The Canary Islands detailed a climate action plan at the Cop28 summit in Dubai – the only Spanish destination to offer a dedicated solution at the conference.
Jose Juan Lorenzo, the islands’ managing director of tourism, introduced the Journey to Decarbonization, a free digital tool enabling companies to assess and diminish their carbon footprint.
Journey to Decarbonisation, found at Sustainability.canariasdestino.com, provides a free carbon footprint calculator, a self-diagnosis questionnaire, personalized recommendations and downloadable resources for initiating a climate action plan.
The plan is designed to curtail CO2 emissions in alignment with the Glasgow Declaration to reduce emissions.
The Declaration, signed in 2021, encourages climate action in tourism to reduce emissions “by at least 50%” over the next decade and achieve Net Zero as soon as possible before 2050.
"As pioneers in adopting the established objectives and commitments in Glasgow, we are taking decisive steps towards Net Zero in 2050, supporting the Canary tourism industry and advocating for the declaration’s objectives," Lorenzo said.
There are 857 global signatories to the Glasgow Declaration, with 261 already possessing a climate action plan.
Initiatives in the Canaries include a cruise company operating in the archipelago planning its first net zero ship by 2030, hotels designed for climate neutrality from construction, and the application of artificial intelligence to reduce food waste in tourism, already implemented.
Cop28, held at Expo City Dubai, focused on limiting future planetary warming to a 1.5C increase, the cessation of fossil fuels and the global peak of CO2 emissions in 2025.
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