A new UN report “shows that the world is on a catastrophic path towards a warming of 2.7 degrees Celsius,” said UN Secretary General António Guterres on Friday. The report assessed the national climate protection commitments of 191 countries under the Paris Agreement.
Preferably, the Paris Agreement of 2015 should limit warming to 1.5 degrees compared to the global temperature level before industrialization. To this end, the emission of greenhouse gases such as CO2 should be significantly reduced. If this goal is not achieved, there is a risk of “massive loss of human life and livelihoods,” warned Guterres on Friday.
The new UN report comes to the conclusion that, based on the national targets, global emissions will be 16 percent higher by the end of the decade than in 2010. “The total numbers of greenhouse gas emissions are moving in the wrong direction,” said UN- Climate chief Patricia Espinosa.
Biden: “We’re running out of time”
Actually, every country should revise its national contribution under the Paris Agreement by the end of 2020. By the end of July this year, only 113 countries had delivered. With these new commitments, emissions from this group, which also includes the US and EU, would decrease by 12 percent by 2030 compared to 2010. That is a “glimmer of hope” that could not change the “gloomy” overall picture, said Espinosa.
Guterres urged the governments to be more ambitious for the World Climate Conference COP26, which begins in Glasgow, Scotland, in six weeks’ time. “It is time for the heads of state and government to stand up and act, otherwise people in all countries will pay a tragic price,” he said.
US President Joe Biden joined this appeal on Friday: “We have to bring our most ambitious goals to Glasgow,” said Biden. “The time is running out”.
Last month the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that the global average temperature in 2030 will be over 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels – a decade earlier than forecast three years ago.
