Can Switzerland’s net-zero climate law help save its Alpine glaciers?

Published : Jun 21, 2023 14:05 IST - 3 MINS READ Swiss voters on June 18 supported a new climate bill aimed at combating the melting glaciers and requiring the country to become carbon neutral by 2050. Socialist Party parliamentarian Valerie Piller Carrard also welcomed the result as “an important step for future generations”.” A full 59.1 per cent of voters back the new law, which will require Switzerland to slash its dependence on imported oil and gas and scale up the development of greener, more homegrown alternatives. Voters also backed adopting a global minimum tax rate of 15 per cent for international companies in a second referendum, with 78.5 per cent in favour of the new, higher rate. But the right-wing conservative Swiss People’s Party had refused to back it, arguing that cutting climate-damaging emissions by 75 per cent by 2050, compared to 1990, would cause energy prices to explode. SVP leader Marco Chiesa last month criticised the “utopian” vision behind the bill, maintaining it would drive up energy costs by 400 billion Swiss francs while having basically “no impact” on the global climate.