TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Ahead of the G20 Summit, activists from Greenpeace Indonesia projected a message that reads “Just Energy Transition NOW” on the popular Melasti Beach cliff located in South Bali. The environmental watchdog hopes that this message will urge leaders to step up on their climate change commitments.

Apart from three main pillars, the G20 Summit is expected to discuss energy transition. Indonesia, as the G20 host, has been urged to agree and accelerate ways to finance its energy transition, especially retiring coal-fired power plants as its main priority.

"The energy transition is something inevitable, and countries will eventually shift in that direction, including Indonesia,” says Tata Mustasya, Head of the Climate Campaign for Greenpeace Southeast Asia in a written statement on Monday, November 14, 2022. "However, it is essential to underline that action must be taken immediately, considering the significant impacts of the climate crisis on the environment and humanity. The G20 holds such responsibility."

Indonesia’s electricity procurement plan (RUPTL) states that the country will continue using coal until the year 2056, in parallel with the "phase-out process."

Meanwhile, the construction of 13.8 GW of coal-fired power plants will carry on. Such policies, Greenpeace argues, contradict the country’s commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as written in the submitted Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) document.

At Glasgow’s COP26 in 2021, along with the signing of the Global Coal to Clean Power Transition Statement, the Indonesian government pledged to decommission its 9.2 GW coal-fired power plants and replace its 3.7 GW energy loss with renewable power plants.

The watchdog believes that it is crucial to ensure that Indonesia and other G20 leaders will not adopt fictitious solutions that could hinder energy transitions, such as co-firing and clean coal technology. G20 countries, which control about 80 percent of the world’s economy, are responsible for 80 percent of global emissions, Greenpeace emphasized in its statement.

“The climate crisis is here, wrecking lives, livelihoods, communities, and cultures around the planet. Time is not on our side. Leaders must take a bold step before we end up in a permanent climate disaster. G20 leaders must ensure that climate justice principles are adopted into a quick and just energy transition scheme that will completely cease fossil fuel use,” says Yeb Sano, Executive Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia and Greenpeace’s Head of Delegation for COP27.

GREENPEACE

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