Foreword

Israel, along with the rest of the world, is confronting an immediate health and economic crisis due to COVID-19, which is adding greater complexity to the low-carbon transition. The development of Israel’s long-term low emissions development strategy (LT-LEDS) has constituted an opportunity to align government action around the pursuit of a low-emissions future. This instrument is today, more than ever; key to support the alignment of near-term action with long-term goals. An integrated approach that addresses climate and well-being as part of a cohesive and coherent strategy is indispensable for making climate action more feasible, acceptable and cost effective as well as to avoiding further lock-in of emissions and inequalities. Developing sectoral policy packages in line with this approach – especially for sectors that are difficult or key to decarbonise - will be necessary. This will allow Israel to transform the economy, benefit from its capacity for technological innovation, and reach multiple well-being priorities while building its resilience towards future shocks, such as heat waves, droughts or other diseases.

This report is part of a collaboration project between Israel’s Ministry of Environmental Protection and the OECD Environment Directorate to support the development of Israel’s LT-LEDS. The report is an input to governmental discussions in Israel to develop a roadmap that will back the implementation of Israel’s LT-LEDS. It analyses needed actions in the next five to ten years to align three sectors – electricity, residential and transport – with long-term climate objectives and broader well-being goals such as incomes, jobs, good and affordable housing, access to services and opportunities, health, and equity. Whilst written before the COVID-19 crisis, this report can inform decisions for Israel’s economic recovery, helping to ensure that stimulus packages do not risk locking the country into carbon intensive infrastructure and activities, but instead advance and catalyse long-term aims for well-being in the country, of which climate change mitigation is a pillar.

This report can also serve as a resource for other governments, particularly as countries form stimulus packages to recover from COVID-19 and continue to work on longer-term instruments (such as revised Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions – NDCs or LT-LEDs). There are examples of national and sub-national governments who are using the recovery from COVID-19, as an opportunity to advance both climate and wider well-being goals, but this is far from ubiquitous. This OECD report provides an application of the well-being approach to climate change mitigation, which governments can use to increase viability and acceptance of climate action, while ensuring consistency across actions planned for different timeframes.

Rodolfo Lacy

OECD Environment Director