For once, this week's economic and environmental transition news is marked by a word. Not just any word: the trilemma, dear to International Monetary Fund economists, who have been using it for a few decades. In its latest issue, the IMF mentions "the transition trilemma": climate, debt, and politics constitute, in fine three impossible goals to achieve simultaneously. One must be sacrificed to achieve the other two. If we choose politics and climate, debt soars. If we prefer debt and climate, politics implodes. And if we prioritize politics and debt, then climate suffers. Without going back to the Greek philosopher Epicurus and his trilemma on the existence or not of a benevolent and omnipotent god – current geopolitical events suggest an answer, but that's not the subject 😉 – the project management triangle is a classic example of a trilemma. "Fast" and/or "good" and/or "cheap". Don't look: there is no common central area, no intersection between the three… You have to choose!
Les Echos considers this trilemma analysis " very enlightening on the situation in France ": "the left promises a climate struggle paved with roses and promises purchasing power to households, it doesn't care about debt (…); the far right renounces climate (…) and swears to improve incomes; Emmanuel Macron, who loves 'doing both at the same time,' wants to hold all three objectives together despite the IMF's trilemma." To resolve this trilemma, Les Echos tells us, we must therefore attempt a "triple at the same time," the only worthwhile strategy: "Climate, debt, and subsidies, all three together." In Le Monde, Jean Pisani-Ferry also mentions this magic of "doing both at the same time" sought by the government. For his part, he warns against the faith, excessive in his view, placed in " the performative power of words ". In such choice words are these things said…
In the meantime, this squaring of the circle, to stay with complex geometric figures, seems to have inspired the drafting of the 2024 draft budget, especially its "expenditure" aspect and particularly its "green budget" part, presented yesterday. This budget shows a sharp increase in "green" spending and a clear decrease in so-called "brown" spending. With some optical illusions. Thus, the sharp decrease in so-called "brown" spending: environmentally harmful spending will indeed fall by two-thirds, from 33.6 to 13.1 billion. But alone, the energy price shields, which heavily burdened spending in 2023 (8.9 billion planned for electricity and 9 billion for gas), will decrease from 22.6 to 2.2 billion. So that "apart from these exceptional expenses, brown spending remains generally stable," Bercy admits. A not very structuring movement, therefore 😉. Furthermore, the breakdown of the main items, as shown in the graphs below, shows that most of the efforts focus on fossil fuels, which, need we remind you, faithful readers of "Breaking (RE)NEWS," constitute only a part, and not necessarily the "heaviest," of the challenge posed by the transition.
And even there, a blind spot has already been pointed out : fuel. Because, precisely, they are not touching it, "yellow vests" oblige. Ah, trilemma, you've got us 😉.
To begin our weekly sections, let's stay in France with the anti-waste campaign of the week which reminds us that, contrary to appearances, "winter is coming": aid for purchasing thermostats to control temperatures, reduction of light pollution, promotion of cycling and teleworking… Energy Transition Minister Agnès Pannier-Runacher announced new measures on Thursday, still "incentive-based and non-coercive," supposed to reduce energy consumption in France. The details of these measures and mini-measures can be found in particular in Le Monde.
The draft law of the week is well known to readers of Breaking (RE)NEWS: for a few months, we have been informing you about the measured progress of "green industry". White smoke has emerged from a room where senators and deputies met in a CMP (Joint Committee), where they agreed on this famous draft law. A development that pleases the Senate, which was able to add its "local authorities" touch. Welcoming this agreement, Dominique Estrosi Sassone, the new president of the Senate's Economic Affairs Committee, however, warned: "it is only a very small step towards the reindustrialization of France. We must now open the structural projects of vocational training, business competitiveness, and venture capital mobilization, because it is the entire productive apparatus that must be put in order for the ecological transition." A small step indeed, to the point that Le Monde describes this text as "pale green". Some attentive observers believe that the two flagship measures respond to demands made "in every tone by industrialists for a long time". The first consists of halving the administrative deadlines for site opening, from seventeen to nine months. The other measure is a tax credit that can represent up to 40% of the investment for factories producing batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, or heat pumps. The thirteen other measures of the law – creation of a savings account, site rehabilitation, creation of a label, training… – also go in the direction demanded by industrialists.
The synthetic report of the week concerns French-style ecological planning, repeatedly mentioned in this Breaking (RE)NEWS, with a very well-made document, a goldmine of interesting figures, which can be downloaded here.
Theslightly technical controversy of the week which we are not sure, at (RE)SET, which likes the concrete, constitutes a key topic of the transition, concerns "materiality," double or not double. We warned you, it's technical 😉. On one side, you have Emmanuel Faber, the charismatic former leader of Danone, who in an opinion piece states that it is "simplistic" to wish for materiality to extend beyond the economic domain. Now President of the international body responsible for extra-financial accounting standards, the ISSB, he is thus contesting the criticisms directed, in Europe, at the project proposed by this body. Criticisms sometimes vehement, including those of Jean-Marc Jancovici (among others), who advocates for the " double materiality " promoted by Europe. Behind this jargon lies a difference in philosophy between Americans and Europeans regarding what a company owes to third parties. Faber argues that the only environmental information a company must make available to its shareholders is that which is likely to have an impact on the share value. With this approach, a company must disclose whether one of its assets is likely to be affected by global warming, but it does not need to say what its own impact on the environment is. "double materiality " assumes doing both. Faber/Jancovici, round eighteen, place your bets! Concretely, enough words, action matters: let's go!
The war of the week has been going on for years and is far from over. The European Commission is about to approve the renewal of glyphosate authorization for ten years, despite scientists vehemently opposed to this herbicide, the most widely used in the world. Once again, a collective of soil specialist researchers warns, in an opinion piece in Le Monde, about the many studies that show "unequivocally" the deleterious effects of glyphosate on earthworms, powerful allies of sustainable agriculture. Furthermore, we learn today, "by a twist of fate," that the harmfulness of glyphosate has been recognized at least once, in the emblematic case of the Grataloup family (child malformation in utero following exposure to glyphosate), thus compensated. But all this is not very serious, Le Figaro dares to assert, which must have information that others don't, as it headlines the lack of harmfulness of glyphosate. Meanwhile, a first vote today in Brussels failed to find a majority for the renewal. Some must not have read Le Figaro 😉. But it's only postponed…
The transition of the week that will be long and complicated is that of the maritime sector: in the maritime sector, we are far, very far, from alternatives fuels being able to impose themselves except over time. Today, 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions come from maritime transport. But without behavioral changes and without heavy investments, this share will rise to 17% of global emissions by 2050.
In the series "nothing is simple when you're transitioning", the stagnation of the week concerns, alas, recycling, the global figures for which have just been released for 2022. The drop in consumption led to a decrease in the volume of waste collected, and competition with virgin materials (plastic, paper) is to the disadvantage of recycled ones. Ultimately, the recycling market is stagnating, at best. Even as it should be developing rapidly if France intends to achieve its targets in this area.
The editorial of the week is to be found in Le Monde, where Stéphane Foucart ironically discusses our "adorable" "cars". As we remember, after the sarcasm about the "Amish model" and the "return to the oil lamp", after the wishes for the year 2023 marked by the now famous "Who could have predicted it?", Emmanuel Macron has again loaded his public speech with a little phrase of his own. He "loves the car". This allows us to mention a specific but not-so-specific topic: the "company car" , a tax loophole for 2.4 million French people who also love it. And to stay with "the car", the 2024 draft budget nonetheless vigorously tackles a touchy subject: the SUV ("Sport Utility Vehicle"), which represents 47% of the automobile market since January 1st 2023. The "double penalty" will now be truly dissuasive, unless you opt for 100% electric. The good idea is unfortunately not pushed to its logical conclusion, since we know, thanks to ADEME, that switching to electric is only "profitable" in terms of overall carbon emissions if the "car" in question is "small" and "light": even 100% electric, the SUV remains a bad choice!
The video investigation of the week denounces the role of certain major French banks in the persistent financing of fossil fuels, in this case Saudi Aramco, the world's largest oil company, in contradiction, once again, with their commitments: $16 billion since 2019, nonetheless.
About unfulfilled commitments (we're joking!), the social network of the week is TikTok, which is everywhere, including where it might not be expected. According to the 2023 social media trends revealed in the Visibrain report, companies are increasingly choosing TikTok to discuss their CSR commitments and, particularly, the transition. Not sure that the format of this social network helps much in the fight against greenwashing…
The news of the week that doesn't have much to do here but we're telling you about it anyway concerns Onclusive, a leader in media monitoring, which will replace more than half of its employees in France with artificial intelligence tools, Chat GPT and its "colleagues". There's only one step from here to Breaking (RE)NEWS being written by a software, a step that the author of these lines – living, flesh and blood – will not take 😉.
The report of the week concerns Mayotte, a French overseas department, which we hope does not foreshadow what could one day happen in mainland France. There, "water is truly blue gold, it's almost as expensive as oil " Libération tells us. The fault lies with dilapidated infrastructure – in other words, leaks, among other things – and a historic drought.
The other (!) report of the week comes from India, in the Himalayas, and again Libération explains how the foreseeable rupture of an overheated glacier caused a high-altitude lake to spill over a small mountain town, killing a dozen people and leaving 10,000 homeless. A picture is worth a thousand words:
In the same spirit, the number of the week is given to us by UNICEF, and it is 43.1 million (children). " In six years, climate-related disasters have caused 43.1 million internal displacements of children in 44 countries", i.e. "about 20,000 child displacements every day", warns the United Nations Children's Fund in a report published today.
Last week's riddle was a measurement: "4805.59 meters". It also made headlines. What was it about? The clue was that we were talking more about height than length! Easy, therefore, to guess that these 4805.59 meters constitute the new official measurement of the altitude of the summit of Mont Blanc, about two meters lower than two years ago. The altitude varies mainly depending on the weather, and the temperature, which (almost) no one has missed is on the rise, is melting glaciers, among other things. The trend over 20 years is quite clear:
This week's riddle is also about a number: 5 million square meters. But of what? The clue: this number raises two questions. The first about the "made in China" or not of… something. The second about net zero land take. There, really, you are being helped!
