Majority of nations miss Paris climate target deadline

Years after
signing a landmark Paris Agreement, nations are still
far off-track from preventing severe global warming as more than half of world’s countries, once again, failed
to submit their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) by year’s end to reduce their greenhouse gas
emissions, straggling behind the schedule of accelerated climate ambitions set
out in eminent climate deal.

According to United Nations, only 70 out of nearly 200 nations had filed updated agendas as of January 1, with many countries blaming the delays on the
COVID-19 pandemic.

The biggest disappointment as per climate advocates was World’s largest emitter, China, who despite President Xi Jinping’s ambitions to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060 and tall claims to attain net-zero output this century, failed to formally submit proposals by new year’s eve.

Another notable
omission is the world’s second largest emitter, the United States, which was
yanked out of the Paris Agreement by Donald Trump.

Incoming
President-elect Joe Biden, however, had pledged carbon neutrality by 2050 and a
return to Paris commitments.

Meanwhile, UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, in his new year’s message, said that building a global coalition
for net zero emissions by mid century would be the “central ambition”
of the world body in 2021.

“Every
government, city, business and individual can play a part in achieving this
vision,” he added in his speech.

The UN has
estimated that emissions need to be cut by 7.6% a year till 2030 if there is to be a hope of limiting heating to 1.5 degree Celsius.

According to the latest estimations by Climate Action Tracker, the 49 states that had
submitted their new proposals by mid-December, including the then
27 member nations of the European Union, only represented 23.7% of global greenhouse
gas emissions.

While the trackers also found that revised
commitments by many member nations were merely a revision of prior commitments with Brazil, Japan, Russia, New Zealand, Switzerland and
Vietnam being the case in point.

Meanwhile, as many as 20 more states have filed their plans, including South Korea and Argentina after the assessment.

However, the NDCs submitted on time will now come under the scrutiny of the UN Convention on Climate
Change, which will assess progress on February 21.

The picture may
become clearer only later in the year, at a major UN climate meeting in Glasgow
that has been postponed to November.

David Waskow,
International Climate Director at the World Resources Institute, said there had
been some “important headway” made on climate action in recent weeks,
particularly with upgraded 2030 targets from Britain and the EU.

“A number of
major emitters still need to come forward with greater ambition, especially to follow-through
on their net-zero commitments with 2030 targets that match their long-term
vision. This year will be a critical test.”

Almost every
country on the planet signed up to the 2015 Paris deal, which calls for capping
global warming at “well below” two degrees Celsius compared to
pre-industrial levels, and 1.5 Celcius if possible.