With global temperature rise set to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, urgent and stringent cuts to greenhouse emissions are needed to minimize the magnitude and duration of this overshoot and to return to 1.5°C by the end of the century, a new report released by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on Wednesday has found.
“Renewables are now the cheapest source of new electricity in most of the world. Solar power deployment has grown seven times faster than expected a decade ago and climate policies are already showing results. Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP said every additional fraction of a degree and additional year of warming above 1.5°C increases climate impacts and risks.
The emissions gap is now a leadership gap and the world is running out of time and excuses to close it,” he said, calling for the G20 to lead on climate commitments and for governments to accelerate clean energy and electrification across every sector, adopting credible roadmaps to transition away from fossil fuel, cut methane emissions and reverse deforestation, among other key measures. Reacting to the projections on Wednesday, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change, Simon Stiell said the world still has tools to change course.
It also finds that if current policies continue, warming could reach 2.8°C within this century and increase thereafter.
Coming ahead of COP31 in Turkey next month, the “Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return” has looked at the ‘lowest possible’ 1.5°C overshoot scenario, in which peak warming by around the middle of the century is limited to 1.7-1.8°C and global temperature rise returns to or below 1.5°C by 2100, with a 50% chance.
