The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has warned that the world remains far from achieving the Paris Agreement’s temperature goals, with current national climate commitments showing only marginal progress toward limiting global warming.
The sixteenth edition of the Emissions Gap Report, released ahead of the COP30 climate conference in Belem, Brazil, finds that global warming projections over this century are now between 2.3 and 2.5 degrees Celsius if all Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are fully implemented. Under current policies, the projected rise is 2.8 degrees Celsius.
Last year’s projections were between 2.6 and 2.8 degrees under NDCs and 3.1 degrees under current policies. However, UNEP noted that part of the improvement — about 0.1 degree — results from methodological changes, while the upcoming withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Agreement will offset another 0.1 degree. This means that the new pledges have done little to alter the overall climate trajectory.
UNEP said that to meet the Paris Agreement targets of limiting global warming to well below 2 degrees and pursuing efforts to stay below 1.5 degrees, global annual emissions must be reduced by 35 percent and 55 percent respectively by 2035, compared with 2019 levels. The report warns that, given the limited time and current political challenges, global temperatures will very likely exceed the 1.5-degree threshold within the next decade.
The report stresses the need for urgent and deep emission reductions to minimize climate-related risks, reduce costs, and lessen dependence on uncertain carbon removal technologies. It also highlights that every fraction of a degree of avoided warming translates into lower losses for people and ecosystems.
Despite the bleak outlook, UNEP points to positive developments. Since the Paris Agreement was adopted nearly a decade ago, temperature predictions have declined from 3–3.5 degrees to the current 2.3–2.8 degree range. Rapid advancements in renewable energy technologies — particularly in wind and solar power — have driven down deployment costs and expanded access to low-carbon solutions.
UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen emphasized that while national climate plans have delivered some progress, it remains far from sufficient. “We still need unprecedented emissions cuts in an increasingly tight window, with an increasingly challenging geopolitical backdrop,” she said.
To accelerate progress, UNEP calls for greater financial and technological support for developing countries and a redesign of the global financial architecture to make climate action more equitable and effective.
The report concludes that the tools and technologies to achieve rapid emission reductions already exist. What is needed now, it says, is the political will to deploy them at scale and speed to prevent catastrophic climate impacts later this century.
Baburajan Kizhakedath