As climate impacts intensify globally, the Emissions Gap Report 2024: No more hot air … please! finds that nations must deliver dramatically stronger ambition and action in the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions or the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C goal will be gone within a few years. The report is the 15th edition in a series that brings together many of the world’s top climate scientists to look at future trends in greenhouse gas emissions and provide potential solutions to the challenge of global warming.
What’s new in this year’s report?
The report looks at how much nations must promise to cut off greenhouse gases, and deliver, in the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), due for submission in early 2025 ahead of COP30. Cuts of 42 per cent are needed by 2030 and 57 per cent by 2035 to get on track for 1.5°C.
A failure to increase ambition in these new NDCs and start delivering immediately would put the world on course for a temperature increase of 2.6-3.1°C over the course of this century. This would bring debilitating impacts to people, planet and economies.
It remains technically possible to get on a 1.5°C pathway, with solar, wind and forests holding real promise for sweeping and fast emissions cuts. To deliver on this potential, sufficiently strong NDCs would need to be backed urgently by a whole-of-government approach, measures that maximize socioeconomic and environmental co-benefits, enhanced international collaboration that includes reform of the global financial architecture, strong private sector action and a minimum six-fold increase in mitigation investment. G20 nations, particularly the largest-emitting members, would need to do the heavy lifting.
The future of our planet is at stake. We are in the midst of a climate emergency, and the window to act is closing fast. The 2024 UNEP Emissions Gap Report highlights the stark choices we face: limit global warming to 1.5°C, struggle to adapt to 2°C, or face catastrophic consequences at 2.6°C and beyond. There are three possible futures based on our collective action—or…
