Over 100 nations have issued new commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions ahead of the United Nations Conference of the Parties, or COP26, currently underway in Glasgow, Scotland.
Over 100 nations have issued new commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions ahead of the United Nations Conference of the Parties, or COP26, currently underway in Glasgow, Scotland.
A new analysis published today in the journal Science assessed those new pledges, or nationally determined commitments (NDCs), and how they could shape Earth’s climate. The study’s authors find the latest NDCs could chart a course where limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) and under within this century is now significantly more likely.
Under pledges made at the 2015 Paris Agreement, the chances of limiting temperature change to below 2 and 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100 were 8 and 0 percent, respectively.
Under the new pledges—and if those pledges are successfully fulfilled and reinforced with policies and measures of equal or greater ambition—the study’s authors estimate those chances now rise to 34 and 1.5 percent, respectively. If countries strike a more ambitious path beyond 2030, those probabilities become even more likely, rising to 60 and 11 percent, respectively.
Read more at DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Photo Credit: catazul via Pixabay
