Need for Speed Carbon Review
Need for Speed Carbon
By Douglass C. Perry
Updated: May 17, 2012 6:57 am
Posted: Oct 28, 2006 12:55 am
After Need for Speed Underground outsold all other games in 2004, the largest independent game publisher in the world adroitly kept the series coming without a hitch. Last year’s Most Wanted shipped at Microsoft’s Xbox 360 launch and introduced a creative take on story-telling by using filtered customized FMV to give the familiar racer a fresh presentation. The police were back with a ferocious vengeance. And it offered a particularly North-West vibe to it.
This year’s version, Need for Speed Carbon, which refers to Carbon Canyon where racers duel for territory in the city below, is a minor shake-up for the series, shifting in new features, shifting out others, while continuing the FMV-heavy story-telling from Most Wanted. Carbon, in other words, is a decent update to last year’s game with improved graphics, excellent Autosculpt customization, a different progression system, and an all-around solid take on the game. It’s not revolutionary, it’s not brilliant, but it’s good, deep racing.
Meet your former girl friend. Hah!
Near Carbon Copy
Carbon is an arcade-style racer that plays, in general, a lot like other Need for Speed games. It provides four camera perspectives (two in-car, two over-the-shoulder), a 10-14 hour single-player campaign, and a series of mini-challenges based on collecting racing cards. The Career mode is the meat and potatoes of the game, comprising a city split into four territories plus hilly canyon races outside the city. Players can pick from three different car classes, exotics, tuners, and muscles (the muscles being the new addition), which broadens the game’s middle-of-the-road feel in a smart, controlled manner. The four new features offered in Carbon comprise a crew, a unique autosculpt customization, drifting races and additional car classes. One of the bigger additions is the online functionality. It enables from 1-8 players to vie online on Xbox 360, PS3, and PC, whereas the Xbox, PS2 and GameCube versions don’t offer online compatibility.
The Career mode follows last year’s trippy FMV-based narrative. Because of the addition of crews or because EA wanted to go even heavier into its presentation (which it often does at the expense of improving gameplay), the game is filled with cutscenes and pasty, well-coiffed well-dressed gearheads. Last year’s game was basic. Razor was your enemy, he was a first-class dick, and he rigged your car. You had to seek revenge and it felt good because he was a no-good bully. This year’s narrative is watered down, with more forced mystery behind a rather simple premise. The novelty of the specialized FMV cutscenes is still moderately entertaining, but because of EA’s excesses it comes across as strained, and there are simply too many dudes with perfect eyebrows and mullets for my tastes. Clearly Emmanuelle Vaugier needs a little more direction and some more meat to reach her potential. Meanwhile Josie Maran had far more fun and showed far more skin in her role in Most Wanted.
The boss races in the canyons are neither great nor horrible, they just are.
Hot girls aside (and let’s just be honest here, they’re all great looking women), the game drives differently than before. Sure, it’s still an accessible arcade game in which cars don’t take any damage; it’s still Need for Speed. But the addition of muscle cars and high-end tuners really alter the normal feel that’s common in the NFS series. (See Real Muscle below for more details.) The game starts out at a normal pace and it gradually enables you to more earn enhancements. Cars are split into classes, but also tiers. There are three tiers, staring with tier one. The second tier is faster, and the third tier is insanely fast. You won’t believe how powerful and quickly these final-tier cars drive. NFS still runs at a modest 30 FPS with some framerate variation, though the game doesn’t hitch like Most Wanted.
Progress
Carbon’s progression system is similar to THQ’s Saint’s Row. This is a good thing for the most part. You start off as a nobody who once had it all but lost it, and you must start all over again.
You begin by choosing a car class. Since I’ve played this series for like eight years now, to experience NFS in a different light I choose a muscle car, a Camaro SS. Muscle cars tend to be classic American cars, thus they have big, fat V8s, they drive like dragsters with great acceleration and top speeds. But they handle like merde. No difference here, at least at first. If you decide the first car you chose was a bad decision, win races and beat bosses, and you’ll earn money to buy new cars. Or, like last year, after you beat a boss you can pick from a set of random cards, one of which is the boss’s pink slip.
There are 40-plus cars to earn or unlock. Other muscle cars include the new Mustang GT, the Dodge Charger SRT8, and the old Dodge Charger RT. While we’re on the subject, the tuners feature the Mazda Speed3, RX-7, RX-8, Eclipse GT, and Lotus Elise for starters. The tuners comprise the Alpha Brera and Mercedes CLK 500, and a variety of Porsches.
Each territory is made of a number of sections.
In each section you’ll see about three to four races. You’ll need to win each race to win a section and, from there, move in on a full territory. Each territory is controlled by another gang, overseen by their leader, who visits you from time to time as you creep into their space. While fighting for territory, a rival gang may challenge you to a section you own. There are two choices, accept the challenge or reject it. If you race and win, it’s yours. If you lose, you can always re-try. This function works better in Saints Row because the actual fighting was different each time. In Carbon, you simply race the same territory as before, and instead of feeling like a real challenge, it’s a chore. A new race or a different take on a race would have sufficed. Once you take over a full territory the boss appears and challenges you. You’ll race once against the boss, and then take it to Carbon Canyon for a two-leg race.
The two-part race takes place on steep narrow canyon roads built with huge S-turns and pliable railings that give way to spectacular deaths if you mess up.
The first race involves following the boss as closely as possible. Your score is based on your proximity. In the second race he follows you. Whoever gets the high score wins, as long as nobody has driven off the canyon walls beforehand. Honestly, the first city race is usually harder than the canyon races, and in at least two of the canyon races I was able to surge ahead of the boss in the first race, maintain the lead of about five seconds, and beat him in a single route. The boss races in Most Wanted were tougher and more complicated and thus more fun. These are different, but the final outcome is that the experience is just OK. It’s like a sideways move. These boss races are different than before, but like Gertrude Stein said about Oakland, there is no there there. Plus, there are only four boss races, whereas in Most Wanted there were 15.
The crew is another so-so additon.
2NewCrew
Ripped straight from EA’s NASCAR series is this year’s «crew» feature.
The crew is introduced through and integrated into the storyline. The rag-tag crew of hopefuls are neither terribly funny nor that interesting. They’re all kind of creepy, to be honest. But that really doesn’t matter. It’s what they do, or don’t do, that matters. And what they do is little. There are three types, drafters, scouts and blockers. Drifters provide a physical trail of color enabling you to follow them to slingshot ahead. Their problem is that the courses don’t provide enough straight-aways to use them effectively enough and if you’re fast enough you’ll eliminate their usefulness. Scouts find shortcuts hidden on your map. They find shortcuts that normally appear in NFS games without the need for a scout, so they eliminate the joy of discovering them on your own. Blockers cause chaos. They block opponents from creeping up on you. They function well enough and of the three types, they’re the most useful.
But the addition of a crew is another sideways move. The triple-headed crew actually brings in more problems than benefits to Carbon.
Crew members regularly will get in your way; they’ll slow you down and perhaps even ruin a real chance of winning. They also win races for you. For some people that might be a benefit. For me, I just felt like my experience was tampered with. The crew is also always talking to you. It’s like Halo’s Cortana is there, except instead it’s some mullet-headed fat dude. You’ll eventually get as many as six different members available for hire, but in the end I prefer not having them at all.
Create all sorts of excellent custom cars in Carbon. E.Honda wins again!
Customization and Auto-Sculpting
Need for Speed Underground introduced serious customization to the series and Most Wanted and this year’s Carbon add various wrinkles to the fold. As in previous games, players earn cash for winning races. Each new win unlocks the ability to pick new parts and, of course, money. By pressing a button (down on the Xbox 360 D-pad), players can view a top-down map, pick a race to enter, visit their safe house or a car lot, where cars can be bought and sold.
In the Safe House, players can customize their vehicles.
In familiar fashion, individual parts or pre-made full-body kits can be purchased. The suite of choices is solid, though it appears fewer engine performance options and upgrades are allowed than in Underground 2. The new AutoSculpt option, however, makes up for that in part. Once you hire a scout, you’re enabled the option of sculpting your modified parts to new heights. Spoilers, bumpers, skirts, hoods, you name it, you can tweak them all using a series of sliders. Admittedly, the effect is purely visual. But hey, it’s fun! And, when you’re done tweaking the car (at least for Xbox 360), you can take it online and show it off.
Real Muscle
EA’s decision to take advantage of Ford’s newly remade Mustang and Dodge Charger is both opportunistic and smart. Along with the online options, the addition of muscle cars is the biggest single change the series has seen in core gameplay in years. The muscle cars drive differently than any other car in the series and they affect the series in a central way..jpg)
In Underground 2 EA tried to incorporate SUVs but with little success. The muscles are different. These cars rock. They have huge up-front power and great top speeds. And, true to life, they handle like crap. But hey, everyone liked Starsky and Hutch, right? I mean look at Driver the game. It’s built on sliding ’70s hot rods. Still, EA has designed the muscle cars and the courses to work together and better than in almost any other racer. Driving them is more like driving a rally car on 100% pavement all the time. You have to start early and slide into each turn. The real reward is modifying these beasts as you progress. The upgrades tighten the handling and cornering. The top speeds and acceleration increase even further. And the ride is totally different than driving either the tuners or the exotics. Try driving a muscle and then switch to the tuners, and you’ll see the difference right away.
The variances between muscles, exotics and tuners is distinct.
Catch That Drift
EA Black Box brought back drifting, replacing the drag racing from Most Wanted and it’s a fully acquired taste.
Drifting isn’t for everyone. EA uses a totally unique engine for the drifting races and you’ll notice the handling and physics right away. Each of the classes — muscle, exotic, and tuner — drift differently. Luckily, if you dislike drifting, there isn’t too much of it in Carbon. Unfortunately, if you hate it, you’ll find it difficult to avoid altogether.
EA designed drift races to function so that emphasis is placed on skill and combos. Each player must achieve the top score against his rivals. The best combos are created by attaining the highest possible speed, keeping your car in the yellow paint (next to the walls) for as long as possible, and linking combos together. Do it in a tuner and then try a muscle car. It’s quite a difference. Or try a tier three exotic. They’re all completely distinct skill sets.
Online Power
EA eschewed adding online functionality on the current generation systems and has instead focused on making it work well on Xbox 360, PC and PS3.
(Though we have yet to see how well it runs on PS3.) While that sucks for current gen owners, it’s good news for next-gen and PC systems owners. (And, for the record, Most Wanted wasn’t online for PS2 anyway.) We played the Xbox 360 retail build against EA today for about two hours and the experience was surprisingly fun. EA’s servers still may very well cause problems (we’ll have to wait to experience this once the retail build is in hundreds of gamers’ hands), but our retail builds played well.
Onlie matches permit up to eight gamers to race simultaneously. They consist of two race types with a few variations, Pursuit Tag and Pursuit Knockout. Pursuit Tag consists of one racer against all cops. The racer’s goal is to avoid the cop cars for as long as possible. The player with the highest points (and time logged) as the civilian racer wins. To get the chance to be the civilian racer you must be the first to bust him or her.
The graphics and sound are improved over Most Wanted.
Pursuit Knockout is even more fun. This is a lap race…with cops. Everyone starts out as a civilian and the last person to finish the first lap transforms into a cop car. As the cop, your goal is to chase down and make as much contact as possible with the other non-cop cars. In other words, as a cop you get to smash the crap out of the other cars. In a nice bonus, the normal colored barriers that prevent you from exploring the city in a race don’t matter to cop cars. So, you can out-maneuver the speeder by hitting him head-on. The only issue here is that the speeders are really wily, fast, and a lot harder to hit than you might think. Quite quickly several of our games turned into insanely comedic Blues Brothers scenarios. It was humiliating/hysterical to see the inane blunders! You might think you had a speeder cornered with a head-on and then he fakes right, goes left, and instead of a killer point-grabbing knockout, you miss him and smash into three oncoming cop cars as the speeder zips by.
On the next gen systems, you’ll also be able to race in a series of cooperative courses with as many as four players. Though these are just basic races, these co-op challenges are like playing with your crew, who happen to be your friends — which is twice as fun. Lastly, if you own a Xbox 360, PC or have the chance to buy a PS3, then you can auto sculpt your car to the ultimate level AND bring it online to show it off.
Graphics and Sound
Carbon stands out against Most Wanted. Most Wanted seemed to take place in a fictitious Seattle-like area: There were lots of forests, country by-ways, and lakes that, well, looked like parts of Washington. If you weren’t keen on last year’s environments, you’ll like Carbon. It is a return to the sparkling urban lights of Underground 1 and 2. The game is filled with sparkling lights, darker night levels, and a distinctly urbane look. Special effects adorn the city streets and fast-paced cars. Streams trail off cars to enhance the visual sense of speed.
Blur effects are always working to provide a great sensation of velocity. And nox injections will boost the sense of speed even further. Or the speed breakers will slow time down. The customization enables creative control over your cars, which adds to the sense of visuals, and of course, the FMV-filtered characters incorporated into game environments create a distinct visual appeal (even if this year’s game over-does it a little).
On the sound side, Carbon takes the over-the-top sound from Most Wanted and gives it a kick in the pants. You’ll hear greatly altered engine effects; you’ll experience a dramatic set of sonic sounds infused into the cutscenes and transition sequences; you’ll hear the sweet in-take of NOX. You’ll also hear the realistic cop radio chatter ranging from casual level-one pursuits to level three crackdowns. The music is energetic and turbulent. It increases in volume and intensity as you’re being chased by cops, and there is a good mix of rock and techno tunes.
Need For Speed Carbon isn’t a revolutionary game and it’s far from a stinker. Instead, it’s what EA does best, usually. It creates pretty good games with lots of features. Carbon switches out drag racing and Pacific North West backgrounds for drift racing and inner city urban streets. The freaky FMV filtered stuff is back and there seems to be more than ever (too much?). The drifting is an acquired taste (but it’s good), the canyon duals are decent changes (though not great), and the crews…well, they suck. Of the myriad new features, the addition of muscle cars and the online functionality are the best. The muscle cars bring real challenge and change to the races and the online games (when lag isn’t hampering you) are great cop-chase endeavors.
Need for Speed Carbon Review
great
Douglass C. Perry
Need for Speed Carbon Review
Need for Speed Carbon
By Chris Roper
Updated: May 15, 2012 9:39 pm
Posted: Nov 16, 2006 1:19 am
EA’s Need for Speed series still has the pedal to the floor with its latest release, Need for Speed Carbon, launching alongside the PlayStation 3’s North American premiere.
Released not too long ago on the Xbox 360 and current-gen systems, the game is something like a sequel to last year’s Most Wanted, but has enough changes to the layout and format that it warranted a new name.
Many of the race modes from Most Wanted have returned, namely things like the Speedtrap races. While cops are still about, you don’t need to build up evasion runs like you did in Most Wanted to progress. Cop Heat is still an issue that you’ll have to contend with, however, meaning that while the cops have taken a backseat to the actual racing, they’re still prevalent. We’re certainly supportive of this design.
The main new race type in Carbon is the Canyon races. After finishing enough races to take over a territory on the map, you’ll meet up with that crew’s boss along a cliff side in a winner-take-all competition. These races are pretty cool in that the side of the track is a simple barrier that overlooks a very long drop, so if you push your car too much you may wind up at the bottom of the canyon in a heaping wreck.
It’s pretty cool in concept, though we wish they were more prevalent in the game.
One returning competition type from the Underground games is drift racing. Drifting is very arcadey in Carbon, with a simple tap of the brake being all you need to put the car into a slide. Rather than being based on moves like faints or over-steering, everything is based on speed and how sideways you can get. You’ll get bonus multipliers for stringing multiple turns together, but that’s about as complex as it gets, for better or worse. The drift races wind up being a decent bit of simplistic fun. Like the Canyon races, they’re basically tests of how far you want to push your car to win.
Need for Speed Carbon’s single-player story is focused around taking over and defending territories. Each territory has a number of individual races, and taking over more than half of them will earn you the territory. After you’re in possession of a territory, other crews will occasionally try to take them from you and you’re prompted to compete in a defending race.
This whole system is reasonably cool in setup, though since you’re allowed to retry any race you fail you’re never really in much danger of losing anything you’ve earned. It would have been cooler if you couldn’t retry, giving the whole scenario a more back-and-forth and dynamic feel, though that doesn’t quite fit in with the game’s very arcadey setup.
Tying into the territory thing is your racing crew. You’re allowed to have up to three crew members at any one time, and one of the three members of your choosing will race with you in applicable events. These wingmen come in three types: Brawlers, Scouts and Drafters. Brawlers will crash into an opponent and take them out of the race for a bit. Scouts will always take the quickest route through a track, helping you find the shortcuts, and Drafters will set up a nice wake in their path and allow you to gain some speed.
This system works reasonably well, though Brawlers are far and away the most useful wingmen since they can hold off other vehicles.
Scouts are decent to use the first time or two in a specific section if you’re not very good at finding shortcuts (which isn’t hard at all), though once you know where they are they’re not of much use. Drafters can also be somewhat helpful at times, though you have to ride in their line to make use of the speed burst, which isn’t always ideal.
When it comes to the actual racing in Need for Speed Carbon, EA has largely stayed true to the same formula it’s used forever. Cars are easy to drive and largely feel very similar, courses are generally long and winding with a few sharp turns here and there, and traffic is reasonably sparse. And yes, everything still takes place at night.
While the cars still do feel very similar to one another, there are three different classes this time around that do each have their own unique characteristics. Muscle cars are extremely powerful, but are more likely to slide around a turn. Tuner cars are quick and agile, while exotics are extremely fast but don’t handle as well as the tuners.
Of the three, muscle cars are the most fun to drive as they kick and scream with power that forces you to watch the throttle and go easy on the gas when exiting turns. Sadly though, one of the things that made the muscle cars most fun on the Xbox 360 is the controller rumble, and as the SIXAXIS doesn’t feature said ability, they’re left a tad more lifeless.
Speaking of the SIXAXIS, the PlayStation 3 version of Need for Speed Carbon makes use of its tilt controls for steering, though only for giving it a little extra oomph. Once you’ve pushed the analog stick all the way to the side, you can tilt the controller to squeak out just a little tighter angle, though in practice it’s really not noticeable.
The franchise has had great customization features for a while now, though Autosculpt takes them to the next level and is easily the most impressive new aspect of the series. Instead of replacing parts with pre-existing add-ons, Autosculpt gives you control of a section of the car and lets you dynamically shape said area.
For instance, you can raise and lower air intakes, fatten, spin and split wheel spokes, lengthen, flatten and raise spoilers and more. It’s an absolutely fantastic system that allows you to truly customize your car. It’s limited, mind you, as you can’t change the overall, basic body shape of any vehicle, but you can customize its individual pieces to no end.
One disappointing aspect is that the PlayStation 3 version of the game doesn’t have a couple of the «show off» features that the Xbox 360 game does. The 360 version lets you pause the game at any time and enter a photo mode. It’s basic, sure, but you can spin and zoom the camera and take a snapshot of your vehicle in motion. You’re also able to upload a photo of your modded vehicle for others to drool over, but the PS3 game lacks this feature as well, sadly.
Visually, the PlayStation 3 version of Need for Speed Carbon falls short of its Xbox 360 counterpart. The two games run at roughly the same framerate, but the PS3’s filtering effects, specifically the blurring, can be ugly.
Road textures look nice and detailed at low speeds, but when you’re flying down the road and the game blurs everything, they simply look poor. A few other odd things don’t match up either, like the Drafter’s wake, which is a transparent cylinder on the 360 and some rather ugly blue streamers on the PS3.
Need for Speed Carbon is an overall fun racing game, though in large part it’s simply more of the same from EA. Cars still feel too similar to each other, and as they’re the stars of any racing game, we wish there was a bit more character here. Autosculpt is a fantastic addition to the series’ already great customization features. Carbon winds up being a pretty fun racer, and fans of Most Wanted likely won’t be disappointed.
In This Article
Need for Speed Carbon
Black Box
Rating
ESRB: Everyone 10+
Platforms
MacintoshPlayStation 3PlayStation 2Wii
Need for Speed Carbon Review
good
Chris Roper
sustainable development of Asia and the Middle East
Despite the economic and technological difficulties that arose in 2022, the ESG agenda does not leave Russia, although now it is not the easiest times for it.
Domestic companies have to revise the ESG transformation process, adjust plans and expenses, pause some previously planned projects, and, on the contrary, develop others at an accelerated pace. Until recently, corporate strategies for the sustainable development of Russian business were guided by Western standards and initiatives (in particular, European regulation and CBAM), but now we are seeing a turn towards the Middle East, South, Southeast and Central Asia.
The countries of these regions have long been involved in the ESG agenda. China in 2015 became the first country to set criteria for green projects. In India, since 2013, there have been requirements for companies to disclose business responsibility reports. Some of the largest exchanges in the world — Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Bombay (with a total capitalization of more than $20 trillion) — impose their own requirements on companies in the field of ESG. Kazakhstan already in 2013 began testing a system for trading CO 9 emissions0005 2 . In addition, ambitious decarbonization targets in the countries of the regions under review help develop ESG initiatives and contribute to the emergence of new sustainable projects, as well as open up opportunities for attracting external financing and investment.
We tell you how things are with the ESG agenda in the Middle East, South, Southeast and Central Asia, based on analytics prepared by the ESG Directorate of Sberbank. The review of ESG practices in 12 countries that are potentially attractive for Russian business today is designed to help domestic companies understand the current status of the sustainable development agenda and ESG in these regions and adapt strategies for entering new markets, taking into account current requirements.
Alexander Vedyakhin
First Deputy Chairman
of the Board of Sberbank
“Why and for whom did Sber prepare this analytical study? It is important for companies that are aimed at international development to understand the requirements and trends of new markets, and our task is to help businesses in this.
In fact, the study is a short guide for such companies and gives them tips on what to look for in order to adapt to new working conditions as painlessly as possible. But we see a demand for such analytics from purely Russian businesses: as practice shows, many ESG trends and regulatory requirements, once born in one country, then quickly spread to others, including Russia. And, apparently, the growth of Eastern influence in the field of ESG will be rapid and extensive: in terms of the number of ESG regulation initiatives, Asia is already overtaking North America, it accounts for half of all climate investments on the planet, and this sector is growing there much faster than in the EU and USA. Finally, as the leader of the ESG agenda, it is important for Sberbank to have a thorough knowledge of foreign markets in order, on the one hand, to communicate requirements for borrowers throughout the supply chain and form customer support mechanisms, and on the other hand, to find opportunities for the development of new projects and entire industries, such as like electric transport, hydrogen energy, etc.
, and together with business to develop these promising areas not only in Russia, but also abroad.”
DECARBONIZATION
Greenhouse gas emissions
China is the undisputed leader in greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for a third of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions. Moreover, some Chinese companies emit more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than individual countries. For example, the world’s largest steel producer China Baowu produced more CO 2 than Pakistan in 2020.
GHG emissions, 2019,
Mt CO 2
India is a significant emitter of greenhouse gases, after China, the US and the EU. About half of the primary energy in the country is generated from coal, and this figure has remained virtually unchanged over the past decades. Indonesia is also among the three largest issuers among the countries under consideration.
Over the past 30 years, emissions in the Middle East, South, Southeast and Central Asia have increased significantly.
This applies not only to the energy, industrial and municipal sectors, but also to transport, agriculture and other industries.
According to EDGAR, the largest increase in emissions in the energy sector is in Indonesia, with a 9.5-fold increase from 1990 to 2020. In terms of transport emissions, China is in first place: over 30 years, it has become 9 times higher. The largest increase in emissions in industrial production occurred in Qatar — here the volume of emissions increased by 7 times.
In the countries of Central Asia, the reverse trend is observed: emissions from the energy sector from 1990 to 2020 decreased by 5, 12 and 46% in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, respectively.
The Paris Agreement and carbon neutrality
The Paris Agreement is an international treaty adopted at the UN climate change conference in 2015. The parties to the agreement undertake to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, take measures to adapt to climate change, develop a low-carbon economy and establish the exchange of green technologies.
The main goal is to prevent the average annual temperature on the planet from increasing by more than 2 °C from pre-industrial levels and to do everything possible to keep warming within 1.5 °C in the current century.
All countries in question have signed the Paris Agreement. The UAE became the first Middle Eastern state to ratify the treaty in 2016, followed by Qatar and Egypt. Iran is one of the few countries in the world that has not yet accepted obligations under the Paris Agreement. In 2021, the Iranian authorities said they would do this only if the sanctions pressure on the country was eased. Turkey delayed the longest and ratified the agreement only in October last year, although it signed it back in 2016. Recall that Russia signed the Paris Agreement in 2016 and ratified it in 2019.-m.
Achieving the ambitious targets set by the Paris Agreement requires significant reductions in global greenhouse gas emissions. In this regard, countries set deadlines for achieving carbon neutrality*.
This government measure launches decarbonization processes at the country level.
Carbon neutrality goals
2050
2053
2090 0146
Russia intends to achieve carbon neutrality no later than 2060. By the same date, China, Indonesia and Kazakhstan want to achieve zero emissions. In some countries, the plans are more ambitious: the United Arab Emirates, South Korea and Kyrgyzstan plan to become carbon neutral by 2050, Turkey — by 2053. By the middle of the century, Uzbekistan also wants to get close to zero emissions, however, we are talking about carbon neutrality only in the energy sector.
Estimated funding required for
It is the plans to achieve carbon neutrality that are the basis for the creation of national decarbonization programs, the development of carbon regulation and the launch of various green financing mechanisms in certain sectors of the economy.
Carbon regulation
Regulatory instruments are usually divided into two groups: restrictive and market. The first are administrative mechanisms of technical regulation. For example, setting a «ceiling», that is, the maximum possible level of emissions for companies, depending on the type and scale of their activities, or a ban on the use of certain technologies. The second group of measures is aimed at creating economic incentives for businesses. Their goal is to push companies to operate more sustainably and reduce their carbon footprint. Such incentives include emissions trading systems, taxation, fines for producers of «dirty» products, etc. What will be the functionality of the implemented greenhouse gas emissions regulation system depends on the goals and objectives of a particular country.
The government of Qatar plans to limit itself to launching a greenhouse gas emission accounting system for the time being until 2030.
The authorities of the United Arab Emirates influence greenhouse gas emissions not with a «stick», but with a «carrot» — through financial support for projects for the development of alternative energy sources. In Indonesia, the implementation of the carbon taxation mechanism was planned in August 2022, but the initiative was postponed indefinitely due to rising inflation. At the same time, in 2021, Indonesia conducted a pilot project to limit emissions with the participation of 32 coal-fired power plants — the cost of a ton of greenhouse gas emissions was several times lower than the world average price ($2 per ton of CO 2 versus $34).
Among the countries under consideration, national carbon trading systems in one form or another are currently operating only in China, Kazakhstan and South Korea.
Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Systems
40%
China-ETS covers national emissions. The mechanism was launched in 2021 and currently only applies to the energy sector.
74%
national emissions are covered by Korean K-ETS. The mechanism was launched in 2015.
46%
is covered by Kazakh ETS-KZ. The mechanism was initially launched in 2013. After a temporary suspension, it was restarted in 2018.
Source: ICAP
In India, the cap-and-trade system is just about to start. First, it will be tested in one region (Gujarat) and gradually scaled up to the whole country. For this, the experience of the trading system for polluting particles (the so-called PM resulting from car exhaust and fuel combustion) that has been operating since 2019 in the city of Surat (also in the Gujarat region) will be used. China, before introducing a national emissions trading system, also tested a carbon trading system in certain regions. Right now, Russia is also following this path: on September 1, an experiment was launched on Sakhalin to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
The development of carbon regulation in China is worth watching closely, as increasing climate pressure on the country and growing ambitions for its own energy transition could push the authorities to introduce cross-border carbon regulation comparable to the European CBAM.
The unfolding climate policy in Turkey, an associate member of the EU, also requires attention. Last year, the country presented the EU Green Deal Action Plan, which should bring Turkish legislation closer to the current European regulation. The plan, in addition to combating climate change, includes the development of green finance, as well as the creation of a pricing mechanism for carbon units.
ESG-FINANCING AND INVESTMENT
ESG-financing
For the development of sustainable projects, there are several groups of financial ESG-instruments — green, social, sustainable and related to sustainable development (green, social, sustainable, sustainability-linked), their type depends on the intended use of funds.
Decarbonization requires the transformation of various sectors of the economy (energy, transport, industrial processes, etc.), and also implies the implementation of projects aimed at combating environmental degradation and adapting to climate change.
Attracting funds for the implementation of such goals takes place within the framework of green or climate financing, for which various financial instruments are used (loans, insurance, asset management, direct investment and bonds).
The volume of ESG financing in the regions under consideration is growing every year. For example, the UAE is considered one of the leaders of the ESG agenda in the Middle East. The government and large companies are developing programs and roadmaps for ESG transformation and increasing investment in sustainable projects. The first green bonds in the Middle East were also issued in the UAE — in 2017 they were placed by First Abu Dhabi Bank. In the Asia-Pacific region, China is the leader in ESG financing. Last year, the country became the largest climate investment market outside of Europe, surpassing the United States. In 2021, climate fund assets registered in China reached a record high of $46.7 billion, up 149 billion, according to Morningstar.
% more than in 2020. By comparison, U.S. climate fund assets rose 45% to $31 billion in 2021. In Central Asia, Kazakhstan stands out: the country’s president recently stated that Kazakhstan’s sustainable finance market has grown 500-fold to over $250 million in 2021
ESG bonds
Since 2014, financing of environmental and social projects with the help of sustainable bonds has become widespread worldwide. Recently, there has been a trend towards a sharp expansion of this market. In 2021, according to the international rating agency Moody’s, the global issue of ESG bonds reached $992 billion, this exceeds the value of 2020 by 64%. Also, according to CBI, in 2021, more than 25% of all green bond issues were in the Asia-Pacific market. According to the results of the second quarter of 2022, their share increased to 35% of the world output.
The total volume of produced ESG-volume, billion $
China
261.4
South Korea
9000.
1
India
25.3
Iran 9000
20.5 9000 9000
11 ,4
Indonesia
9.6
Turkey
5.4
Qatar
1.2
Egypt
0.8
Uzbekistan 9000 9000
Kazakhstan
0.17 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 9000 0.17 9000 9000 0.17 9000 9000 0.17 9000 9000 9000 0.1 Kyrgyzstan
n/a
Sources: CBI, Dubai Financial Services Authority, Kazakhstan Stock Exchange
ESG investment
Exchanges play an important role in the development of the green finance and investment system. The creation of sustainable development sectors makes it possible to more effectively promote issuers and investors with a targeted nature of investments and helps to attract additional funding for ESG projects. Stock indices, in turn, act as indicators of the performance of companies in the field of sustainable development.
Turkey
Istanbul Stock Exchange
(Borsa İstanbul, BİST)
BIST Sustainability Index
Corporate Governance Index
Like a classic ETF, this investment fund includes securities of several dozen issuers, but it focuses on companies that are leaders in the ESG agenda.
There are also separate funds that specialize in the shares of companies operating in the field of renewable energy and low-carbon technologies.
Number of ESG funds
China
152 9000
South Korea
30
Indonesia
14,0003
India
10
Egypt
1 9000
Sources: Department of Financial Services of Indonesia (OJK), Office of Indonesia) Korea Herald, Morningstar, Blackrock, Catalyst Capital
Researchers note significant growth in investment in ESG in Indonesia, with 14 «responsible» funds managing $203 million at the end of 2020. Indian ESG funds are also doing well, even in during the pandemic, they showed a fairly high profitability. In terms of the number of ESG ETFs in the region under consideration, China leads with 152 funds. The inflow of funds into them in 2021 amounted to $11.3 billion, almost twice the figure for 2020. There is only one classical ESG fund in the UAE (iShares MSCI UAE ETF), this is due to the fact that there are dozens of Sharia ETFs in the country, the principles of which intersect with the ESG logic.
There are no ESG funds in Iran, Qatar, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkey.
ESG REGULATION
ESG regulation is a broad concept that includes not only environmental and labor legislation, regulations and requirements in the field of corporate governance, protection of human rights, climate, but also recommendations for businesses on disclosure of information on sustainable development.
Green taxonomy
Lack of clarity about what activities or assets are sustainable creates obstacles to the scale-up of green finance mechanisms. Therefore, countries are developing taxonomies — sets of criteria that help determine how a particular project, company or financial instrument is in line with the ESG agenda. Half of the countries under consideration have their own green taxonomies, we will talk about them in more detail in a series of materials on RBC Trends dedicated to each macro-region separately. In Qatar, Iran, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, such systems of ESG criteria are not yet available.
Implementation of green taxonomies
2015
2021
2022
China
Taxonomy
9000 9000
Kazakhstan
Kazakh
Kazakh
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
INDOMI Sources: Net zero tracker, reports from official government resources
Disclosure of sustainability reporting
Green taxonomy
Disclosure of sustainability reporting by country
India
- 2012 — Mandatory Responsible Business Reporting (BRR) for Top 100 Indian Companies by Capitalization
- 2015 — Mandatory BRR Preparation for Top 500 Indian Companies by Capitalization
- —
- 2022-2023 — Mandatory Preparation of Extended Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report (BRSR) for Top 1000 Indian Companies by Capitalization
Mandatory BRR Preparation for Top 1000 Indian Companies by Capitalization
Indonesia
- 2020-Mandatory disclosure of the ESG reporting for listing companies
Korea
- 2025-Mandatory disclosure of ESG-information for fox-core of 2
- 2030 — Mandatory ESG disclosure for all listed companies
China
- 2022 — A set of voluntary ESG reporting guidelines came into effect.
Mandatory disclosure requirements for component E are required only from companies included in the list of major polluters - — ESG reporting and data in accordance with TCFD, in case the share capital exceeds 500 million Egyptian pounds (about $26 million).
Sources: reports from official state resources
In Iran, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Qatar, ESG reporting is not yet mandatory.
Conducting Responsible Business
In addition to reporting requirements and limits on greenhouse gas emissions, there are guidelines for companies to conduct their business in a sustainable manner. One of the documents establishing such rules of conduct is the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises.
The Guiding Principles is one of the documents included in the Declaration on International Investment and Multinational Enterprises 1976 years old. To date, the Guidelines have been signed by 50 states, 12 of which are non-OECD members. Of the countries under consideration, Egypt, Kazakhstan, South Korea and Turkey have already joined the instrument. Russia has not yet adopted this standard.
The concept of a multinational enterprise does not distinguish between companies by their structure or size, so the Guidelines also apply to small and medium-sized enterprises. In the EU classification system for sustainable economic activities (EU taxonomy), the standard is used along with the «Guiding Principles» of entrepreneurial activity in terms of human rights — as minimum criteria for project safety (minimum safeguards).
In turn, India adopted its own Responsible Business Conduct Guidelines (NGRBC) in 2019.
These recommendations apply to both large companies and small and medium-sized businesses. Following the approval of NGRBC, the reporting rules also changed: from FY 2022/23, the top 1000 largest Indian companies by market capitalization are required to provide an expanded report on business responsibility and sustainable development, including NGRBC.
Conclusion
The ESG agenda is actively developing in all regions, in each country there are already certain initiatives, standards and mechanisms that help both individual companies and entire states become more sustainable.
In the regions under consideration, the need for financing ESG projects is many times higher compared to Europe. Therefore, in the developing countries of the Asian region and the Middle East, one can expect the rapid development of the necessary regulation and the creation of opportunities for attracting financing. For Russian companies and investors, this could be a window of opportunity.
Deepening the understanding of ESG requirements and market features, as well as integrating these aspects into the activities of domestic companies, can help in the process of entering the markets of the countries of the region, establishing cooperation, and ensuring more productive interaction with foreign businesses and regulators.
You can learn more about ESG finance market participants and strategic documents in the field of sustainable development in a particular country, about the development of electric transport, hydrogen and renewable energy in Sber materials.
Carbon games. What will the world be like in 2050
Carbon dioxide has been declared the main enemy of all progressive mankind. The fight against global warming has long been no longer a matter exclusively for eco-activists. Today it is big politics and a huge market with billions of dollars of investments (and trillions of dollars are needed). Russia is ready to actively participate in this, but first it is necessary to clarify the rules of the game.
Geopolitical cataclysms caused by social dissatisfaction with high electricity prices, houses freezing in winter and people suffering from heat in summer, a ban on driving cars other than electric cars, exorbitant prices for flights due to the high cost of hydrogen fuel, regular blackouts. These are not outlines of a Hollywood scenario, as the International Energy Agency, which prepared a report for the UN climate conference in Glasgow, sees the world in 2050.
Guilty on all counts
Even before the arrival of the coronavirus in our lives, CO₂, carbon dioxide, one of the greenhouse gases, allegedly responsible for global warming due to an increase in its concentration in the atmosphere, was recognized as the main culprit since the beginning of the industrial age.
Global warming is associated with fires in Australia, record heat waves in Canada, hurricanes, droughts, floods, banana shortages, the threat of biota decline, problems of hunters living in the polar regions.
The WHO claims that climate change is responsible for at least 150,000 deaths per year, not to mention the indirect impact on many health problems. Surprisingly, there has not yet been a study that would reveal the correlation of carbon dioxide emissions by country with the death rate from COVID-19.
It is important to have a good understanding of all this «carbon hype» that has gripped the world in recent decades. Consciously or not, we are all already participating in it as consumers, paying for goods and services of companies that have included in their priorities the goal of achieving carbon neutrality (business is not charity, all these additional costs are included in the cost of the product).
Companies from various sectors, it is not only about industrial enterprises, it is useful to understand how the laws, regulations, environmental programs adopted here and now can affect business development, how to take into account the growing demand of customers and consumers for environmental friendliness in their plans, what to expect from state regulators, in general, how to fit into the new reality.
With this introductory material, we open a series of articles on the «carbon issue». We will discuss the common agenda, carbon tax, carbon neutrality, the green technology market, government environmental programs, carbon trading business (carbon credits), Greta Thunberg and much more.
CO₂ and global warming
Let’s fix the entry point. The scientific consensus is that 97% of actively published climate scientists recognize the fact of global warming and the key role of human activity in this. All these theses are presented most fully in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) at the UN.
Climate change is clearly reflected in the melting of glaciers, which seems to have accelerated in recent years, and an increase in mean annual temperatures. Statistics show rapid warming over the past few decades. 2016 and 2020 were the warmest years since 1880, according to NASA, continuing a long-term upward trend in global temperatures.
The 10 warmest years of the 141-year record have been since 2005, with the last seven years on record.
Source: NASA
That’s it, then we enter the field of interpretation of these data, we move from facts to opinions and hypotheses. The generally accepted chain of reasoning is as follows:
Global warming is caused by an increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere (greenhouse effect) — water vapor, methane, ozone and carbon dioxide, especially the latter.
The key is the anthropogenic factor. Although natural emissions of CO₂ give it much more, it was human emissions that upset the natural balance.
In order to restore the balance, or at least slow down the further impact of emissions on the environment, it is necessary to reduce emissions and increase the capture of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
In order to make the picture a little more objective, it is necessary to make a couple of remarks:
If we think in geological epochs, in the long term, the Earth does get drier and colder.
The current warming is caused by factors that we cannot control. If we take separate regions and model changes taking into account different conditions, then warming over the Arctic (and middle latitudes) can also be caused by an increase in western and weakening of meridional heat transfer between middle and high latitudes in the northern hemisphere. In the tropical Pacific, climate warming may be due to an increase in the Walker circulation in combination with the La Niña climate regime.
Already in historical times there were long periods of climatic optimums, when the temperature on the planet and in some regions was higher than today’s indicators:
- -1.5°C).
- The Roman Climatic Optimum (approximately ~100 BC — 200 AD, in general the heyday of the Roman Empire) with temperatures in the Mediterranean 2°C warmer than now. It is easy to see that climate warming coincided with the rapid development of civilization.
Even if all the measures proposed to date to curb global warming are implemented, it may take tens of thousands of years to stabilize the temperature regime (provided that the anthropogenic factor is really of decisive importance), according to historical data.
There are many natural sources of carbon dioxide emission : the ocean, the processes of combustion, decay and decomposition of organic matter, forests, by the way, also contribute to the respiration of living organisms. Of the anthropogenic, the main one is the combustion of fossil fuels (87% of anthropogenic emissions). Plus deforestation, some industrial processes, such as cement production.
Point Zero: Positions of countries at the start
Let’s assume that climate change is the most important issue, against which the fight against poverty, terrorism, unequal access to resources and technologies fades.
In order to eat something, you need to produce something, and according to the logic of Greta Thunberg, it would be nice to drive the population of the third world back into the forests.
We do not exist in the world of abstractions, it is important for us to understand the context: why here and now. Developed countries are rapidly mastering the information economy. In the EU, services (including the financial sector) account for roughly 75% of GDP. Less than 2% for agriculture. According to the World Bank, the contribution of industrial production to EU GDP in the period from 1991 to 2020 decreased from 20% to 14%.
Share of industrial sector in EU GDP 1991-2020.
Source: The World Bank. labor, and proposed from that moment to fix the «point 0». Those who go from this point into the red in terms of CO₂ emissions will be punished with fines and taxed with a carbon tax, those who care about the environment will be rewarded with money.
In October 2021, the Forest Carbon Partnership Fund paid Mozambique a $6.
4 million award for reducing harmful emissions into the atmosphere, carbon emissions. This is the first such case in history.
The green squid game has begun, but no one, including its organizers, fully understands what the rules are. These rules are written in the present tense. There are many important points to be clarified: what is carbon neutrality for countries and companies, what parameters it is calculated on, who set the emission standards, who and how conducts certification, how the carbon tax will be levied, and many others. We will talk about all this in new articles.
In the meantime, here are the positions of the players at the start:
Greenhouse gas emissions by the world’s largest economies 1990-2030 (historical data + forecast).
Source: International Energy Agency
Per capita greenhouse gas emissions, 2018.
Source: International Energy Agency
Global CO₂ emissions, 1850-2040 (historical data + projection).
Source: International Energy Agency
Global energy-related CO2 emissions, 1990-2021
Source: International Energy Agency
Most of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to these data, come from a relatively small number of countries. China, the United States and countries in the European Union are the top three emitters in absolute terms. Greenhouse gas emissions per capita are highest in the US and Russia. The lion’s share of emissions by sector falls on energy production (72%), agriculture provides about 11%, industrial processes about 6%.
It is easy to see that the pandemic has not led to an increase in environmental friendliness. After a temporary lull (minus 6%) associated with periods of lockdowns in 2020, carbon dioxide emissions in 2021 increased sharply, reaching peaks in 2018-2019. India, Argentina, China are expected to exceed their 2019 emission levels by the end of the year.
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