Environment minister: climate strategy is ‘feasible and affordable’

The Swiss government has signed off on a strategy it says will enable the country to reduce net carbon emissions to zero by 2050. Measures and legal changes to implement the strategy will follow. The “Long-term climate strategy for Switzerland” comes after the 2019 declaration to eliminate net emissions by 2050, a goal which Environment Minister Simonetta Sommaruga said on Thursday put Switzerland “in good company”. “Our most important trading partners – including the European Union and the US – all want to achieve the same target,” Sommaruga said at a press conference in Bern. The goal is more ambitious than the 75-80% reduction called for by the 2016 Paris Agreement, and reflects the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) about the negative effects of temperature hikes. The government is also concerned that temperatures in Switzerland – “as an Alpine country” – are rising twice as fast as the global average. First targets, then measures Ten “basic...