The world is heading for a 2.5-2.9 degree Celsius temperature rise above pre-industrial levels if countries fully implement unconditional Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) made under the Paris Agreement in 2015, the 2023 Emissions Gap Report, released by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) says.
The report shows that progress has been made since the Paris Agreement’s long-term temperature goal to keep the rise in mean global temperature to well below 2 degree Celsius rise above pre-industrial levels and preferably limit the increase to 1.5 degree Celsius. Fully implementing conditional NDCs would lower the projected temperature to 2.5 degree Celsius, it said.
UNEP’s 2023 Emissions Gap Report calls for all nations to accelerate economy-wide, low-carbon development transformations. Countries with greater capacity and responsibility for emissions will need to take more ambitious action and support developing nations as they pursue low-emissions development growth, it said.
The report looks at how stronger implementation can increase the chances of the next round of NDCs, due in 2025, and the potential and risks of Carbon Dioxide Removal methods – such as nature-based solutions and direct air carbon capture and storage.
The Emissions Gap Report is UNEP’s spotlight report launched annually in advance of the annual Climate negotiations. This report comes days ahead of COP28 or the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference that is to be held from 30 November until 12 December 2023, at the Expo City, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
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The EGR tracks the gap between where global emissions are heading with current country commitments and where they ought to be to limit warming to 1.5°C. Each edition explores ways to bridge the emissions gap.
According to UN News, UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen presenting the report from Nairobi, said that no person or economy is being left untouched by climate change, underscoring the urgent need to “stop setting unwanted records on greenhouse gas emissions, global temperature highs and extreme weather.”
“We must instead lift the needle out of the same old groove of insufficient ambition and not enough action, and start setting other records: on cutting emissions, on green and just transitions and on climate finance,” she emphasized.
Read more: World way off tract to meet goals of Paris Agreement, says UN report
United Nations, Secretary-General António Guterres said, “The emissions gap is more like an emissions canyon – a canyon littered with broken promises, broken lives, and broken records.”
“All of this is a failure of leadership, a betrayal of the vulnerable, and a massive missed opportunity.”
Reiterating that renewables have never been cheaper or more accessible, he urged leaders “to tear out the poisoned root of the climate crisis: fossil fuels.”
Guterres called on countries to commit to phasing out fossil fuels with a clear time frame aligned to the 1.5°C limit, as well as for those that gave yet to do so, to announce their contributions to the Green Climate Fund and the new Loss and Damage fund to “get it off to a roaring start”, UN News said.
