November 30, 2024
Remember the Paris Climate Agreement?
In 2015, at the UN Climate Change Conference, 196 nations agreed to binding reductions in CO2 emissions. The goal was to hold “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and pursue efforts “to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.”
In recent years, climate experts have stressed the need to limit global warming to 1.5°C by the end of this century. That’s because the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has concluded that crossing the 1.5°C threshold risks unleashing far more severe climate change impacts, including more frequent and severe droughts, heatwaves and rainfall.
To limit global warming to 1.5°C, greenhouse gas emissions must peak before 2025 at the latest and decline 43% by 2030.
So… how are we doing?
Well, emissions from fossil fuels are up eight percent since 2015, and CO2 emissions are expected to hit a record 37.4 billion metric tons this year, a 0.8% percent increase over 2013.
Discuss.