Action for climate empowerment

In the words of the UN, the goal of ACE is “to empower all members of society to engage in climate action, through the six ACE elements – climate change education and public awareness, training, public participation, public access to information, and international cooperation on these issues.”

The UN sees this as crucial because a transition to sustainable lifestyles, consumption and production is key to reducing greenhouse emissions and boosting our resilience to the effects of climate change. 

Paris, Glasgow, Bonn

Article 12 of the Paris Agreement commits governments to taking ACE measures “as appropriate” and makes clear that this is an important way of enhancing other climate change actions.

This position was reinforced at COP26, which saw agreement on a ten-year Glasgow work programme on ACE (a successor to the Doha work programme which ran from 2010 to 2020).

The new programme offers a framework for implementing ACE, flexible enough to reflect the differing priorities and circumstances of governments around the world.

But while the programme holds governments and regions responsible for ACE implementation, in many cases, as the UN puts it, “the knowledge and tools for working effectively on ACE are lacking or not readily accessible to everyone.”

It is in governments’ own interests to educate and engage their citizens in national efforts to reach net zero – not least because achieving national net zero targets will require widespread behavioural change. Yet compared with the attention given to investment and technical innovation, ACE gets relatively little consideration – even though governments are encouraged to address it in their Nationally Determined Contributions, to make it an integral part of their climate responses.

The UN has been trying to change this. The Action for Climate Empowerment Hub, which opened this year at the UNFCCC Secretariat in Bonn, is intended to provide support to governments and other stakeholders as they engage the public in climate action. And we are likely to see a further push on improving ACE at COP27.

Beyond governments

In reality, ACE is not a matter for governments alone. NGOs, civil society organisations and other bodies are also prominent in climate change education and related areas. Businesses too have a role to play, with many larger companies being well placed to raise awareness of key issues and encourage public participation – sometimes across borders.

At CMS, for example, in addition to our other environmental pledges and initiatives, we have embraced the need for ACE as part of our commitment to sustainability.

In the run-up to COP26, we worked with Young Citizens to create and fund Climate action: Using the law to drive change, a programme to fill a gap in the UK educational system by developing secondary school students’ understanding and critical thinking around climate action.

Climate action: Using the law to drive change is a classroom resource that focuses on embedding awareness that climate action is everyone’s responsibility and looks at how the law can be used to drive positive change.

Topics in the programme include:

• who is responsible for tackling climate change;
• the key outcomes of a range of climate change related legislation;
• considering the role of the law in real life cases; and
• how people are using the law to challenge decisions and instigate changes.

The programme – which is available free to teachers – was named Sustainability Initiative of the Year at The Lawyer Awards 2022. Much more importantly, it has already reached tens of thousands of young people across the UK.

A growing number of other businesses around the world have their own projects to inform and educate people about climate change, or to encourage public participation. Initiatives like these are great examples of a way in which companies can engage in the fight against climate change in addition to making and delivering on their own net zero commitments.

Related CMS resources: