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Hungary's Green New Deal

Hungary has released its equivalent to a Green New Deal, and it's surprisingly ambitious, considering Hungary's historic hostility to climate goals and emissions reductions. It calls for reducing emissions by 40% by 2030 and getting to net zero by 2050. The 2030 goal is relative to 1990 levels, so I'm guessing it's roughly in line with the ~50% reductions relative to 2010 levels called for in the IPCC report. It calls for spending about 120% of its GDP over the next three decades, which is the equivalent of about $23 trillion for the US. That works out to about $7-8 trillion per decade, so Hungary's proposal is more expensive relative to the size of its economy than the proposals of most of the presidential candidates.

When it comes to energy, Hungary expects to continue to use both coal and nuclear as of 2030. Its biggest coal plant currently burns a very dirty type of coal, and will be switching to run on natural gas, and are hoping to eventually convert it to green hydrogen. Emissions from the energy sector are targeted to go down by 90% by 2030, which is less ambitious that what the US should be targeting, but probably the most we can expect from Hungary.

All in all, this is a very pleasant surprise.

https://www.magyarhirlap.hu/gazdasag/20191220-gazturbinas-eromuve-alakit...
https://www.ibtimes.com/hungary-vows-be-carbon-free-2050-remains-committ...