After a drop due to the Covid-19 pandemic, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have started to rise again and are now at record levels, putting the climate objectives of the Paris Agreement at risk, says a report by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) published on Thursday 16 September.
“Throughout the pandemic we have heard that we must build back better to set humanity on a more sustainable path (...) This report shows that so far in 2021 we are not going in the right direction”, said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas.
According to the report, which was produced with the participation of several organisations such as the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), concentrations of the main GHGs - carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) - continued to rise in 2020 and the first half of 2021. The UN therefore fears that the world is reaching a point of no return.
“Unless there are immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, limiting warming to 1.5°C will be impossible, with catastrophic consequences for people and the planet on which we depend”, said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
In his view, the 26th UN Conference of the Parties on Climate Change (COP26) - to be held in Glasgow from 31 October to 12 November - must be a turning point.
Guterres urges all countries to set a target of zero net emissions by 2050 and to present “clear and credible long-term strategies to achieve this”. Currently, countries that have committed to achieving net zero emissions by 2050 account for about 63% of global emissions.
See the report: https://bit.ly/3Chn7wr (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)