The Emissions Gap Report
Are the Copenhagen Accord Pledges Sufficient?
This report, published by UNEP, tackles the question whether the Copenhagen Accord are sufficient to limit global warming to 2 °C or 1.5 °C. The Emissions Gap Report informs governments and the wider community on how far the response to climate change has progressed over the past 12 months, and thus how far the world is on track to meet wider goals. In particular, the report addresses the following questions: - What 2020 emission levels are consistent with the 2° C and 1.5° C limits? - What are the expected global emissions in 2020? - How big is the “emissions gap”? - How can the gap be reduced?
The majority of results in this report show that emissions in 2020 expected from the Copenhagen Accord pledges are higher than emission levels consistent with a “medium” or “likely” chance of staying below 2° C and 1.5° C. At the same time they also show that the range of 2020 emission levels from the Copenhagen Accord pledges tends to be consistent with model results that have “likely” temperature increases of 2.5° C to 5° C up to the end of the twenty-first century.
However, this does not mean that a 2° C goal is infeasible. In order to bring emissions in line with model results that meet a 2° C limit, there is a need to not only implement current pledges fully, but also to raise the ambition of those pledges and lay the groundwork for faster and deeper reductions of post 2020 emissions. Going further in the short term and achieving stronger cuts to lower levels in 2020 would leave open more possibilities to meet temperature limits and would allow more flexibility in choosing a post 2020 pathway for global emissions.