Two-weeks of negotiations in November 2015 led to the Paris Agreement. The culmination of 20 years of discussions, concessions and compromises. Is the Paris Agreement an important document to the hospitality industry? Without a doubt. Science-based targets driving the industry decarbonisation efforts are based on the 2°c (1.5°c) threshold as per the agreement.

COP26 in Glasgow will see countries submitting new or updated targets which is an integral component of the Agreement. A good time to take stock of how much (or little) has been achieved since 2015. Despite the pandemic, the International Energy Agency predicts that emissions are on course to surge, reversing the 2020 decline (-5.8%) due to the pandemic [1, 2]. No wonder many are asking: when are we going to get it right? [3].

It is with desperation that reports [4, 5] are published indicating that some large, global corporations with proclaimed climate commitment, are actively impeding stricter legislations (on fuel, carbon etc.) through lobbying. Regulation is a core component (as many argued and discussed here a few months ago: Sustainability-driven legislation: setting the right conditions for hospitality?) to ensuring a level-playing field as it is sending a decisive message that climate emergency must be dealt with, with all tools we have available.

For hotel development and operations, it is a mixed bag which can actually lead to new opportunities. In the bag are the regulatory and transition risks for inefficient assets, imminent carbon market systems for buildings, a decreasing costs of capital for sustainability-driven investment and access to cheaper technologies (e.g. market for photovoltaic).

So from your stance, experience and position, why is COP26 important? Why should our industry care? There has been talk also in this panel (see The (Green) Recovery Imperative: Hospitality Re-Set Or Bouncing Forward?) about post-COVID-19 green recovery. Is this happening and can COP26 foster this somehow?

Trevor Girard
Trevor Girard
Director of Standards, Hotel Resilient

Tourism not only faces greater risks to climate impacts than other sectors, it is also one of the factors driving climate change. Tourism is a rapidly growing sector that is expected to increase rather than reduce emission levels according to the UNWTO's report on "Transport-related CO2 emissions from the tourism sector". 

Accelerating climate action in tourism is therefore of utmost importance for the resilience of the sector. Climate action is understood as the efforts to measure and reduce GHG emissions and strengthen adaptive capacity to climate induced impacts. 

The global nature of COP26 is what makes it important, because tackling climate change issues and reducing emissions can only be achieved when everyone is on-board, including the tourism industry. What would I recommend world leaders to agree and commit to in regards to tourism climate actions?:

1. Encourage measurement and transparent communication of carbon emissions in the tourism industry

2. Improve incentives for tourism businesses that implement climate actions

3. Think beyond emissions by placing greater emphasis on climate risk management through adaptation and mitigation strategies 

4. Establish indicators to measure tourism sector and destination adaptive capacity

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