Azul was born in April 2022 and, since then, I have written every year about the Emissions Gap Report. In this report, the United Nations environmental agency analyzes how the definition and delays of each country’s climate policies will influence the future of all of us on the surface of this increasingly hot planet. In 2022, 2023 e 2024the message was strictly the same and yet fundamental: we need to stop releasing carbon into the only atmosphere we have.
Every year, scientists return to tell us what political and economic decision-makers should already know. They are tireless: they redo countless calculations, participate in press conferences, write opinion articles, like the one Joana Portugal Pereiraco-author of the report, publishes this Thursday in Azul. I admire their perseverance.
This United Nations report constitutes a map of the path we have taken so far and what remains to be done (and at what pace) to reach a tolerable destination for the human species: limiting the rise in the global average temperature to well below 2 degrees Celsius, ideally around 1.5 degrees Celsius, as recommended by the Paris Agreement. For wise political and economic decision-makers, it should read like a treasure map. Or a fight for survivalas I wrote Carlos Antunes A few days ago in Azul, another scientist who never tires of reiterating, in other words, that carbon molecules are not governed by the laws of the market.
The document indicates that the current trajectory, in terms of global emissions, “will lead to a catastrophic temperature increase of 3.1 degrees Celsius” by 2100. To keep the hope of 1.5 degrees Celsius alive, countries will have to commit to reduce, in a joint and “immediate” effort, 42% of annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and 57% by 2035.
It is still technically possible to reach the 1.5 degrees Celsius target, according to the report. But not necessarily likely, if we consider that last year we reached a historic peak of 57.1 billion tons of emissions, which means an increase of 1.2% compared to the previous year. We are going backwards: we are back to the pre-pandemic growth rate.
Right now, all countries should be considering their new climate ambitions. In the formal language of the United Nations, this is called “nationally determined contributions” (NDC). In practice, it corresponds to a voluntary commitment by each nation (or bloc, in the case of the European Union) regarding the cut of greenhouse gas emissions it intends to make.
The announcement of the third round of climate ambitions should be made by February 2025, before the COP30which will take place in November in Brazil. It seems like just another step, but it will be the most decisive of them. The ideal, for us to comply with the famous Paris Agreement, is that NDC be as ambitious as possible. But there is also no point in having a boyfriend who swears of eternal love if, later on, the promises are empty. Both in climate and in love, promising is not enough. It is necessary to comply.
The authors of Emissions Gap Report emphasize that, if there is a lack of words or ambition, the goal of the Paris Agreement “will disappear within a few years”. And the planet will be exposed to an increase in the global average temperature of 2.6 to 3.1 degrees Celsius. Writing this is a nice way of saying that humanity – unequally, of course – will be exposed to more violent and frequent extreme climate phenomena: fires, heat waves, cyclones, storms, episodes of prolonged drought, etc. Time is running out, we don’t have many more years to wait for those in power to do what they should do, to be ambitious and to deliver on climate promises. And the cost of inaction is unbearable.
Repeating and reinforcing warnings year after year doesn’t seem to be working. Year after year, scientists insist on the same increasingly urgent appeal, always concerned not to cut the increasingly fragile thread that holds the (technically possible) chance of maintaining the 1.5 degrees Celsius target. What does it take to make your voices heard? Admit it’s already too late?
