The Earth is heating up faster and the nations must collectively commit to cut 42% of annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and 57% by 2025, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) suggested. 

According to a new UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report, greenhouse gas emission cuts are needed to get on track for 1.5°C. 

The UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report 2024: No more hot air … please! finds that a failure to increase ambition in these new Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and start delivering immediately would put the world on course for a temperature increase of 2.6-3.1°C over the course of this century. This would bring debilitating impacts to people, the planet and economies.

The 2.6°C scenario is based on the full implementation of current unconditional and conditional NDCs. Implementing only current unconditional NDCs would lead to 2.8°C of warming. Continuing with current policies only would lead to 3.1°C of warming. Under these scenarios – which all operate on a probability of over 66 per cent – temperatures would continue to rise into the next century. Adding additional net-zero pledges to full implementation of unconditional and conditional NDCs could limit global warming to 1.9°C, but there is currently low confidence in the implementation of these net-zero pledges.

“The emissions gap is not an abstract notion,” said António Guterres, UN Secretary-General, in a video message on the report. “There is a direct link between increasing emissions and increasingly frequent and intense climate disasters. Around the world, people are paying a terrible price. Record emissions mean record sea temperatures supercharging monster hurricanes; record heat is turning forests into tinder boxes and cities into saunas; record rains are resulting in biblical floods. 

“Today’s Emissions Gap report is clear: we’re playing with fire; but there can be no more playing for time. We’re out of time. Closing the emissions gap means closing the ambition gap, the implementation gap, and the finance gap," he said. 

The report also looks at what it would take to get on track to limiting global warming to below 2°C. For this pathway, emissions must fall 28 per cent by 2030 and 37 per cent from 2019 levels by 2035 – the new milestone year to be included in the next NDCs. 

“Even if the world overshoots 1.5°C – and the chances of this happening are increasing every day – we must keep striving for a net-zero, sustainable and prosperous world. Every fraction of a degree avoided counts in terms of lives saved, economies protected, damages avoided, biodiversity conserved and the ability to rapidly bring down any temperature overshoot,” Guterres said. 

The report shows that there is technical potential for emissions cuts in 2030 up to 31 gigatons of CO2 equivalent – which is around 52 per cent of emissions in 2023 – and 41 gigatons in 2035. This would bridge the gap to 1.5°C in both years, at a cost below US$200 per ton of CO2 equivalent.

Increased deployment of solar photovoltaic technologies and wind energy could deliver 27 per cent of the total reduction potential in 2030 and 38 per cent in 2035. Action on forests could deliver around 20 per cent of the potential in both years. Other strong options include efficiency measures, electrification and fuel switching in the buildings, transport and industry sectors. 

This potential illustrates it is possible to meet the COP28 targets of tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030, doubling the global average annual rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030, transitioning away from fossil fuels, and conserving, protecting and restoring nature and ecosystems.

However, delivering on even some of this potential will require unprecedented international mobilization and a whole-of-government approach, focusing on measures that maximize socioeconomic and environmental co-benefits and minimize trade-offs. 

The G20 members, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union, are responsible for the bulk of total emissions, must do the heavy lifting. However, this group is still off track to meet even current NDCs. The largest-emitting members will need to take the lead by dramatically increasing action and ambition now and in the new pledges. 

The report said that the G20 members, excluding the African Union, accounted for 77 per cent of emissions in 2023. The addition of the African Union as a permanent G20 member, which more than doubles the number of countries represented from 44 to 99, brings the share up by only 5 per cent to 82 per cent – highlighting the need for differentiated responsibilities between nations. 

[Disclaimer: This story is a part of ‘Punascha Pruthibi – One Earth. Unite for It’, an awareness campaign by Sambad Digital.]