As global climate challenges intensify, a clear and actionable path to averting climate catastrophe remains elusive.
The United Nations has urged nations to update their commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, outlining specific steps over the next decade to achieve definitive climate outcomes.
This call to action follows a new UN report released Thursday, which emphasizes that only a "quantum leap in ambition" will suffice to make meaningful progress as the world stands poised to exceed all global warming targets.
A Motivational Push
The "Emissions Gap" report, an annual assessment of global climate trajectories, serves as a motivational call to world leaders and policymakers. The report critically analyzes current warming projections based on existing policies, while identifying the additional measures required to meet climate goals.
UN Report Editor Anne Olhoff stated, “Each passing year without action places us in a worse position.”
At present, cumulative national pledges, many of which depend on external funding, position the Earth on a warming trajectory of around 2.6°C by century’s end. This far surpasses the targets set in the 2015 Paris Agreement, which committed nations to keep warming "well below" 2°C, with a more ambitious target of 1.5°C.
Raising Ambitions
The report indicates that if nations were to fully meet both their long-term net-zero pledges and their national targets, warming could potentially be limited to 1.9°C. Yet, the actions necessary to make these targets achievable remain unimplemented.
In her forward to the report, Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme, warned that without a "massive increase in ambition" in upcoming pledges, the 1.5°C target would soon be out of reach, replaced by a 2°C threshold.
Many scientists argue that the 1.5°C target—a benchmark for avoiding the most severe consequences of global warming—may already be unattainable. Nonetheless, limiting warming remains crucial, as incremental temperature increases are expected to intensify global disasters.
According to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, global monthly temperatures have now exceeded pre-industrial levels by 1.5°C for 14 consecutive months.
With the next round of national commitments, or Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), scheduled for submission early next year, there is an expectation that these will include fresh measures and targets for 2035.
