UK and Canada launch alliance to phase out coal by 2030
Canada and the UK launched a new global alliance designed to phase out the use of coal power by 2030 at the United Nations climate talks last week. However, the 19 countries, and six cities, provinces and states that have committed to the “Powering Past Coal Alliance” account for under 3% of global coal use. Key members of the group, including Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Mexico and the Netherlands had also already committed to retiring their remaining coal power. The alliance also does not include Germany, which still uses coal to generate 40% of its electricity.

BONN, Germany — One of the biggest announcements at this year's United Nations climate talks came on Thursday, when Canada and Britain began a new global alliance aimed at phasing out the use of coal power by 2030. But so far, the countries, states and provinces that have joined the “Powering Past Coal Alliance” account for less than 3 percent of coal use worldwide.

Many of the alliance’s key members — including Denmark, France, Finland, Italy, Austria, Mexico, and the Netherlands — were already on their way to retiring what little coal power they had left.

Opponents of coal, the most carbon-intensive of all fossil fuels, were feeling triumphant in Bonn. This week, the International Energy Agency declared that coal's “boom years” were over, as China’s once-insatiable appetite for the fuel has waned and countries like the United States have been closing their coal plants in favor of cheaper and cleaner sources like natural gas, solar, and wind.

“The market has moved on, the world has moved on, and coal is not coming back,” said Catherine McKenna, Canada’s minister of environment and climate change.

Yet coal still provides roughly 40 percent of the world’s electricity, and many countries aren’t willing to commit to a total phase-out just yet. A number of developing countries in Asia — including India, Vietnam and Bangladesh — are still looking to build new coal plants to bring electricity to those who don't have it.

For the world to meet its climate goals, the coal landscape would have to change drastically — and soon. A recent report from the United Nations Environment Program warned that keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, would require either shutting down nearly every coal plant in the world before 2050 or outfitting the plants with technology to capture emissions and bury them.

The new anti-coal alliance, which is made up of 19 countries and six states, provinces and cities, has one notable omission: Germany, which still generates 40 percent of its electricity from coal. On Wednesday, Chancellor Angela Merkel acknowledged at the Bonn climate talks that Germany would most likely miss its goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 because of its continued consumption of lignite, a particularly dirty, low-grade form of coal.

While many environmentalists had hoped that Ms. Merkel would use the climate talks to set a timetable for the elimination of coal in Germany, she merely said that she was engaged in “tough discussions” on the issue as she sought to form a new government.