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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the functionality and effectiveness of the Carbon Risk Real Estate Monitor (CRREM tool). The aim of the project, supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, was to develop a broadly accepted tool that provides investors and other stakeholders with a sound basis for the assessment of stranding risks.

The tool calculates the annual carbon emissions (baseline emissions) of a given asset or portfolio and assesses the stranding risks, by making use of science-based decarbonisation pathways. To account for ongoing climate change, the tool considers the effects of grid decarbonisation, as well as the development of heating and cooling-degree days.

The paper provides property-specific carbon emission pathways, as well as valuable insight into state-of-the-art carbon risk assessment and management measures and thereby paves the way towards a low-carbon building stock. Further selected risk indicators at the asset (e.g. costs of greenhouse gas emissions) and aggregated levels (e.g. Carbon Value at Risk) are considered.

The approach described in this paper can serve as a model for the realisation of an enhanced tool with respect to other countries, leading to a globally applicable instrument for assessing stranding risks in the commercial real estate sector.

The real estate industry is endangered by the downside risks of climate change, leading to potential monetary losses and write-downs. Accordingly, this approach enables stakeholders to assess the exposure of their assets to stranding risks, based on energy and emission data.

The CRREM tool reduces investor uncertainty and offers a viable basis for investment decision-making with regard to stranding risks and retrofit planning.

The approach pioneers a way to provide investors with a profound stranding risk assessment based on science-based decarbonisation pathways.

Amidst a growing interest in greenhouse gas (GHG) science-based target setting by businesses, it is becoming increasingly urgent to understand how these are set in theory and in practice.

Using a model framework for science-based methods, the authors compare four different science-based target-setting methods: sectoral decarbonization approach, linear emission reduction to target year, GHG emissions per unit of value added and corporate finance approach to climate stabilizing targets. Input and output variables, GHG scopes, allocation principles and mathematical formulations are described, followed by a discussion of the differences and similarities between methods.

The authors show GHG emission mitigation scenarios are as important in the determination of targets as the allocation principle.

For this reason, businesses should apply well-bellow 2ºC scenarios with robust sectoral and regional granularity and the science community should consider the needs of these groups of stakeholders.

Policymakers should actively support efforts by corporations to set science-based targets and ensure that the research they commission can be translated into practical action by non-party stakeholders.

This paper contributes to the understanding of the theory and practice of science-based targets.

The purpose of this study is to systematically review the state-of-art literature on the net-zero economy in the field of supply chain management.

A systematic literature review of 79 articles published from 2009 to 2021 has been conducted to minimise the researchers' bias and maximise the reliability and replicability of the study.

The thematic analysis reveals that studies in the field of net-zero economy have mostly been done on decarbonisation in the supply chain, emission control and life cycle analysis and environmental and energy management. The findings highlight the strong positive association between digitalisation, circular economy and resources optimization practices with net-zero economy goals. The study also addresses the challenges linked with the net-zero economy at the firm and country levels.

Practitioners in companies and academics might find this review valuable as this study reviews, classifies and analyses the studies, outlines the evolution of literature and offers directions for future studies using the theory, methodology and context (TMC) framework.

This is the first study that uses a structured approach to analyse studies done in the net-zero field by assessing publications from 2009 to 2021.

This paper aims to explore the future path of agricultural development in China toward 2060 under the dual carbon goals, so as to inform better policy choices for facilitating agricultural and rural transformation toward the goal of maintaining food security, sustainable income growth and low carbon emission.

This study employs a single-country, multi-sectoral computable general equilibrium model, CHINAGEM model and develops eight illustrative scenarios to simulate the impacts of attaining dual carbon goals on agricultural development in China. Additional two scenarios have also been designed to inform better policy making with the aim to offset the negative impact of the decarbonization schemes through facilitating agricultural technology progress.

Dual carbon goals are projected to impose substantial negative impact on agricultural productions and consumptions in China in the coming four decades. Under the assumption of business as usual, agricultural production will reduce by 0.49–8.94% along with the attainment of carbon neutrality goal by 2060, with the production of cereals and high-value being more severely damaged. To mitigate the adverse impact of the decarbonization schemes, it is believed that fastening technology progress in agriculture is one of the most efficient ways for maintaining domestic food security without harming the dual carbon goals. In particular, if agricultural productivity (particularly, for cereals and high-value products) can be increased by another 1% per year, the production losses caused by carbon emission mitigation will be fully offset. This implies that promoting technology progress is still the best way to facilitate agricultural development and rural transformation in future China.

The paper contributes to the literature in better informing the impact of dual carbon goals on China's agriculture and the effectiveness of technology progress in agriculture on buffering the adverse impact of the decarbonization schemes and promoting agricultural development.

Globally, climate change governance continues to be a significant challenge to policymakers, environmentalists and politicians despite international summits, conferences and programmes designed to find sustainable solutions to the climate change crises. Climate change continues to be viewed primarily as a challenge for the future, whereas many leaders and administrators globally regard it as an environmental issue rather than a challenge that encompasses all aspects of life. In South Africa, these misleading perceptions of climate change continue to prevail both at national and local levels. The government and private organisations do not attach the required levels of urgency needed to address the climate change crisis. While numerous policies and institutions have been established to address these challenges, they lack financial backing, coordination and synergy that cut across the broad objectives of environmental, social and economic agendas. Additionally, weak, eroding trust and manipulating of institutions continue to hinder effective policy implementation and focus-driven governance. This paper aims to explore the structural and governance weaknesses of climate change administration in the KwaZulu-Natal province and South Africa in general.

This paper used extensive literature reviews and a triangulated approach to investigate the weaknesses of the current governance structure in the context of institutional and capacity constraints.

The findings uncovered that most institutions and organisations mandated to address climate change challenges operate in silos, lack required investment and capacity and have weak accountability mechanisms with a shallow understanding of climate change governance.

This paper recommends better coordination between national, provincial and local governments as well as the private sector towards climate change activities and capacity to ensure that climate change actions are effectively implemented.

The overall purpose of this paper is to detect spatial, temporal, sectoral, thematic and other patterns or transitions in techno-socio-economic evolution that are likely to co-determine future development and allow the steering of it. The development of a “Global Change Data Base” (GCDB) promises a graphically and geographically oriented tool for the representation of correlations for global long-term data series.

A literature analysis supports the interpretation of such “pattern recognitions”, especially the literature in the areas of economic growth, systems analysis, energy economics, social indicators and quality of life. Preconditions for economic growth are empirically analysed on a sectoral level along with prevailing structural shifts in the use of energy sources.

The main outcome is a distillate of a few formative “paths of development”, according to a synthesis of to-date growth theories. These lines might influence development in future decades and co-determine the degree to which sustainability targets are met. Debates and discussion procedures make use of such findings and outline modes of actions.

Developmental university curricula such as “Global Studies”, democratisation endeavours based on analyses of economic performance of (partly) democratic systems or global governance of science could profit from a consensus on global trends patterns, similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change endeavour at the United Nations level.

Such heuristic methods could suitably mediate (in “multicultural” manner) between contradictory paradigms of global economic development that are mainly ideology-driven and hamper global society’s joint action.

In short, this is an empirical work on pattern recognition in global evolution using aggregated spatially and temporally enabled data. It refers to the historic example of Kon-Tiki which undertook a surprisingly long journey based on precise knowledge of ocean currents and wind without applying own force.

This paper aims to offer a preliminary overview and analysis of the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on commodity-dependent developing economies (CDDEs). Using debt, decarbonisation and demand as empirical and analytical prisms to understand impacts and dynamics, the paper offers “rent space” as a theoretical tool to appreciate the changing possibilities for using resource rents for capital accumulation and expand development frontiers. It maps out the certain common features among this group of developing countries facing an increasingly adverse and uncertain situation. It offers a political economic perspective on the global dynamics and internal political situation that constrain these countries’ ability to manage the effects of this external shock that date to the 2008 crisis, and to therefore shore up an effective recovery in the coming years.

The paper draws together secondary literature and evidence from a number of sources including the World Bank, United Nations and International Monetary Fund on the empirical situation in these countries in view of COVID-19. The paper uses a thematic approach to understand how the current crisis has exposed these embedded and worsening vulnerabilities in this group of countries.

Results demonstrate the wide-ranging effects of COVID-19 as an existential crisis of demand in short and medium term, the explosion of debt due to actually occurring financialisation and the looming medium and long-term consequences of decarbonisation that may oblige countries to abandon exploitation of fossil fuel resources.

In the final analysis, COVID-19 has revealed a number of lingering effects of the commodity boom and global financial crisis. The increased indebtedness that resulted not only underscores the long-term unviability of commodity-based development as a strategy but also reveals new unprecedented weaknesses and challenges. Given the current configuration of global and domestic political economy dynamics, the paper shows that the “rent space” in fossil fuel exporters is particularly constrained and shrinking, compared to mineral exporters, but all showing a trend towards concentration in commodity production overall and worsening prospects for green recovery or industrial pathway.

This study aims to examine the ability of clean energy stocks to provide cover for investors against market risks related to climate change and disturbances in the oil market.

The study adopts the feasible quasi generalized least squares technique to estimate a predictive model based on Westerlund and Narayan’s (2015) approach to evaluating the hedging effectiveness of clean energy stocks. The out-of-sample forecast evaluations of the oil risk-based and climate risk-based clean energy predictive models are explored using Clark and West’s model (2007) and a modified Diebold & Mariano forecast evaluation test for nested and non-nested models, respectively.

The study finds ample evidence that clean energy stocks may hedge against oil market risks. This result is robust to alternative measures of oil risk and holds when applied to data from the COVID-19 pandemic. In contrast, the hedging effectiveness of clean energy against climate risks is limited to 4 of the 6 clean energy indices and restricted to climate risk measured with climate policy uncertainty.

The study contributes to the literature by providing extensive analysis of hedging effectiveness of several clean energy indices (global, the United States (US), Europe and Asia) and sectoral clean energy indices (solar and wind) against oil market and climate risks using various measures of oil risk (WTI (West Texas intermediate) and Brent volatility) and climate risk (climate policy uncertainty and energy and environmental regulation) as predictors. It also conducts forecast evaluations of the clean energy predictive models for nested and non-nested models.

The cement industry's environmental implications place climate change at the centre of sector organisations' corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies, such as the Secil Group. The organisation's CSR policies definition, narrative framing and communication are fundamental, as they can affect its reputation. This article aims to highlight the climate change framing in the Secil Group sustainability report (SR) narrative.

The framing theory is applied to analyse the international and sectoral climate change regulatory measures and the Secil Group SR. Document analysis is used to characterise Secil SR as a communication tool. Qualitative content analysis is used to highlight how Secil and the international and sectoral regulatory measures on climate change frame their narrative and compare each other.

The international and sectoral regulatory measures on climate change and the Secil's SR broadly frame climate change, using ethical, efficiency and effectiveness, communication and relations and law and regulation framings. The Secil's Group SR also highlights the financial frame, exposing the challenge of reconciling economic with collective interests. There is room for researchers to explore the concepts of CSR, sustainability and environment, social and governance (ESG) through the lens of complementarity.

This study shows that the Wehmeier and Raaz (2012) model, created to study transparency, can be applied to other communication studies. This paper explores a case study and, for this reason, is not generalisable. Although, the method and theoretical framework can be applied to any organisation.

The gender specific issues that arise out of transport infrastructures, such as more complex travel patterns and safety and security concerns for women in transport, highlight more than ever the need for a better gender perspective in the design, development and management of transport systems. This however is hard to achieve when only 22 per cent of transport employees in the European Union are female. According to the International Transport Forum, women are less represented in senior level positions in the sector. Furthermore, with declining numbers in employment in the sector, the risks of discounting some of these gender concerns in decision-making becomes even more pressing. This chapter looks at current trends and investigates the opportunities and challenges that the sector is facing to attract, retain and train women in transport. Focussing on cases of EU island states, this research will look at women and work within the public transport sector and, through interviews with management, will investigate concerns about current trends as well as the future of work in transport. The chapter also discusses the future of transport employment, and raises some questions with regard to the fast approaching decarbonisation of transport, with increased focus on green skills and green jobs, but also with the forthcoming technological disruption envisaged through automation and Mobility as a Service.