Cite report
IEA, IRENA & UN Climate Change High-Level Champions (2022), Breakthrough Agenda Report 2022, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/breakthrough-agenda-report-2022, Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Executive summary
Strengthening international collaboration to accelerate transitions
The world remains far off track to meet internationally-agreed climate change goals, despite action being taken in many areas. The Nationally Determined Contributions that countries have put forward in the UN climate change negotiations imply a lower emissions trajectory now than they did before, and most countries have committed to achieving net zero emissions by around the middle century, as have many businesses. Yet, global emissions, which must be halved this decade to limit temperature rise to 1.5°C, are still increasing. The energy crisis and threat of a global food crisis that the world now faces underline the equal urgency of increasing the affordability, accessibility, resilience, and security of supply of humanity’s most essential commodities and services. Transitions to sustainability can reduce the likelihood of such crises occurring in future.
International collaboration will be critical to success, given the global scale and fast pace of change required. Action by governments and businesses individually is necessary, but not sufficient. Well-targeted international collaboration can make low carbon transitions faster, less difficult, and lower cost. By aligning and coordinating actions internationally, countries and businesses can accelerate innovation, create stronger signals for investment and larger economies of scale, and establish level playing fields where needed to ensure that competition is a driver of the transition, and not a brake. International assistance, finance, and the sharing of best practice can support widespread adoption of effective policies and available technologies. International infrastructure can enable cross-border flows of clean energy. Without international collaboration, the transition to net zero global emissions could be delayed by decades.
There is a huge opportunity, and need, to strengthen international collaboration in each of the major greenhouse gas emitting sectors of the global economy. Many valuable international initiatives exist, led by governments, businesses and civil society, and their number and diversity has increased notably over recent years. However, current efforts are far from exploiting the full potential of collaboration to accelerate progress. In each sector, collaboration must go beyond sharing of best practice, and include deliberate alignment of action in areas such as technology development, standards and trade, complemented by strong support to developing countries. Participation must expand to include more countries in each sector, to make this a truly effective global effort. Collaboration must be sustained over years to have its full impact, not sporadically started and stopped. Serious, sustained and focused international collaboration of this kind could greatly increase the chances of limiting the rise in global temperatures to 1.5°C, as well as positively contributing to economic development. This will help generate an additional 14 million jobs and prevent 2 million premature deaths globally from air pollution by 2030 (IEA, 2021).
How international collaboration can accelerate progress at each stage of the transition
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The Breakthrough Agenda is designed to strengthen international collaboration where it is most needed. Leaders of signatories (44 countries plus the European Union), which represent over 70% of global GDP, committed at COP26 to work together to make clean technologies and sustainable solutions the most affordable, accessible and attractive option in each of the emitting sectors before the end of this decade. They agreed on collective goals with the intention of focusing attention on critical problems to solve in each emitting sector. The annual process to identify priorities for stronger collective action to accelerate transitions and then tracking progress on delivery, of which this report is a major part, can help to increase the impact of international action over time.
Action in the five sectors for which the signatories have so far agreed on goals under the Breakthrough Agenda – power, hydrogen, road transport, steel, and agriculture – is essential to achieving international climate goals. Global greenhouse gas emissions have now reached almost 60 GtCO2e and these sectors today account for over 50% of that total (IPCC, 2022). Clean technologies and sustainable solutions are not yet the most affordable or accessible options in these sectors except in the power sector; and even in the power sector, this is not yet the case in all countries. Meeting the Breakthrough Agenda goals in these sectors will require concerted action from governments, businesses and civil society. And doing so could enable all countries to make faster progress, greatly increasing the chances of avoiding more dangerous levels of climate change and meeting the Sustainable Development Goals.
Greenhouse gas emissions by sector, 2019
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Priorities for strengthened international collaboration in the five focus sectors
The power sector, the immediate focus for international action must be growing, coordinating and improving the accessibility of support to developing countries. This will be vital to mobilise investment in the additional 7.4 – 8 TW of renewable power capacity that is needed globally by 2030, as well as in other clean power options. At the same time, there must be more dedicated international support for developing countries, and exchange of best practice among all countries, on the socioeconomic challenges of the transition. Countries should reassess the opportunities for interconnectors to support the integration of larger shares of low-cost clean power, while reinforced international action is needed now to coordinate the demonstration and testing of power system flexibility solutions, including long-term storage, that will be needed to enable fully net zero power in future years. A concerted international effort to agree on strong minimum energy performance standards for high energy consuming appliances will be essential to help cut costs as well as emissions, reducing the necessary increase in power generation capacity.
- The power sector accounts for around 13 GtCO2e, or 23% of total emissions. This has risen by around 10% since 2010. These need to fall by over 50% by 2030.
- Emissions from the power sector should fall by around 8% each year to 2030.
- Electricity access should reach 100% by 2030, if not before.
- Investment will need to grow 25% each year, reaching USD 2 trillion per annum required by 2030.
To increase the availability and affordability of renewable and low carbon hydrogen, the immediate priority is for countries and companies to work together to create larger markets for its deployment and trade, including through purchase commitments. This will also incentivise investment in production, which must scale up from less than 1 Mt in 2020 to around 140-155 Mt per year by 2030. Stronger international action on two fronts is essential: countries and companies should coordinate measures to move away from production based on unabated fossil fuels in sectors where hydrogen is already used, and share best practice in deployment in new applications for hydrogen such as steel, shipping, and energy storage. The number and geographical distribution of demonstration projects should be increased, along with deeper sharing of learning, and should be backed by targeted technical and financial assistance. This will be important to make hydrogen solutions available and affordable for more countries at an earlier date. International efforts to agree safety, operational and emissions standards should be accelerated, since these will be critical to enabling widespread deployment and trade.
- Hydrogen production and use accounts for around 0.9 GtCO2 of emissions, or 1.5% of total emissions.
- Renewable and low carbon hydrogen production currently accounts for less than 1% of total.
- Targets and commitments to use low carbon and renewable hydrogen are equivalent to 3% of current total hydrogen demand.
- 15% of ammonia and 28% of methanol is internationally traded.
In road transport, countries and manufacturers should align target dates for all new vehicles to be zero emission, to shift investment more quickly towards the new technologies and accelerate their cost reduction. Zero emission vehicles accounted for around 9% of global car sales in 2021; this should reach about 60% by 2030. An even greater acceleration of deployment is needed for zero emission heavy goods vehicles, given the earlier state of current deployment, and in many countries the transition to zero emission two- and three-wheeled vehicles will also be important. More systematic exchange of best practice is needed to promote effective policies to mobilise investment in charging infrastructure, narrowing the wide gap between the countries furthest ahead in this regard, and the rest. Technical and financial assistance to developing countries should be greatly increased, to enable wider sharing of the benefits of the transition. Harmonised standards will be essential to ensure sustainability in battery supply chains. Regulatory coordination between used vehicle importing and exporting countries is needed to take the most inefficient vehicles out of international trade, saving costs as well as cutting emissions.
- The road transport sector accounts for around 6 GtCO2e, or 10% of total emissions. That’s risen by 13% since 2010. These need to fall by nearly a 1/3 by 2030.
- Public charging infrastructure needs to increase 10-fold by 2030.
- If major markets align their policies with 100% ZEV sales by 2035, cost parity between ZEVs and ICE vehicles could be reached several years earlier.
- Over 60% of the vehicles added to the roads in Africa each year are imported used vehicles.
In the steel sector, the immediate opportunity is for aggregation of demand to mobilise investment in the production of near-zero emission steel. Less than 1 Mt of primary near-zero emission steel per year is currently produced, whereas over 100 Mt per year will be needed by 2030. Joint procurement commitments by groups of countries and companies should be greatly increased, and be supported by measures such as advance purchase commitments, to mobilise the needed investment. Collaboration on commercial-scale pilot projects is needed in all major steel producing regions, to accelerate learning. A strategic dialogue on trade should be launched at the earliest opportunity, including the leading producer and consumer countries, to agree ways to ensure near-zero emission steel can compete in international markets – removing what could otherwise be a significant obstacle to the transition. Common definitions and standards for low emission and near-zero emission steel must be agreed, as important enablers of collaboration on procurement and trade.
- The steel sector accounts for around 3 GtCO2e of emissions, or 5% of total emissions. That’s risen by around 15% since 2010. These need to fall by around ¼ by 2030.
- Global average direct emissions intensity of steel production needs to fall by around 30% by 2030.
- 114 Mt of conventional, high emission plants are currently underway or in the planning stage.
In agriculture, an immediate priority for international collaboration must be to improve access to finance for smallholder farmers in developing countries – by increasing the flow of public finance, and its leverage of private finance. This is needed both to reduce emissions and to increase productivity and resilience. Current agricultural practices are depleting natural resources as well as contributing over a fifth of global emissions, and this must be reversed. Global investment in research, development and demonstration of technologies and practices for resilient and sustainable agriculture needs to be increased, reversing the declining trend of recent years that threatens to undermine positive international efforts. A long-term process should be established to share learning on reorienting agriculture policies towards sustainability, to accelerate progress away from harmful practices. Countries should also begin focused discussions on how to ensure international trade facilitates, and does not obstruct, the transition to sustainable agriculture.
- Agriculture and related land use accounts for around 10GtCO2e, or 17% of total emissions. Of those about 7 GtCO2e come from direct, farm-gate emissions.
- Farm-gate emissions have increased by 0.6% per year since 2000. These need to fall by around 20% by 2030 and agricultural expansion needs to halt.
- Smallholder farmers produce about 30% of global food production.
- 27% of all agriculture and land use emissions can be attributed to agricultural products that are internationally traded.
Putting the world on track to meet the Paris goals
Countries and businesses should work together in each emitting sector to increase the chances of meeting the Paris Agreement goals, in line with the Breakthrough Agenda commitment. There are likely to be significant opportunities for well-targeted international collaboration to accelerate low carbon transitions in sectors beyond the five discussed in detail in this report, such as in buildings, cement, shipping and aviation. Action in each sector can support progress in others, for example by scaling up the deployment of clean technologies and reducing their costs. International collaboration is of course an addition to, not a replacement for, the necessary action by individual countries and businesses.
In each emitting sector, there needs to be at least one international forum in which actors with strong influence and interests in the sector collaborate to accelerate the global transition. Governments and companies should work to agree the international fora through which to take forward the recommendations of this report for each Breakthrough sector, within existing frameworks wherever possible. This will help provide greater clarity for new and existing participants, reducing barriers to collaboration, and enabling international efforts to develop greater strength and depth over time.
Technical and financial assistance must be made more available in all sectors. In many sectors there is a need to agree priorities, massively scale up climate finance and coordinate international efforts to provide more timely and accessible support, responding to the needs of developing countries. This needs to include a range of instruments, including innovative approaches to finance that take into consideration and overcome key barriers, notably debt risks and budget and financial constraints. The assistance should include both capacity building and support for technology development, demonstration and deployment, in line with broader economic and social objectives.
In trade-exposed sectors where clean technologies or sustainable solutions are at a cost disadvantage to high emitting technologies or practices, level playing fields in international trade will be needed. The success of international efforts in this regard will critically depend on involving countries with the largest production or consumption in the relevant sectors, and on ensuring that any international measures support, and do not obstruct, broader economic and social objectives of developing countries and local communities. Countries can build mutual confidence in these sectors by collaborating on issues including technology demonstration, standards, and the creation of markets for first deployment.
Coordinated efforts to research, develop and demonstrate technologies can support progress in many sectors. Testing clean energy technologies and sustainable agriculture solutions across multiple regions and markets can bring them to widespread commercial deployment more quickly, especially when supported by commitments and processes to ensure sharing of learning.
Coordinated international deployment of low carbon infrastructure such as electricity interconnectors, hydrogen gas pipelines, and refuelling or recharging facilities for shipping, aviation, and heavy-duty vehicles, can increase the availability of clean energy and the feasibility of decarbonisation.
Table of recommendations
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Power |
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1 |
Governments, working with companies, multilateral development banks (MDBs) and investors, should agree a clear set of strategic priority projects to demonstrate and test power system flexibility solutions, including but not limited to energy storage, in a wide variety of contexts. This should build upon existing initiatives and involve the systematic sharing of learning from different geographical, climatic and market settings. This will increase confidence in delivering net zero power systems in a broader set of markets, supported by increasingly affordable and effective technologies. |
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2 |
Donor governments, working with key institutions, initiatives, and funds, should increase the scale, coordination, transparency and accessibility of international support for the power sector transition, building on established frameworks and successful models. Along with other forms of support, donor countries should, where requested, facilitate more power sector experts working within developing country governments, to strengthen their capacity to make use of international support, implement policy and regulatory reforms and leverage private finance. This will provide developing countries with the resources they need to deliver on a rapid acceleration towards a net zero power system. |
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3 |
Donor governments and MDBs should work together to more strongly align development funding with targeted support for local jobs, skills, and investment, for the repurposing of fossil fuel assets and for environmental restoration, in the fossil-fuel-dependent regions and communities. Civil society, governments and industry should contribute to creating international centres of expertise on the just transition, within existing institutions. This action will be vital to ensure inclusive and participatory transition processes, effective social protection for affected workers and communities, and better economic and environmental outcomes. |
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4 |
Governments should work together to reassess the opportunities for cross-border and regional power interconnection and smart grids to support the transition to clean power systems, including opportunities that have been previously considered but not taken forward, given the improving technology, falling costs, and increasing need for system flexibility. Countries and investors should support international efforts to identify top regional priorities for interconnection, and to replicate successful approaches to technical agreements. In doing so, countries can access new opportunities to integrate larger shares of renewables and improve system reliability. |
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5 |
Countries, in consultation with industry, should collectively agree to higher minimum energy performance standards for high energy-consuming appliances, supported by awareness campaigns and incentives, such as energy efficiency retrofit programmes. Improved technical assistance should facilitate the implementation of effective standards in developing countries. This will help to cut energy costs and reduce emissions, as well as mitigate future electricity demand growth, easing pressure on renewables and electricity infrastructure deployment. |
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Hydrogen |
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1 |
Governments and companies should coordinate internationally to increase commitments for the use of low carbon and renewable hydrogen in sectors where hydrogen is currently used, supported by specific policies and purchase agreements to collectively send a strong demand signal and mobilise investment in production. In new priority application sectors, countries should share learning to accelerate early deployment. This should be done in a manner that ensures a level playing field in international trade. |
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2 |
Governments and companies should agree a comprehensive portfolio of international standards and associated certification schemes for renewable and low carbon hydrogen, addressing emissions accounting, safety, and operational issues, including leakage. This should be supported by a programme that provides a clear direction and sufficient resources to relevant technical bodies. This will be vital for supporting a series of other actions, most notably high-quality demand commitments and trade agreements. |
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3 |
Governments and companies should work together to dramatically increase the number and geographical distribution of hydrogen demonstration projects and to ensure that these appropriately cover each of hydrogen’s high-value end use sectors, including maritime shipping, heavy industry, and long-duration energy storage. Governments and the private sector should agree on principles to guide a deeper and more rapid sharing of knowledge from these demonstrators, including a commitment to share the lessons learned from all publicly funded projects. Doing so will help overcome technology availability barriers and accelerate the pace of deployment in multiple regions in parallel. |
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4 |
Donor governments and multilateral development banks should make increased levels of concessional finance available for well-targeted, catalytic uses that can mobilise large-scale private investment in hydrogen production, distribution and end-use projects in developing countries. This should be supported by a process in which countries work with donors and lending institutions to identify viable projects that are being delayed by high costs of capital, and to assess obstacles to investment, and by technical assistance programs to assist governments with policy design. This will provide much-needed support for the first-wave of low carbon and renewable hydrogen projects, ensuring that a wider set of countries can deploy the technologies required. |
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Road transport |
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1 |
Governments should agree on a timeline by which all new road vehicle sales should be zero emission, with interim targets for countries taking into account their level of economic development and ability to scale up infrastructure, and should align policies with this target. Pathways compatible with 1.5 °C indicate that a target date should be around 2035 for cars, for example. Vehicle manufacturers should commit to the same timelines for 100% zero emission vehicle production. This will send a clear signal to industry and unlock larger economies of scale and faster cost reductions, making the transition more affordable for all countries. |
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2 |
Governments should collectively agree a common understanding of the technologies that are consistent with the goal of zero emissions road transport, in order to send a clear and unambiguous signal to industry. This will accelerate economies of scale for key technologies, accelerating the pace of innovation and cost reduction, making ZEVs affordable sooner for more people. |
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3 |
Governments should exchange best practice in policy to mobilise investment and accelerate deployment of charging infrastructure, in consultation with vehicle manufacturers and infrastructure investors. This should be complemented by a broader scaling up of technical and financial assistance to developing countries at city, provincial, national and regional levels. This will help to mobilise private investment, and ensure all countries are able to access the benefits of the transition to zero emission vehicles. |
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4 |
Governments should work together and with industry to avoid further divergence of standards for charging infrastructure. There are already several competing charging standards for light-duty vehicles; for heavy-duty vehicles, avoiding further divergence could limit wasteful investments in multiple charging types, and accelerate the adoption of zero emission trucks. Aligning standards for hydrogen refuelling stations can reap similar benefits. Doing so will decrease costs and facilitate the transition in vehicle importing countries. |
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5 |
Governments should work together and with industry to agree harmonised standards to ensure sustainability and social responsibility along the electric vehicle battery supply chain, including the extraction and processing of minerals and the recyclability of battery modules. As a priority, these standards should minimise batteries' lifecycle emissions and the adverse social and environmental impacts associated with their production, seek to extend their durability and promote reuse, repurposing and recycling of their components. Similar standards on fuel cell value chains, including information on platinum and other catalyst materials’ content and origin, should be put in place. Harmonised standards will send a clearer signal to the global market, and facilitate compliance by battery and vehicle manufacturers that sell to multiple markets. |
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6 |
Vehicle importer and exporter countries should agree on harmonised regulations on vehicle trade to improve vehicle efficiency and safety in international trade in used vehicles. These rules should govern trade in zero emission vehicles as well as internal combustion engine vehicles, supported by strong mechanisms to enforce compliance. This will help prevent ‘vehicle dumping’, locking developing countries into higher emitting vehicles. |
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Steel |
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1 |
Governments and companies willing to lead the transition in the steel sector should agree on common definitions for low emission and near-zero emission steel, along with a timeframe for the adoption of standards by the mid-2020s. This is an important market signal and will be vital for unlocking a series of subsequent actions, most notably high-quality demand commitments and trade agreements. |
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2 |
Governments and companies should increase the scale of near-zero emission steel procurement commitments to cover a significant share of their future steel demand. These commitments should be high quality, supported by appropriate legal and implementation frameworks, such as advance purchase commitments. Countries and companies should consider joining public and private sector initiatives where these commitments are aggregated. This will strengthen the global demand signal for near -zero emission steel, increasing the incentives for industry to invest in its production. |
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3 |
Governments should urgently launch a strategic dialogue, including the leading producer and consumer countries, with the purpose of agreeing ways to ensure near-zero emission steel can compete in international markets. This is needed to prevent trade acting as a brake on the transition. This may be supported by agreements to cooperate on data, standards, comparability of policies, R&D, finance and procurement. |
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4 |
Governments and companies should identify several commercial-scale pilot projects, in all major steel producing regions, where international collaboration can support shared technology learning, business case development and policy support. Collaborative networks should deliver operational projects in these countries by the late 2020s at the latest. Emerging markets and developing countries’ participation in key R&D and demonstration initiatives should be increased in support of this aim. This will help eliminate technology availability issues, providing multiple case studies for a large group of countries and companies to further improve upon. |
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5 |
Donor countries and MDBs, led by the priorities of developing countries, should significantly increase funds supporting industry transition to near-zero emission technologies in emerging and developing countries. This will provide much needed near-term technology and financial support to unlock additional private sector capital for the first wave of near zero emission projects in key steel producing countries, especially for EMDEs. |
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Agriculture |
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1 |
Governments and companies should work together to deliver higher levels of investment in agricultural research, development, and demonstration (RD&D), to be maintained over the course of this decade. The scale and diversity of collaborative international RD&D initiatives and programs should also be increased. Priority should be given to innovations that can reduce food waste, limit emissions from livestock and fertilisers, improve alternative proteins, develop climate-resilient crops and livestock, and protect soil and water resources. This will accelerate the development and eventual cost-effective deployment of technologies and solutions that can reduce emissions across multiple regions.. |
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2 |
The level of international climate finance directed at agriculture should be sharply increased, in line with its importance to global emissions, adaptation and resilience and food security. Governments, multilateral development banks and private sector investors should work together to make finance available to small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and smallholder farmers in developing countries on a far larger scale than has been achieved so far. Finance should be accompanied by assistance with the adoption of practices that increase productivity and resilience while reducing emissions and protecting natural habitats. This will support economic development, resilience, and food security, as well as reducing emissions. |
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3 |
Governments, research institutions, international organisations and the private sector should commit to a long-term process to test, develop evidence, and share learning on approaches to redirecting policies and support for agriculture towards sustainability and climate resilience. This should involve all of the world’s largest agricultural producer countries, whose policies heavily influence global markets, as well as countries representing a diverse range of environmental and economic conditions. This will help countries identify the most effective and feasible ways to incentivise the transition to sustainable agriculture. |
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4 |
Governments should begin a strategic dialogue on how to ensure international trade facilitates, and does not obstruct, the transition to sustainable agriculture. International organisations can advise on options to ensure a level playing field so that policy measures essential to drive a transition to climate-resilient, sustainable agriculture do not put a country’s agricultural sector at a competitive disadvantage in international trade. Early priority should be given to agreeing sustainability standards for the agricultural commodities that contribute disproportionately to deforestation. A level playing field in international trade will give countries and companies greater confidence and ability to move ahead in the transition. |
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5 |
Countries and international organisations should develop internationally agreed standards for monitoring and reporting on the state of natural resources on which agriculture depends, including soil carbon content and health, and pollinator health, as well as on the geographical extent of agriculture. International measurement standards will help support high-quality knowledge sharing on policy effectiveness and enable international trade to play a positive role in supporting the transition. |
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Cross-cutting |
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1 |
Countries should work to agree the international fora and institutions through which they will take forward each of the recommendations for collaborative action contained in this report, and should then invest in those fora both politically and financially. Existing institutional frameworks should be used wherever these are appropriate to the task. This can help to establish the institutional underpinnings needed for strong and sustained international collaboration over the course of this decade. |
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2 |
Governments, philanthropies, financial institutions and delivery partners, should together review the state of international assistance in each major emitting sector, identify the gaps in assistance that are most important to address, and coordinate efforts to provide responsive and accessible support in these areas, led by the needs of developing countries. This will ensure that assistance is appropriately targeted and available to support countries in relation to each of the major low carbon transitions. |
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3 |
Governments, companies and relevant international organisations should establish high-level, strategic dialogues in each sector that is highly exposed internationally and where competition risks being a barrier to the transition, to develop a common approach to reaching a level playing field. This should include, where relevant, actions on data, standards, procurement, technology collaboration and technical and financial assistance, as well as trade. This will help to focus dialogue on areas where collaboration is most urgent, and ensure that competition accelerates transitions, and does not hold them back. |
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4 |
Governments and companies should greatly increase spending on clean technology demonstration projects, working together to bring new technologies to commercial-scale deployment as soon as possible. Early deployment projects should be supported by matchmaking forums and ensuing commitments and processes in all regions. This will help ensure deep and sustained sharing of experiences gathered with these projects between countries, including those with limited resources. |
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5 |
Wherever not already agreed, governments in each region of the world should agree the top priority common infrastructure projects that can support near-term growth in the deployment of clean solutions, such as interconnectors and hydrogen pipelines. In each of the land, sea and air transport sectors, countries and companies should identify specific international routes to be prioritised for the coordinated first deployment of zero emission charging or refuelling infrastructure. This will support earlier deployment of infrastructure that unlocks accelerated deployment of clean technologies and solutions in multiple countries and regions. |