The promises announced so far in Glasgow, during the COP26, United Nations Conference on Climate Change, may be insufficient to prevent the global temperature from increasing at least 2.4°C compared to the pre-industrial era.
The conclusion is in a study by the CAT (Climate Action Tracker), the main climate analysis coalition in the world, released on Tuesday (9).
“It’s all well and good for leaders to say they have a net zero goal, but if they don’t have plans for how to get there and their 2030 goals are as low as many of them, then frankly these net zero goals are just talk. for real climate action. Glasgow has a huge credibility gap,” said Bill Hare, president of Climate Analytics, a partner organization of the CAT.
The body made a presentation of its annual reviews at COP26. According to the calculations, considering all the short-term promises made so far, the emissions of gases that cause global warming will still be almost double what is needed to contain the warming by 2100 at 1.5°C, a commitment made by the countries who sign the Paris Agreement.
In absolute numbers, there will still be an excess of emissions of between 19 and 23 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, said Claire Stockwell.
According to the institute, in the last year, leaders and governments have failed to commit to more ambitious short-term goals. The new announcements corresponded to a drop, until 2030, of only 17% of what was needed.
Brazil was one of the countries that worsened its goals, even after the “revision” presented at this COP, which, according to the government, would recover the setback made in 2020. Last year, the Bolsonaro government raised the calculation basis for the cuts in emissions without changing the cut percentage of 43%, which in practice reduced the cuts.
At this COP, the government revised the promised percentage to 50%, which still means a smaller reduction than what was agreed in 2015, said Claire Stockwell, of Climate Analytics, in an interview during the presentation of the new numbers.
“The new target announced by Brazil for 2030 is only stronger on paper and, at best, only reverses some of the damage caused by the 2020 update. The lack of clarity in the references used makes the target level of emissions uncertain “, states the document.
Mexico also worsened its offer, and Australia, Indonesia, Russia, Singapore, Switzerland, Thailand and Vietnam did not change their 2015 targets, according to the analysis.
For Niklas Höhne, from the New Climate Institute, another CAT partner organization, the promises of carbon neutrality should not serve as an excuse for countries to “sit down and relax”: “The situation we are in is so serious that there is no point in making a little change here, another there. This moves the warming needle almost nothing. All countries must urgently look at what more they can do.”
The global situation is even worse, according to the CAT, in the projections of the results of the policies actually implemented, and not of the promises: in this case, last year there was an improvement of only 0.2°C, and the temperature will rise by 2.7°C without more drastic measures.
According to Maria José de VillaFranca Casas, of the New Climate Institute, progress is unacceptably slow and is not due to new comprehensive policies being implemented, but to changes in inventories (calculation bases) and expectations of economic growth.
Private sector initiatives not factored into this analysis were also noted by the CAT. “Their increase in emissions reductions is small, but welcome because the gap is so big that it will not be possible to close it with just federal governments,” said Höhne.
According to the CAT, if all the climate neutrality announcements (net zero carbon emissions) made in Glasgow actually materialize, the “optimistic scenario” would be a rise of 1.8 °C by 2100.
The institute points out, however, that this scenario is quite unlikely, because, in addition to the still large gap in reducing warming by 2030, many of the long-term goals are vague.
“The vast majority of actions and targets for 2030 are inconsistent with net zero targets: there is a gap of almost a degree between governments’ current policies and their net zero targets,” said Hare.
According to the calculations presented today, the chances that the world will reach the end of the century with a warming in excess of 2.4°C is 16%.
The CAT analyzed the climate neutrality pledges of 40 countries, which cover more than 85% of emissions, and classified only four as acceptable: Chile, Costa Rica, the United Kingdom and the European Union. According to the report, there are real plans in place to zero just 6% of global emissions.
Brazil enters the list of targets with incomplete information, which also includes some of the biggest polluters in the world, such as India, Indonesia and Russia.
In total, more than 140 governments have announced carbon neutrality targets in Glasgow, corresponding to 90% of global emissions.
“Given this situation, in the final stages of Glasgow, governments need to focus on closing the credibility gap,” says the CAT, something that will only happen if they raise their ambition to 2030 and close the funding deal, “essential for many developing countries” pay transition costs.
In the CAT analysis, coal and gas are the main reasons for inaction. According to Hare, despite expectations that coal will be abandoned in energy production by 2030 in OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries and globally by 2040, “there is still a lot of coal in development plans.”
Large coal countries, such as China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam, plan to replace coal with gas, which, according to the CAT, will not be a solution, as both are fossil fuels.
According to the CAT, last week’s announcements to reduce methane and deforestation in Glasgow contribute little or nothing to the achievement of emission reductions, because many of the initiatives were already included in the targets announced by the countries.
Thus, according to Hare, it is unlikely that in the coming days countries will be able to improve their offers and actions to actually contain global warming. “The focus must be to come out with a robust process for the next few years.”
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