Climate Chief, Christiana Figueres, announced Tuesday that the climate change deal to be voted on in Paris in December won’t be able to determine a global carbon price.
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With the negotiations in Paris just weeks away, many people want to understand what these targets add up to and whether this action is enough to limit global warming to the goal we have all been aiming for – below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. The target is based on reports presented by the science community.
He says the challenge for Paris will be the 0.7-degree “gap”, making sure commitments don’t allow the Earth’s temperature to increase more than 2 degrees by next century.
Figueres’ Secretariat did not formally project a likely temperature rise by 2100, because most INDCs only stretch to 2030 but she said indications from independent analysis showed the pledged reductions would limit temperatures rises at 2.7 degrees.
For instance, China pledges to cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by 60 to 65 percent from the 2005 level by 2030, and peak its emissions by around 2030.
At the same time, “much greater emissions reductions efforts…will be required” to meet the two degrees Celsius endorsed by the United Nations 195-nation climate body, it added.
Although it is promising that so many countries have pledged to reduce emissions, the Paris agreement is far from being settled.
“INDCs are reducing the rate of growth of emissions marginally, but this is not sufficient to keep the world on a safe temperature rise trajectory”.
Next month, Fabius will host a ministerial meeting in Paris from 8-10 November, with the actual two-week climate summit kicking off on 30 November. Because not enough countries agreed to it, however, it never became legally binding. Instead, the administration is seeking a mechanism within an agreement ensuring that countries meet frequently to stiffen subsequent targets.
A key finding of the United Nations reports is that the INDCs will bring down per capita emissions by 9% by 2030. However, the official said his does not mean that the agreement will be ineffective.
Joeri Rogelj of the global Institute for Applied Systems Analysis said that their study introduced an important new concept which helps them understand how major countries could still assume a leadership role on this highly fragmented playing field.
National pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions, even if fully implemented, would cap global warming at 3 degrees Celsius rather than the 2 degrees targeted to avoid unsafe consequences, the European Commission said on Monday.
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The final agreement is expected to contain few specific numbers, in part to enable US President Barack Obama to impose regulatory measures to curb emissions in the world’s second largest polluting economy without the need to seek approval in the hostile Republican-dominated Senate. Responding to the release of the UNFCCC’s Synthesis of the INDCs report, Samantha Smith, leader of the WWF Global Climate and Energy Initiative said, “The commitments represent a broad and significant dent in what’s needed to fight climate change”.
