Nearly every national government in the world has committed to limiting climate change to well below 2°C and to aim for no more than 1.5°C. This means we must rapidly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions to zero.
To achieve this we have to develop 100% renewable energy systems, and make our buildings and transport systems zero carbon. These sectors have received the vast majority of attention from policy-makers. In comparison the industrial sector has been all but ignored. Yet the production of everyday materials like steel, chemicals, plastics and cement is the source of 30% of global emissions. Without decarbonising industry, we stand little chance of achieving the Paris goals.
In Australia industry accounts for 21% of national emissions. That’s without taking into account the emissions associated with goods we import, which are not factored into national emissions inventories. Moving to 100% renewable energy will solve only a small part of this problem. Less than a third of Australia's industrial emissions are related to electricity use. A bigger part of the problem is industry’s huge demand for heat, which it meets by burning fossil fuels. A further 22% of industrial emissions come from chemical reactions during processing. Cement-making alone causes 8% of global emissions, mostly due to chemical processes and heat requirements
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