Emissions Gap Report 2024: No more hot air … please!

The Emissions Gap Report is UNEP's annual institutional series report that is launched in advance of the annual climate negotiations. The Emissions Gap Report tracks the gap between where global emissions are heading with current country commitments and where they ought to be to limit warming to well below 2°C and pursuing 1.5°C in line with the Paris Agreement temperature goals. Each edition explores ways to bridge the emissions gap, tackling specific issue(s) of interest and relevance to the negotiations each year.

The 2024 edition of UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report shows how much higher nations must aim. To get on a least-cost pathway for 1.5°C, emissions must fall 42 per cent by 2030, compared to 2019 levels. For 2°C, emissions must fall 28 per cent by 2030. Looking out to 2035 – the next milestone after 2030 to be included in NDC targets – emissions must fall 57 per cent for 1.5°C and 37 per cent for 2°C.

As greenhouse gas emissions rose to a new high of 57.1 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2023, the cuts required from today are larger; 7.5 per cent must be shaved off emissions every year until 2035 for 1.5°C. Current promises are nowhere near these levels, putting us on track for best-case global warming of 2.6°C this century and necessitating future costly and large-scale removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to bring down the overshoot.

However, this report shows that it remains at least technically possible to get on a 1.5°C pathway. Increased deployment of solar photovoltaic technologies and wind energy could deliver 27 per cent of the total emission reduction potential in 2030 and 38 per cent in 2035. Action on forests could deliver around 20 per cent of the potential in both years. Other strong options include efficiency measures, electrification and fuel switching in the buildings, transport and industry sectors.

To deliver, we would need a whole-of-government approach, measures that maximize socioeconomic and environmental co-benefits while reducing trade-offs, and a minimum six-fold increase in mitigation investment – backed by reform of the global financial architecture and strong private sector action. G20 nations, particularly the largest-emitting members, would need to do the heavy lifting, as they dominate the world economy.

Essentially, we would need global mobilization on a scale and pace never seen before – or at least not following a global conflict. Many will say this is impossible. But to focus solely on whether it is possible misses one crucial point: the transformation to net-zero economies must happen, and the sooner this global transformation begins the better. Every fraction of a degree avoided counts in terms