EDF Talks Global Climate

EDF’s Climate Talks Blog is Moving

For the past decade, EDF’s Climate Talks blog has shared expert analysis on global climate issues from EDF’s economists, scientists, attorneys and policy specialists, while our sister blog has done the same for U.S. climate issues.

Yet climate change is a challenge that transcends borders, and the line between what constitutes a “U.S.” climate issue versus a “global” one is growing increasingly blurry – particularly in the age of the Paris Agreement, which has catalyzed countries, subnational governments, businesses and other actors around the globe to step up their climate action.

So beginning August 1 our global climate blog will be merging with Climate 411 – EDF’s blog on domestic climate issues (named for the colloquial term for “information”).

Climate 411 will be EDF’s go-to spot for analysis and commentary – as well as climate solutions and reasons for hope – from EDF’s leading climate experts on our wide range of climate work across the globe, such as:

  • Climate science
  • Carbon pricing
  • Actions in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
  • Actions in the U.S. Congress
  • Pollution from cars and trucks
  • Public health
  • Reducing emissions from deforestation (REDD+)
  • UN climate talks
  • Subnational climate policy, including California’s landmark cap-and-trade program
  • Aviation pollution

Our hope is Climate 411’s expanded scope will make it easier for experts, academics, journalists and others to access all our commentary on the science, law and economics of global climate change and clean air – and maybe even come across something unexpected.

Catch our latest posts by signing up for emails for new posts or subscribing to Climate 411’s RSS feed. As always, you can follow EDF’s broader work via our EDF Voices blog, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Finally, join us in celebrating this step by looking back at the most-read Climate Talks blog posts since 2008.

  1. California models climate and air pollution action with balanced approach (July 2017)
  2. Why and how Brazil should do more to stop deforestation and climate change (October 2015)
  3. EDF’s Schwartzman Remembers Chico Mendes (December 2008)
  4. Picturing low-carbon development: Methane cook stoves in rural India (March 2011)
  5. Mexico’s historic climate law: an analysis (July 2012)
  6. NY Times forests oped is out on a limb: protecting trees still key to solving climate change (September 2014)
  7. Agriculture negotiations reach agreement at COP23 (November 2017)
  8. California’s cap-and-trade program doesn’t need an overhaul (May 2017)
  9. On International Women’s Day, a look at rural women in India fighting climate change (March 2011)
  10. Mexico organization partners with EDF to address deforestation, climate change and rural development (March 2012)

We love to hear your feedback, so leave us a comment or shoot us an email to let us know how we’re doing.

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States Should Welcome REDD+ into International Aviation Carbon Offset Program

Sectoral scale REDD+ programs meet or exceed proposed CORSIA offset

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Source: pixabay.com

Two important climate change initiatives are advancing and their future success looks more and more intertwined. The Carbon Offset Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) of the UN’s International Civil Aviation Organization’s (ICAO) is approaching the end of a policy-making phase to finalize environmental criteria for offset programs – which will be necessary for airlines to meet the international aviation sector’s climate commitments. At the same time, many countries striving to conserve their tropical forests are looking for sources of funding for large-scale programs for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+).

ICAO recently hosted a seminar in Montreal on carbon markets. The seminar occurred as ICAO Member States are considering draft Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) for implementing CORSIA, including environmental integrity criteria for offset programs and emissions credits. With some countries having submitted their observations on the proposals this week, and more slated to do so by April 20th following a series of regional seminars on CORSIA, the 36-member ICAO Council aims to finalize and adopt the SARPs this June. ICAO’s CORSIA Resolution directs the Council to establish, with the technical contribution of ICAO’s Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP), a standing technical advisory body to make recommendations to the Council on the eligible emissions units for use by the CORSIA. While the Council is establishing this body, proponents of different programs like the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and REDD+ will be informing decision makers about their ability to supply high-integrity offsets.

Why REDD+ is a great solution for CORSIA

REDD+ is the only sectoral set of policy approaches to be featured in the Paris Agreement, which will govern global climate action starting in 2021. REDD+ received special recognition by the world’s climate policy makers, for two reasons. First, dramatic reductions in emissions from deforestation can play a key role in the battle to avert dangerous climate shifts. Second, the world’s nations have set out a multilaterally agreed framework for measuring these reductions, ensuring that forest protection proceeds with environmental/biological and social safeguards, providing basic guidance for market-based transfers of these reductions, and ensuring environmental integrity through accounting and transparency. The UNFCCC’s 2013 Warsaw Framework for REDD+ and related UNFCCC Decisions set a precedent for these programs to proceed at jurisdictional or national rather than simply project scale in order to develop and enforce policies to address deforestation at a large scale, prevent leakage of deforestation, and avoid double claiming of emissions reductions.

Parallel to the development of the Warsaw Framework for REDD+, the World Bank, nine donor governments and TNC created the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) to help tropical forest countries prepare plans to reduce deforestation nationwide, and to pilot results-based payments for those reductions. These countries are succeeding in reducing emissions from deforestation – and payments for their results could be issued by the end of 2018.

The guidance provided by Warsaw Framework for REDD+ and the upcoming results of the FCPF are two important reasons why REDD+ should be a source of offsets for CORSIA. As the FCPF is demonstrating, REDD+ that meets the UN’s multilaterally agreed Warsaw Framework is achieving real results, and deserves to be a source of offsets for CORSIA.

A recent analysis of REDD+ by Climate Advisers demonstrates how REDD+ programs implemented under the Warsaw Framework meet CORSIA’s draft Emissions Unit Eligibility Criteria. Another just released study by Climate Advisers discusses why REDD+ is a good option for airlines needing to meet their CORSIA obligations.

What are other potential offset suppliers for CORSIA?

During an ICAO seminar held in February in Montreal, potential offset suppliers gave short presentations of their programs to an audience of about 200 people. Reviewing the workshop program, one can’t help but notice a big focus on the CDM. The CDM’s existence is not guaranteed in the new post-2020 climate regime for many reasons. But one prominent factor is the risk that if the CDM actually did achieve real reductions, those reductions could be claimed both by the host country in the context of the Paris Agreement, and by an airline in CORSIA. That would negate the climate benefit of CORSIA. Flawed CDM credits should not be allowed to crowd quality REDD+ credits out in CORSIA.

But can REDD+ actually supply CORSIA? EDF researched this question and found that the answer is yes – even when doing proper accounting to ensure no double counting. Another interesting finding is that if REDD+ is used, many emerging markets could see net economic benefits. See, for examples, analyses by Climate Advisers of net benefits for Colombia, Ethiopia, Indonesia, and Peru.

Making a match of REDD+ and CORSIA

Evaluating CORSIA’s draft Emissions Units Criteria, REDD+– under the Warsaw Framework for REDD+ or the FCPF– meets or exceeds them. Sourcing offsets from REDD+ offers more than just environmental benefits. In addition to generating significant potential supply of emissions reductions, REDD+ activities can also generate significant economic and social co-benefits, in addition to offering higher regulatory certainty than other mechanisms. CORSIA policy makers would be well advised to acquaint themselves with REDD+ – the only sectoral program for the new Paris climate regime agreed upon by 193 countries.

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Indonesia could curb deforestation and increase production with Zero Deforestation Zones

By Dana Miller, Research Analyst and Ruohong Cai, Ph.D. Economist

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A smoldering landscape in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia. Credit: Ruohong Cai, October, 2015

You may have seen news stories this fall about Indonesia and the blanket of haze choking the country and neighboring countries Singapore and Malaysia. This haze comes from burning carbon rich forests and peat soils for the production of palm oil and other commodities; burning currently releases more greenhouse gases daily than the entire U.S. economy.

To address deforestation and the fires and haze it brings, companies that control 90% of palm oil production have pledged to eliminate deforestation from their supply chains. Several major palm oil companies have pledged not to clear High Carbon Stock (HCS) lands—high, medium and low density forests—or peatlands for palm oil and other commodities; instead the companies would shift new production to low carbon stock areas, which are young regenerating forest, scrub or cleared or open lands.

The Government of Indonesia pledged to reduce emissions by 26% unilaterally or 41% with international support below a projected “business as usual” baseline by 2020. This year, Indonesia committed to reduce emissions by 29% to 41% below a projected baseline by 2030.

In a new report, Environmental Defense Fund explores how companies could eliminate deforestation from their supply chains by preferentially sourcing palm oil and other commodities from provinces in Indonesia that meet criteria for Zero Deforestation Zones (ZDZs).

ZDZs would be districts or provinces that align public and private sector actors and are on a path to reaching zero net emissions from deforestation across their jurisdiction while increasing agricultural production. ZDZs would have strong policies in place consistent with the framework Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+). Then, companies could source commodities such as timber and palm oil from ZDZs.

For provinces in Indonesia to become ZDZs, local and national governments would have to address the root causes of deforestation.  Specifically, Indonesia would need to:

  • Revise laws that allow and even encourage deforestation; strengthen law enforcement; and address conflicting agendas between local and regional governments, ministries, and powerful private sector actors.
  • Create a definition for ZDZs that fits Indonesia’s national context. The definition would need to put provinces on pathways to produce zero net emissions from deforestation and comply with UN decisions on REDD+.
  • Set up monitoring systems that both the government and private sector would use to enforce deforestation policies and clarify disputed land claims by local communities and plantations.
  • Provide essential economic incentives to producers to reduce deforestation, increase yields on existing plantations, and shift new production to degraded lands.

Figure 1. This spatial map shows that the opportunity costs of the land translated into a minimum carbon price (local-specific) needed to eliminate deforestation in Kalimantan, Indonesia, which varies widely by location from $0 to $100 per ton CO2.

Economic Incentives for Reducing Deforestation in Kalimantan Provinces:

A carbon price could generate much needed economic incentives to reduce deforestation. To predict the carbon price needed to reduce emission from deforestation, EDF performed a 10-year simulation of deforestation in Kalimantan, Indonesia, using the historical relationship between palm oil revenues per hectare and deforestation rates to estimate landowners’ responses to economic incentives.  Kalimantan provides a good case study for Indonesia because it contributes one quarter of Indonesia’s palm oil production.

Based on our empirical analysis, the opportunity cost of conserving forest varies widely across Kalimantan. Figure 1 translates the opportunity cost of the land into a price per ton of carbon.

We further compared the cost in terms of dollars per ton of carbon for reducing emissions from deforestation on low carbon stock (LCS, less than 40 t C/ha) and high carbon stock (HCS, more than 40 t C/ha) lands. In Figure 2, at a carbon price of $10/t CO2e, Kalimantan provinces can reduce 75 million tons (Mt) CO2e per year from LCS areas, 185 MtCO2e from HCS areas, and 260 MtCO2e per year from both HCS and LCS areas. In the latter and highest scenario that conserves both HCS and LCS areas, Kalimantan could reduce emissions from deforestation 74-78% below the scenario without a carbon price.

Figure 2. Estimated cost curves for avoiding emissions from deforestation on high carbon stock lands (red), low carbon stock lands (yellow) and all lands (blue) in Kalimantan, Indonesia. This figure shows that more emissions can be avoided if Kalimantan conserves both high carbon stock and low carbon stock lands.

This result indicates that more emissions can be avoided at a lower cost if Kalimantan conserves portions of all lands, not just high carbon stock lands.

To further illustrate this point, the table below shows that Kalimantan could achieve its contribution to Indonesia’s emission reduction goals of 26% to 41% below business as usual by 2020 at a lower price if both high carbon stock and low carbon stock areas are conserved.

This shows that a “Zero Deforestation Zone” approach focused on an entire landscape has the potential to more cost-effectively reduce emissions than an approach focused on just a particular subset of lands.   This analysis does not consider the potential for “leakage” or shifts of deforestation from one location to another.  Incorporating leakage would lend a further argument for a regional approach that would capture shifts in deforestation across an entire zone.

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Indonesia has many hurdles to cross before it can level off its rapid deforestation rate and reduce it to zero. But, the haze, health implications, productivity loss and public outrage that ensue from peat fires might just be the wakeup call that Indonesia needs to address its deforestation.

 

Read more in our paper Zero Deforestation Zones in Indonesia; A proposal to curb deforestation and increase agricultural production.

 

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U.S. airlines give up legal battle against Europe’s anti-pollution law

It’s official: U.S. airlines have given up their legal challenge to the European Union’s landmark law limiting global warming pollution from aviation.

Airlines have dropped a challenge in the UK High Court to the aviation directive three months after a ruling from the European Court of Justice, above, upheld the law. (Thanks and photo credit to Gwenaël Piaser)

It was an abrupt move by United, American, and their trade association, Airlines for America, none of which gave an explanation for dropping the case in the UK High Court in London less than 48 hours before the Court’s scheduled hearing.

We can only guess that after the European Court of Justice’s strong ruling  upholding the EU directive as consistent with international law, the airlines’ lawyers realized their efforts in the UK court would be fruitless.

EDF, with the transatlantic coalition of environmental groups that intervened in the litigation, said today that the airlines’ move presents an opportunity for industry to support a global deal to reduce emissions from aviation.

In a joint statement today from Aviation Environment Federation, Center for Biological Diversity, Earthjustice, EDF, Transport & Environment, and WWF-UK, we said:

Although we are pleased this avoids a pointless legal challenge in the UK, it is disappointing that U.S airlines are refusing to accept the ECJ ruling, and may simply be moving the battlefield elsewhere. …

United States, Europe, and other countries [should] work together with airlines and civil society to craft a global solution and enforceable domestic measures.

U.S. House industry-dominated “roundtable discussion” ignores significant developments

In related news, today the U.S. House of Representatives aviation subcommittee hosted a “roundtable discussion” on the EU law and “its impact on the U.S. aviation industry, international law, and global trade.”

However, in the 1.5 hours when participants from the Federal Aviation Administration, State Department and aviation industry delivered short remarks and fielded questions from Members of Congress, the latest updates from the law were noticeably absent. No mention was made that just three months ago, the EU’s highest court had ruled strongly against the airlines, or that yesterday the airlines had given up their latest challenge to the law.

Eyes now turn to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), where its Secretary General Raymond Benjamin has proposed to agree, by the end of the year, on global measures to reduce aviation emissions. We hope airlines use this opportunity to support a global deal.

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EDF submits comments to New Zealand’s emissions trading system review

New Zealand is currently conducting a review of its emissions trading system for greenhouse-gas pollutants, as required by the law that enacted the program.

EDF has submitted comments to New Zealand as it undergoes a review of its emissions trading system.  (Image: Yodod/Flickr)

EDF recently submitted comments for the review, because:

we believe that what happens in New Zealand can make a real difference to the global response to climate change. Historically, New Zealand has initiated important policy innovations that have been adopted around the world over time, from female enfranchisement to fisheries quota management systems. Again, the world is watching New Zealand…

Our comments focus on developments in carbon markets including California, Europe, and elsewhere, suggesting some enhancements that New Zealand policy-makers may wish to consider in the post-2012 environment.

In our submission, we also recommend the country pay particular attention to factors such as:

  • Flexibility and adaptability
  • Continued access to other carbon markets
  • Ongoing development of other carbon markets
  • Maintaining control and flexibility over the types of offsets which can be admitted into the New Zealand ETS
  • Environmental credibility of the market and its instruments

Read more about EDF’s Submission to New Zealand’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) Review 2011.

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On International Women’s Day, a look at rural women in India fighting climate change

With 400 million people living below the poverty line, and an agriculture sector that is heavily dependent on the Monsoon, India is on the frontlines of climate change.  But with such a rapidly developing country and signs of climate change already manifesting, how can both development and climate change be addressed?

The world’s largest democracy will play a crucially important role in answering this question,  and we will learn a lot from the process. This is why Environmental Defense Fund began engaging on the ground in India nearly two years ago.

EDF produced a Bollywood-style movie to address women's roles in managing climate change in rural India.

Since half of India’s population lives in villages and rural areas, one branch of EDF’s work focuses on sharing information about climate change in rural India.  And with a law requiring at least one-third of Indian representatives be women, locally elected women leaders are at the center of our outreach.

It can be challenging to explain how global warming is affecting the women’s lives, so EDF had to think creatively about how to contextualize the risks from climate change, like poverty, risk of hunger, and water security from events like changes in rainfall and rising temperatures.

As a first step, we produced a film starring an Indian soap-opera actor with our partner organization in India, The Hunger Project, which seeks sustainable solutions to world hunger and helps to empower women in rural communities.

The film “Aarohan”, which in Hindi means “A New Beginning”, is designed to prompt the kind of discussion that ultimately may lead to active engagement from women in working to alleviate rural poverty and adapt to climate change.  It’s already been shown in more than 400 villages in three separate states at climate “workshops”, where the women leaders watch the film and share stories about the impact of climate change in their communities.

What follows is a blog piece written by Caroline Howe, a young entrepreneur deeply committed to addressing the issue of energy poverty in India. Caroline was kind enough to be present as an observer during one of the meetings in the Himalayan state of Uttaranchal, which hosted 100 community leaders from 30 villages.  Through the post below, she shares her experience.

Sustainable development in India: reflections from a young entrepreneur

In Delhi, it’s easy to lose hope in the fight for environmental protection and climate mitigation – a thousand new cars every day; thousands of tons of garbage that make their way to the landfills coming from millions of homes, industries, and street sides; constant new construction of flyovers and widening of roads; and the sensation that it is too big for any individual, even any well-intentioned local politician to make a difference.

An overnight train ride away from Delhi, though, there exists another world. One that is full of enormous challenges in a rapidly changing climate, but also one full of Himalayan hope. Environmental Defense Fund, in partnership with The Hunger Project and local NGOs in Uttarakhand, are giving female political and community leaders the tools they need to be able to engage in the development decisions happening every day.

One cold but warming day in mid-January, I had the honor to join Richie Ahuja to visit a leadership program, bringing together more than 100 of these female leaders from throughout the Kumaon district.

These rural women traveled for hours to a small town in the Himalayas to learn about climate change.

Some of these women (and three generations of their family members) travelled by bus for more than 2 hours to reach this workshop, through winding mountain passes from their villages. Many of these women were Sarpanches (elected heads of villages) or members of their panchayat (an elected board of community representatives), while others were community leaders of other kinds, working with Self-Help Groups in their village.

While we waited for the last of the buses to arrive, several women led the group in a song that many of them learned by listening to the first group singing. Describing the interconnectedness between people and the environment, they spoke about how you can’t change one thing without changing the world around it. They sang other songs about the need for action, the need to fight to protect their communities, nature, and the beauty of the Himalayan mountainsides.

The majority of these community members had already seen EDF’s powerful climate film, a drama which unfolds along with the stories of community members in an area with serious environmental challenges directly impacting the lives of the main characters.   (Film is a wildly popular medium in India; India’s own Bollywood now releases in excess of 1000 films a year.)

Conveying as impactful a message as An Inconvenient Truth, but in a format that is easily digestible and appealing to its target audience, the film obviously had sparked dialogue and action in these women. The Hunger Project had conducted surveys of the women who saw the film to discuss the impacts of climate change in their own communities. After a few more songs, the training program began with a review of the survey’s results, while the women present shared their specific stories of impacts in their areas.

Shared experiences from climate change challenges

People shared a common sense of the changing water availability – the lack of snow in Nainital for the past 10 years after centuries of snowy winters, increase in cloudbursts and intense rainstorms, springs running dry – and common impacts from these changes.

One woman observed:

We used to find water nearby; now we walk for 2 hours to find water, and the children do this before they can go to school. The further they walk, the less school they attend.

Women described the effects of climate change they were already seeing in their villages.

Another woman described the impact on the soil: with less water, and less rain, she said, “The soil is getting loose.”

Soil erosion came up as a common theme because of deforestation as well. One woman said

This area used to be all forests, you could look over this valley and see only trees. Now you can see, we’ve cut down the jungle to build these villages and these cottages.

Some women didn’t know who was cutting their forests, but everyone knew it was happening – the best and biggest trees were disappearing.

Another woman described,

Without these big trees, and without the rains there are bigger and bigger forest fires.

Disappearing forests made medicinal herbs hard to find and harder to find fodder for cattle, as well.

It wasn’t just changes in forests and precipitation, though, that these women described. They talked about changes in consumption – with one female leader passionately describing the rise in packaged foods.

We are eating food from plastic instead of food that helps our children and our farms grow.

They talked about the rise in polythene on street corners, on hillsides, all along the village roads.

Other women described the increase in chemical consumption, in farms and in their homes. Instead of using dung or compost, farmers were using chemical fertilizers, and these women recognized that this was an increasing problem for the long-term fertility of the land.

Rural Indian women said they're noticing changes in their environment, like more severe forest fires, less rain and less available drinking water.

But in the midst of these stories of significant changes, women shared the stories of what they had done to change things – what they had done to improve these conditions. One woman spoke of how her community was able to keep people from drawing from their remaining spring so that they could preserve it.

Another woman lay down in the road when someone was trying to take trees out of her village.

You can roll over me, but you won’t take trees out of here.

This delay gave the police enough time to arrive, confirming that these particular men had no permit for logging.

Another community leader had recognized that their village didn’t have a need for a 40 foot wide road as much as they had a need for the trees that would be cut to build it, and so stopped the state government from the road-widening project. They preserved their 10 foot road, and hundreds of trees along the way.

From stories of climate change challenges, hope and inspiration

These stories left me with hope, but the way they responded to questions about why they did this gave me even more inspiration. One participant said:

People from our cities, people from Nainital, have said ‘Why should we do anything? Let Delhi sort it out.’ But if we are the ones feeling the impacts, if we are the ones being impacted, then if we don’t take any action, how can we expect others to?”

Building on this, a woman added:

This is a global problem, but many of these challenges are in our hands, within our control. We can’t wait for others to solve it, we should do what we can with these problems. Polythene here is our problem, the polythene in the city is for them to solve.

One woman concluded by talking about transportation. More cars and more trucks in the mountains, she said, were leading to more pollution and more heat in their area.

I’m not saying don’t drive, but that we need cars that pollute less, and more thoughtful development of our regions’ transportation.

Performances during the workshop allow participants to act out how they plan to combat climate change, along with other environmental challenges they face in their communities.

After this discussion, a group of young people from a local NGO performed a street play set in the future, using the same tools of drama and humor, building intriguing and captivating characters that were being impacted by changes in their communities.

In some ways, this street play brought to life the same dramas and dilemmas facing the characters in EDF’s film, demonstrating again the power of engaging people on an emotional level before asking them to engage intellectually or physically in combating these challenges in their communities.

It was wonderful watching women laugh as young men played characters of grandmothers and as their friends and neighbours made both comic and real the challenges they had been speaking about.

It was even more wonderful to watching the understanding wash over the crowd as these characters faced the extreme challenges that may well face these communities in 10 or 20 years, certainly within the lifetimes of the women present, and to watch the discussions that were generated afterwards.

The group concluded on a powerful, inspiring, empowered note, recognizing that the challenges they could face could also be solved.

They spoke about solar energy – “You may have to pay upfront, but from then on, it’s absolutely free!”– and water conservation – “There is enough, if we use it well.” More importantly, though, they addressed the mindset change that would have to occur within each one of them, and within their neighbours.

Prompting a round of applause, one gentleman said:

If man can make a ton of metal fly in the sky, then we certainly can solve these problems on the ground.

For these men and women who have seen so much change – technological and environmental – in their lifetimes, they know that they do have the power to make these changes possible.

Before getting back onto the ton of metal taking me back down the mountain, I looked back to these women who were facing so much with so much courage and strength, and were able to do so because they were together. They were able to share their stories and learn from each other, as human beings, with emotions and needs, with courage and confidence.

I took some of this with me and re-entered Delhi with a heart and head full of Himalayan hope.

Follow EDF’s India Program Manager on Twitter @richieahuja.

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