Promising the moon? Oslo falls short on bold climate pledges

OSLO – Oslo’s 2016 goal to combat climate change was as radical as it was unprecedented: to halve greenhouse gas emissions within four years.

Having called its plan “demanding yet achievable”, Oslo won global plaudits as a model for bold urban action and went on to be crowned the European Green Capital of 2019, a prestigious annual award from the European Commission.

Without doubt, the Norwegian capital of almost 700,000 people has made huge strides in electrifying public transport, restricting diesel and petrol cars, and building parks and dozens of kilometres of cycle lanes.

Yet Oslo has fallen well short of its 2016 target – to halve emissions from 1990 levels by 2020 – according to interviews with officials and researchers and data analysed by Context.

A newer goal – cutting emissions by 95 per cent from 2009 levels by 2030 – is similarly now in jeopardy.

Oslo is far from unique. Some of Europe’s other leading green cities are struggling to fulfil similar high ambitions, and have revised or dropped climate targets in recent years.

With more than half the world’s population now living in urban areas, concerns are growing about cities’ climate policies, including net-zero pledges, with analysts pointing to a lack of monitoring and scrutiny of pledges made by governments and businesses.

“In 2016 I thought: ‘I will eat my hat if they (Oslo) achieve that goal’,” said Dr Borgar Aamaas, a senior researcher at Cicero, the Centre for International Climate Research in Oslo.

In response to questions, the city council said it could not evaluate its performance against the 2016 target because government agencies had upgraded their methodologies for tracking greenhouse gases, which it said meant statistics from before 2009 were unreliable.

Oslo’s emissions totalled 1.1 million tonnes in 2020 under the new accounting method, about 10 per cent below the 1.2 million tonnes in 1990 that was calculated through the former system.

The goal under the 2016 plan had been to halve emissions to 600,000 tonnes by 2020.

According to the new data, emissions in 2020 were 25 per cent below a peak of 1½ million tonnes in 2009, the first year calculated under the updated measurements, the council said.

That leaves Oslo far off its former target of a 50 per cent cut, though it is still considered a top environmental performer overall.

The jury for the European Green Capital award placed the city top in eight of 12 categories when it won in 2019, including local transport, air quality and biodiversity.

Oslo is “doing an amazing job” by the standards of any major capital, said Mr Stig Schjolset of Norwegian environmental group Zero, praising the city’s policies such as having emissions-free building sites which use electric diggers and cranes.

“But the targets (Oslo) set are extremely ambitious,” Mr Schjolset said, adding that the city was “doomed to fail if you compare them to their ambition”.