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Land-Use Competition between Biodiversity and Net Zero Goals
…points Achieving global energy, climate and biodiversity conservation targets simultaneously has significant implications for land use. At the 28th United Nations Climate Change conference (COP28) in 2023, nearly 200 countries set a target to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030. Based on an assessment by the International Energy Agency (IEA), tripling the capacity of renewables globally requires allocating up to an additional 600 000 km² of land – an area the size of France – to utility-scale solar PV and onshore wind power by 2030, and 2 million km² by 2050. In parallel, the IEA estimates that demand for key energy transition minerals – cobalt, copper, graphite…
