From 23 – 25 September 2019, heads of government from around the world will convene at the United Nations’ General Assembly to discuss efforts to advance climate action and global sustainable development. The summit aims to boost national ambitions to achieve the objectives of the Paris Agreement and will review the implementation of measures relating to the Sustainable Development Goals. The relationship between air pollution and climate change plays an important role in this context, and is the subject of a new IASS Policy Brief titled “A Practical Approach to Integrating Climate and Air Quality Policy”.
Air pollution and the climate crisis are closely related. As well as driving climate change, the main cause of CO2 emissions – the extraction and burning of fossil fuels – is also a major source of air pollutants. An integrated approach to these two issues offers opportunities to maximise synergies, minimise trade-offs and increase efficiency. However, most policy decisions around climate action and air quality are still taken in parallel and with only limited coordination. In this latest IASS Policy Brief, the authors explain what the adoption of an integrated approach to these two issues would entail in practice and make an important contribution to the discussion on the implementation of the United Nations’ climate and sustainable development goals.
Read more at Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies E.V. (IASS)
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