Update on Climate - examining the climate campaigning landscape ahead of us in 2022

This year is going to be a big year for climate action. 2022 is a year where the dynamics of climate action in Ireland will be different, thanks to the passing of the Climate Law last year, some of the outcomes of COP26 and increased public appetite for faster and fairer climate action.

We’ve spent the last few months examining the climate landscape ahead of us in 2022 - analysing the campaigning opportunities and challenges - both by ourselves and with the help of external experts. 2022 is the year where we need to move from talking about action climate plans to tangible climate action. Where headline policies need to become concrete schemes. And where every sector will be jostling to protect their interests.
Before Christmas, Stop Climate Chaos hosted a webinar “The Climate Challenge in 2022: From Plan to Action” where we explored the path ahead of us in 2022, looking at the different milestones and staging posts for climate action this year.

Speakers included Dr Cara Augustenborg, Environmental Policy Fellow at UCD and member of the Climate Change Advisory Council, Dr Hannah Daly, Lecturer, Sustainable Energy and Energy Systems Modelling at UCC and member of the Carbon Budgets Committee of the Climate Change Advisory Council, Dr Ciara Murphy, Environmental Policy Advocate at the Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice and Pat Leahy, Irish Times, Political Editor.
This expert panel examined what each sector needs to do in terms of climate action this year and over the next decade, identifying speedbumps, political pitfalls and opportunities and looking at how we can best deal with them. The webinar also included some discussion on how we can include under-represented voices in climate action policy making and how we can protect the most vulnerable from the impacts of climate change and climate action. If you missed the webinar it’s still available to watch back here.

I have also been briefing the wider environmental community on the outlook for climate action in Ireland, in light of COP26 and the passing of the Climate Law last year. You can listen back to my speech at the Environment Ireland conference here. It’s clear that the text of UN COP negotiations no longer represents the limit of our climate ambition and that the national conversation on climate action this year will move away from “if we should act” to “ how we act” and to “how we carve up the pollution pie between different sectors”.
There’s no doubt about it, 2022 is teeing up to be an exciting year for climate action! It will be full of challenges, of course, but also full of possibilities as we reap the benefits of the Climate Law we have achieved - and enjoy having the scales tipped further than ever before towards climate action!