In the midst of COP26 in Glasgow, after a week filled with big announcements from countries promising to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, what real impact can these commitments have on global warming?
The latest pledges to cut emissions – known as Nationally Determined Contributions, or NDCs – by 2030, before the Glasgow conference, have put the Earth on track for an average temperature rise of 2.7°C this century .
Assuming all additional commitments to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 are maintained and fully met, warming would be capped at 2.2°C.
In the 2015 Paris Agreement, countries pledged to limit temperature rise “well below” 2°C and to work towards the 1.5°C target.
This week there were new announcements, including India’s commitment to achieving carbon neutrality by 2070, Brazil and Argentina’s pledges to strengthen their short-term targets, and 100 countries’ determination to cut their methane gas emissions by 30% until 2030.
Experts believe that all of this could have a significant effect on warming, but it is still difficult to calculate.
1,8ºC?
Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, said Thursday (4) that, according to an unpublished analysis by his entity, if all COP26 commitments are fulfilled, warming will be limited to 1.8°C.
However, he emphasized that that number is heavily dependent on countries making the quick cuts in emissions needed to meet their carbon neutrality plans.
“What is essential is that governments turn their promises into clear and credible political actions and strategies today,” he urged.
1,9ºC?
An assessment by the University of Melbourne this week looked at new pledges of zero net emissions from countries, including those from India and China – the world’s biggest emitters – and concluded that they represent an “important step” to limit warming to 1.5ºC.
The team applied the same climate model used in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report to the NDCs.
And it determined, with a “50% probability”, that if added to the new promises made by 194 countries, the Earth would heat up by 1.9°C by 2100.
too early to need
The UN released a preliminary assessment of the new NDCs on Thursday. Although it has not yet converted the calculations to their temperature equivalent, it found that the latest plans would mean an increase in emissions of 13.7% in 2030 compared to 2010.
It is slightly better than the 16% in the previous assessment made in October, but it is far from the 45% reduction required for the 1.5ºC target.
The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) reported last month that just a reduction in emissions this decade eight times greater than expected would limit warming to 1.5ºC.
Even if Birol’s optimistic assessment is confirmed, NGOs say it would surpass 1.5°C and that every tenth of a degree would cause a series of devastating catastrophes.
“If we get to 1.5ºC, some countries will just disappear from the map. So what we have to take away from these numbers is that we don’t just need words, we need actions,” said Juan Pablo Osornio of Greenpeace.
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