Awareness is growing, but action is still far too timid to limit the dramatic consequences of climate change. On Thursday, October 24, two weeks before the 29th Conference of the Parties (COP29) in Baku, Azerbaijan, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) published its 15th Emissions Gap Report. "There is a direct link between increasing emissions and increasingly frequent and intense climate disasters. Around the world, people are paying a terrible price," warned Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary general, as the study was published.
According to the report, the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) is still far too high to limit the rise in global temperatures to below the thresholds set by the Paris Agreement in 2015 – "well below +2°C" and if possible to +1.5°C. In line with the scientific literature, UNEP predicts instead a warming of +3.1°C by the end of the century if Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs, the climate commitments defined by the states themselves) are not drastically strengthened. As a sign that the situation is getting worse, in 2023 the UN predicted a rise from 2.5°C to 2.9°C by 2100. "Ambition means nothing without action," warn the UN authors.
In terms of ambition, the majority of countries seem clear about the importance of the challenge. One hundred and one parties, representing 107 countries and covering some 82% of global GHG emissions have already made commitments to net zero emissions in the more or less long term (2050 for the European Union, 2060 for China). But things are moving far too slowly.
The report estimates that emissions linked to human activities rose by +1.3 % between 2022 and 2023, a higher rate than the average for the 2010-2019 decade (+ 0.8%). In 2023, all countries released 57.1 gigatons of CO2 equivalent. The energy sector remained the world's biggest contributor at 15.1 gigatons, followed by transport (8.4 gigatons), agriculture (6.5 gigatons) and industry (6.5 gigatons). Responsible for 2% of total emissions, aviation showed the strongest growth, 19.5% in 2023 compared with 2022 levels (against average annual growth of 3.1% from 2010 to 2019).
"We're depleting our carbon budget year after year, and humanity is definitely not on the right trajectory," said Swiss climatologist Sonia Seneviratne, professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and vice president of Working Group 1 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). "Carbon neutrality should be achieved by 2050 at the latest. To achieve this goal, the scientific scenarios assessed by the IPCC assume around 90% reduction in CO2 emissions. The transition is necessary in all sectors, and we're just beginning to see it in some areas."
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