Contributors: Laura Millan Lombrana and Jess Shankleman
Updated on February 1, 4:30 AM EST
What You Need To Know
More than 100 countries have pledged to get to net-zero emissions in the next 30 years, according to the U.K.-based nonprofit Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit. China, the world’s biggest polluter, has a 2060 goal. The stakes are high. Failure could result in the Earth warming so much that it effectively becomes unlivable for dozens of species of plants, animals, and millions of human beings.
Officially, members of the net-zero club are working hard to make good on their Paris commitments. Two of them—Bhutan, the most forested country on Earth, and Suriname—are already carbon neutral. For bigger economies, the transition will be more complicated, encompassing deep reforms fraught with political tensions. The global public needs simple benchmarks to gauge progress over the next five or 10 years, without waiting to check final results at mid-century.
“Some announcements coming from governments sound positive on net zero for 2050, but that’s 30 years from now,” said Greenpeace International’s executive director Jennifer Morgan. “Often times these commitments hide that there are no clear benchmarks or binding laws to achieve the targets—too often it’s more of an excuse to continue with destructive practices.”
Bloomberg Green’s Carbon Benchmark series analyzes how countries pledging to zero out emissions plan to reach that target. We’ll look into the challenges of getting there and feature the technologies that will make it possible.
To Zero Out Emissions, Chile Must Rethink Its Forestry Industry
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Japan’s Green Future Requires Returning to Its Nuclear Past
By The Numbers
Over 100
The number of countries that have pledged to be carbon neutral by 2050
25% to 50%
The amount human emissions need to fall by 2030 to limit warming to levels outlined in the Paris Agreement
7%
The decrease in carbon emissions last year as coronavirus lockdowns halted entire industries and cities
Why It Matters
As world leaders prepare for the next major round of climate talks this year, it’s time to take stock of how they’re doing on their promises. The signatories of the Paris Agreement are required to update their 2015 commitments and issue more ambitious pledges.
A sense of urgency is building among citizens, companies and politicians—and rightly so. Record heat, biodiversity loss, extreme weather and ice melting matching scientists’ worst-case scenarios all point to the same conclusion: humanity is losing the fight against global warming.
Scientific models show that human emissions need to fall between 25% and 50% through 2030 to limit warming to levels outlined in the Paris accord—below 2º Celsius above pre-industrial levels, or preferably 1.5°C. Carbon emissions fell a record 7% last year as coronavirus lockdowns halted entire industries and cities.
Shorter-term measures are an important way to judge if world leaders are delivering on their net-zero pledges. “Making the promises of what we will do by 2050 is not good enough,” said Inger Andersen, executive director at the United Nations Development Program. “We need to see the UN’s conventions translated into real action plans into what we do in 2021, 2022 and 2023, up until 2050.”
bloomberg.com
