A new global partnership has been formally launched in an effort to accelerate the decarbonisation of seven heavy industrial and transport sectors that together represent 30% of global greenhouse-gas emissions and where carbon-abatement pathways have yet to be defined.

Known as the ‘Mission Possible Partnership’ it will focus specifically on the transportation sectors of aviation, shipping and trucking, as well as the aluminium, cement, chemicals and steel industries.

Unlike the energy sector where net-zero pathways have been more-or-less defined, the seven sectors earmarked still require technological breakthroughs if countries are to meet their net-zero commitments.

Several large countries made net-zero commitments by 2050 or 2060 last year and several more are expected to sign up to the goal of achieving balance between emissions produced and extracted from the atmosphere in the run up to the COP26 climate negotiations, scheduled for Glasgow, Scotland, in November.

Unveiled during the World Economic Forum’s (WEF’s) Davos Agenda, the Mission Possible Partnership brings together over 400 companies that have committed to working on concrete net-zero actions.

The initiative is backed by funding from the Bezos Earth Fund, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and Breakthrough Energy and builds on the Mission Possible Platform launched at the United Nations Secretary General’s Climate Action Summit in 2019.

It is run by the WEF, the Energy Transitions Commission, Rocky Mountain Institute and the We Mean Business coalition.

The partnership is premised on the idea that the Paris Agreement alone will not generate the solutions necessary to transition global supply chains and industrial processes.

“Country-centric strategies need to be complemented by action from global industries,” the partnership said in a statement.

“The most important missing piece of the global climate action architecture is an effort by sectors, complementing country-centric strategies with action from global industries to unlock technology and energy transformation. This is particularly important for heavy emitting industries.”

In late 2021, the partnership will aim to showcase net-zero agreement breakthroughs in shipping, aviation and steel. Within three years, it plans to help companies complete climate-action agreements in these sectors as well as trucking, chemicals, cement and aluminium.

Within five years, the partnership aims for clear shifts in investment patterns across the seven sectors and will be pursuing net-zero climate action agreements in additional sectors, including potentially food and agriculture.