The Emissions Gap Report 2021: The Heat Is On, released October 26, reveals that current pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and rein in global warming still put the world on track to warm by 2.7 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels by the end of the century.
Aiming for “net-zero emissions” by midcentury — a goal recently announced by China, the United States and other countries, but without clear plans on how to do so — could reduce that warming to 2.2 degrees C. But that still falls short of the mark, U.N. officials stated at a news event for the report’s release.
Despite these dire warnings, “the parties to the Paris Agreement are utterly failing to keep [its] target in reach,” said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres. “The era of half measures and hollow promises must end.”
The new U.N. report comes at a crucial time, just days before world leaders meet for the 2021 U.N. Climate Change Conference, or COP26, in Glasgow, Scotland. The COP26 meeting — postponed from 2020 to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic — holds particular significance because it is the first COP meeting since the 2015 agreement in which signatories are expected to significantly ramp up their emissions reductions pledges.
Aiming for “net-zero emissions” by midcentury — a goal recently announced by China, the United States and other countries, but without clear plans on how to do so — could reduce that warming to 2.2 degrees C. But that still falls short of the mark, U.N. officials stated at a news event for the report’s release.
Despite these dire warnings, “the parties to the Paris Agreement are utterly failing to keep [its] target in reach,” said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres. “The era of half measures and hollow promises must end.”
The new U.N. report comes at a crucial time, just days before world leaders meet for the 2021 U.N. Climate Change Conference, or COP26, in Glasgow, Scotland. The COP26 meeting — postponed from 2020 to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic — holds particular significance because it is the first COP meeting since the 2015 agreement in which signatories are expected to significantly ramp up their emissions reductions pledges.
