Download COP21 climate pledges add up to 2.7°C warming – UN

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COP21 climate pledges add
up to 2.7°C warming – UN
Pledges submitted before Paris mark a significant departure from business as usual
warming, but focus is now on ratcheting up ambition
T
he United Nations
Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC)
has completed its analysis of
country pledges on climate
mitigation, or Intended Nationally
Determined Contributions (INDCs),
in advance of the COP21 Paris
climate conference, and found that,
combined, they could result in a
world average 2.7°C of warming
on pre-industrial levels. Such a
level of warming is above the
accepted 2°C target, but is a marked
improvement from the 4–6°C
possible outcome if emissions rose
unchecked.
The synthesis report from the
UNFCCC secretariat analyses all the
INDCs that were submitted by
1 October this year. The secretariat
was positive about the report’s
findings, highlighting the potential
impact of cumulative action.
However, it and others also
stressed the need for ambitions to
be ratcheted up after Paris to put
the world onto a 2°C pathway.
According to the report the
aggregate impact of INDCs would
result in a fall in per capita
emissions over the next 15 years
– by 8% in 2025 and 9% in 2030.
‘Fully implemented, these plans
together begin to make a
significant dent in the growth of
greenhouse gas emissions: as a
floor they provide a foundation
upon which ever-higher ambition
can be built,’ said Christiana
Figueres, Executive Secretary of the
UNFCCC. ‘I am confident that these
INDCs are not the final word in
what countries are ready to do and
achieve over time – the journey to
a climate safe-future is underway
and the Paris agreement to be
inked in Paris can confirm, and
catalyse that transition.’
The report assesses INDCs
covering 146 countries – all
developed nations and threequarters of the developing
countries that fall under the
UNFCCC treaty. Around 86% of
global greenhouse gas emissions
are covered by the INDCs in the
report.
‘The INDCs have the capability
of limiting the forecast
temperature rise to around 2.7°C
by 2100, by no means enough but a
lot lower than the estimated four,
five, or more degrees of warming
projected by many prior to the
INDCs,’ said Figueres.
The UNFCCC report isn’t the
only analysis of INDC pledges. In a
World Energy Outlook special
briefing the International Energy
Agency (IEA) found that if all
countries meet the goals outlined
in a slightly larger group of
submitted pledges, growth in
energy-related emissions (which
account for two-thirds of total
greenhouse gas emissions) would
slow to a ‘relative crawl’ by 2030. ‘The fact that over 150 countries
– representing 90% of global
economic activity and nearly 90%
of global energy-related
greenhouse gas emissions – have
submitted pledges to reduce
emissions is, in itself, remarkable,’
said IEA Executive Director Fatih
Birol.
The IEA report finds that with
INDC measures global energy
intensity – a measure of energy
use per unit of economic output
– would improve to 2030 at a three
times faster rate than that seen
since 2000. It also finds that in the
power sector 70% of additional
electricity generation to 2030
would be low carbon.
The full implementation of the
pledges will require the energy
sector to invest $13.5tn in energy
efficiency and low carbon
technologies from 2015 to 2030, an
annual average of $840bn, says the
IEA.
Depending on the methods and
model used, 2.7°C wasn’t the only
estimate given for the cumulative
effects of INDCs – Climate
Interactive put the aggregate
outcome at 3.5°C. There are error
bars around both of these
estimates. A United Nations
Environment Programme
Emissions Gap report puts the INDC
outcome at between 3 and 3.5°C
and quantifies the gap in emissions
needed to reach a cost-effective 2°C
pathway – around 12–14
gigatonnes of carbon dioxide by
2030.
Some were positive about the
INDC news, highlighting the fact
The UNFCCC and
others stressed
the need for
ambitions to be
ratcheted up
after Paris to put
the world onto a
2°C pathway
that, despite 2°C not being
achieved, the INDCs mark a good
start. Others were more critical. ‘It
should come as no surprise that
the aggregated effect of the INDCs
falls short of the global target of
limiting global warming to two
degrees,’ said Hæge Fjellheim, a
Senior Analyst in the Point Carbon
team at Thomson Reuters. ‘The
report clearly illustrates the
weakness of the bottom-up
approach, where all countries bring
forward their contributions in a
global climate potluck. There is
currently no link between the
global target and the mitigation
efforts undertaken by individual
countries.’
It is hoped that, under any
agreement, INDCs will be revisited
and revised at five-year periods,
and France and China recently
made a political agreement that
this should be the case.
For more on climate change and COP21 see
page 20.
Gas replaces coal in US power plant
Siemens is to supply the power island for Panda
Power Funds’ 1.1 GW Hummel Station gas-fired
combined cycle power plant in Pennsylvania, US.
The facility, due to become operational in early
2018, will supply power for Philadelphia and
New York City.
The new plant, to be fueled with shale
gas from the Marcellus field and located near
Shamokin Dam in Snyder County, Pennsylvania,
will occupy the site of the recently retired
Sunbury coal-fired power plant (pictured).
Siemens will deliver the power island consisting
of three gas turbines, one steam turbine, three
air-cooled generators, one hydrogen-cooled
generator and the control system.
Photo: Panda Power Funds
Energy World | December 2015 3