Plans submitted by world's top polluters won't limit global warming to the 2-degree Celsius threshold recommended by the United Nations, according to the Climate Action Tracker (CAT), a tool developed by a consortium of four European research organizations.
In a report released last week at climate talks in Bonn ahead of the U.N. climate conference in Paris, the consortium said that pledges of emissions reductions--Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs)--submitted by 29 governments as of Sept. 1 must be significantly strengthened. Further reductions of 12-15 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent are needed by 2025 and another 17-21 gigatons by 2030.
The projections are based on CAT's analysis of 15 of the 29 INDCs. Of those 15 INDCs, covering 64.5 percent of global emissions, the analysis finds only 2 (those of Ethiopia and Morocco) are "sufficient." Those of Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea and Russia are "inadequate," and those of China, the European Union, Mexico, Norway, Switzerland, and the United States are "medium," that is, consistent with the target.
"It is clear that if the Paris meeting locks in present climate commitments for 2030, holding warming below 2°C could essentially become infeasible, and 1.5°C beyond reach. Given the present level of pledged climate action, commitments should only be made until 2025," said Bill Hare of Climate Analytics, one of the CAT consortium members. "The INDCs therefore need to be considerably strengthened for the period 2020-2025."
The CAT report also found that "in most cases" countries didn't have policies in place to reduce emissions to match their INDCs for 2025. China and the European Union were the exceptions.
The world has already warmed up by 0.8 C--nearly half the 2 C target--and, according to CAT, is on track for 2.9-3.1 C of warming by 2100.
Bonn Talks Conclude
At climate talks in Bonn, Germany, delegates agreed to give two co-chairs of the talks permission to move forward on shrinking down a lengthy draft deal slated to be negotiated at the Conference of the Parties, November 30 to December 11, in Paris. That deal would commit all nations to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
"At this session, countries have crystalized their positions and have requested the co-chairs to produce a concise basis for negotiations with clear options for the next negotiating session in October," said Ahmed Djoghlaf, co-chair of the Ad Hoc Working Group of the mandate. "This means that we will arrive in Paris on time without too much turbulence--not before, not later."
Delegates will start line-by-line negotiations on the next draft in Bonn, Oct. 19. Major sticking points are how much pollution will be cut and exactly how much money rich nations will offer to help poorer countries deal with their growing energy and climate adaptation needs.
U.N. Study Examines Global Deforestation Rates
The amount of forest lost across the world in the last 25 years encompasses an area nearly the size of South Africa (about 500,000 square miles) and has resulted in the release of 17.4 billion tons of carbon, according a new United Nations report, which used self-reported data from 234 countries and territories. It finds the biggest losses from deforestation and forest degradation, which are known to increase the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, are in Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia.
Even so, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) found that the rate of loss has slowed from 0.18 percent annually in the early 90s to 0.08 percent yearly since 2010. Globally, it notes, natural forest area is decreasing, and planted forest area is increasing.
"FRA 2015 shows a very encouraging tendency towards a reduction in the rates of deforestation and carbon emissions from forests and increases in capacity for sustainable forest management," said FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva. "The direction of change is positive, with many impressive examples of progress in all regions of the world."
FAO pointed to agriculture as the main driver of deforestation in the tropics. "The place to start and the place to finish in many ways is the agriculture story," said Kenneth MacDicken, an FAO senior forestry officer (subscription). "We need to boost intensification of food production on less land, and it's really market forces that drive food production. If the price goes high enough, people will take more risks."
Some challenged the U.N. findings, disputing the data used to arrive at them and claiming that deforestation rates have actually increased 62 percent during the study time period.
The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University's Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.