands of the productive sectors of the North region.
This is the second project approved by the senators with the intention of improving Brazil’s image at COP26. In October, the House accepted a text that anticipates reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The cuts would go from 37% until 2025 and 43% until 2030 to, respectively, 43% and 50%.
To achieve this result, the proposal that went to the Chamber calls for the government to create a regulation that necessarily includes actions and instruments for the elimination of illegal deforestation and the promotion of sustainable agriculture.
The Brazilian government delegation at COP26 signed two agreements at the conference on Wednesday. In one of them, the country undertakes to limit deforestation in the coming decades, together with 100 world leaders.
The other was the Global Commitment on Methane, together with 96 other countries. The agreement’s goal is to reduce 30% of global methane emissions by 2030, compared to emissions in 2020.
“Brazil is, therefore, part of the solution to the challenges of climate change,” said a note signed by the Ministry of the Environment and Itamaraty, which are leading the negotiations at COP26.
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