Paris Agreement climate proposals need a boost to keep warming well below 2 °C

Intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) are a new strategy for mitigating climate change. Many international organizations and scholars have assessed the possibility of holding the increase in global average temperature to well below 2°C based on INDCs. Although the conclusions of these assessments are consistent, there are still large differences among the assessment results. For example, the global greenhouse gas emissions in 2030 estimated by INDCs are between 47.1–66.5 GtCO2 eq, and the temperature increase at the end of the 21st century estimated by INDCs is between 2.4–4.0°C; the inconsistency represented by these ranges is not conducive to an accurate assessment of the contributions of the current INDCs to global warming mitigation or to the further development of emissions reduction programs. By summarizing the existing studies, we found that the main reasons for the differences in estimates of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2030 made using INDCs are as follows: (1) The studies interpreted INDCs differently, which is attributable to three reasons: The studies (a) made different assumptions for the unquantifiable INDCs; (b) ignored or used different methods to estimate the emissions not covered by INDCs; and (c) used different amounts of INDCs because the studies were performed at different times. (2) The studies used different databases that include different greenhouse gases, accounting methods and data sources to estimate historical greenhouse gas emissions. (3) The studies used different methods for estimating greenhouse gas emissions and removals related to land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF). (4) The studies used different values of the global warming potential. Additionally, the main reasons for the differences in the predictions of the temperature increase at the end of the 21st century based on INDCs are as follows: (1) Differences in the estimations of greenhouse gas emissions in 2030 based on INDCs and (2) different methods of extrapolating global greenhouse gas emissions to 2100. There are three main extrapolation methods: one is to maintain the net present value of the carbon price in 2030 and then extrapolate the greenhouse gas emissions to 2100; another is to maintain the decarbonization rate of a certain period of history and then extrapolate the greenhouse gas emissions to 2100; the third is to match the emissions reduction scenario with the current INDC emissions reduction scenario from the IPCC AR5 scenario database and then use the matching emissions reduction scenario as the current INDC emissions reduction scenario. The use of different methods of extrapolating carbon emissions is one of the main reasons for the differences in the prediction results. (3) Differences in the methods for predicting the effects of greenhouse gas emissions on temperature. Statistical methods and simulation methods are the two main prediction methods; they use different calculation methods, which led to the difference in the prediction results. Therefore, the following points are worth noting: (1) Most importantly, to the extent possible, countries should submit absolute emissions reduction targets as much as possible; nonquantifiable INDCs without detailed methods descriptions and data introductions should not be submitted; (2) authorities should recommend certain data sets that are the most suitable for INDC accounting; (3) a global warming potential should be designated to avoid differences in greenhouse gas estimates due to the use of different criteria; and (4) to the extent possible, future research should adopt simulation methods for predicting the impact of global greenhouse gas emissions on temperature.

GHG Mitigation Potentials of Thailand’s Energy Policies to Achieve INDC Target

The role of renewable energy in achieving Turkey's INDC

Scientists welcome new global climate change pact

In the lead-up to the Paris Agreement, every country was invited to submit an intended nationally determined contribution (INDC), and indicate how it is fair. We analyse how countries have explained the equity of mitigation and adaptation in 163 INDCs, providing a bottom-up analysis of equity to complement a literature that has focused on top-down allocations. While no single indicator of equity was used by all INDCs, a menu of quantified indicators or tiered approaches could provide bounded flexibility across different national circumstances. The most common equity indicator used in mitigation INDCs is the country’s ‘small share’ of global emissions, followed by per capita emissions. The emissions of individual ‘small share’ INDCs add up to 24% of annual global emissions when using a consistent data set. Per capita emissions are used across a range of countries with low (0.5) to high (25 t CO2–eq per capita) values for that indicator. Adaptation is included in 89% of INDCs, of which more than half quantify impacts in some manner, and two-thirds use vulnerability as an equity argument. Broadly, we find that most claims to equity are either unsubstantiated or drawn from analysis by in-country experts. Only two INDCs refer to independent evidence, and none consider the consequences of their approach when applied to all countries. Given that the aggregate effect of INDCs will not be sufficient to keep global temperature increase well below 2 °C, and even less to keep temperature below a 1.5 °C rise, the INDCs have distributional implications. More rigorous information is needed to assess relative fair shares, which could be provided officially in future nationally determined contributions (NDCs). Absent improved information, it is likely that researchers and civil society will continue to assess informally what could be considered fair. A hybrid approach to equity—combining bottom-up assessment and top-down allocation—would be consistent with the hybrid architecture of the Paris Agreement, which comprises bottom-up elements such as NDCs and top-down elements such as global goals. Improved information on equity in NDCs will be an important input to the global stocktake ‘in the light of equity’.

(Korea's Multilateral Trade Polices in the Changing Global Trade Landscape)

By 15 December 2015, 187 countries had submitted their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) summarising their climate actions after 2020 in the context of the Paris Agreement. We used a unified framework to assess the mitigation components of INDCs covering 105 countries (representing approximately 91 % of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2012) with a special focus on the G20 economies. We estimated the required reduction effort by comparing the greenhouse gas emission targets implied by the INDCs with the projected levels resulting from current mitigation policies. The resulting projected global reduction effort amounts to approximately 4–6 GtCO2eq by 2030, of which the G20 economies are responsible for the largest share, in particular Brazil, China, the EU, and the United States. Despite these reductions, the global and G20 emission level is still projected to be higher in 2030 than it was in 2010. We compared the ambition levels of individual INDCs by analysing various indicators. Our analysis shows, for instance, that INDCs imply that greenhouse gas emissions of Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, and South Korea peak before 2025, and of China, India and South Africa by 2030 or later.

The tradeoffs between GHGs emissions, income inequality and productivity

To limit global warming to well below 2°C in accord with the Paris Agreement, countries throughout the world have submitted their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) outlining their greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation actions in the next few decades. However, it remains unclear what the resulting climate change is in response to the proposed INDCs and subsequent emission reductions. In this study, the global and regional warming under the updated INDC scenarios was estimated from a range of comprehensive Earth system models (CMIP5) and a simpler carbon-climate model (MAGICC), based on the relationship of climate response to cumulative emissions. The global GHG emissions under the updated INDC pledges are estimated to reach 14.2∼15.0 GtC/year in 2030, resulting in a global mean temperature increase of 1.29∼1.55°C (median of 1.41°C) above the preindustrial level. By extending the INDC scenarios to 2100, global GHG emissions are estimated to be around 6.4∼9.0 GtC/year in 2100, resulting in a global mean temperature increase by 2.67∼3.74°C (median of 3.17°C). The Arctic warming is projected to be most profound, exceeding the global average by a factor of three by the end of this century. Thus, climate warming under INDC scenarios is projected to greatly exceed the long-term Paris Agreement goal of stabilizing the global mean temperature at to a low level of 1.5‐2.0°C above the pre-industrial. Our study suggests that the INDC emission commitments need to be adjusted and strengthened to bridge this warming gap.

Until fairly recently, the main approach to getting business to respond to climate change has been top‐down efforts to regulate emissions and enact various forms of “carbon pricing.” The aim of such efforts has been to make businesses “internalize” the costs associated with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Governments are expected to set the environmental protection rules for companies in their respective countries, and markets are expected to adjust to the new regulations and carbon prices.But this classical approach to economic policy does not work when applied to a global “public goods” challenge like trying to limit the extent and effects of climate change. Instead of a top‐down approach, in which economic actors are forced to respond to regulations imposed on them, the Paris climate agreement of 2015 was reached using a bottom‐up approach centered on the concept of Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs)—along with a process that ended up encouraging the participation of all economic actors, not just governments.The authors provide an account of how the Paris agreement was reached, and why the “Portfolio Decarbonization Coalition” under the auspices of the United Nations is the most important of several private‐sector initiatives that are changing the way corporations operate. Thanks in large part to the PDC, investors can now undertake meaningful corporate governance action on climate change. With GHG emissions from a particular companies’ operations now much easier to measure, objective performance metrics on GHG emissions can now be set by boards and verified by shareholders. And current decarbonized indexes can be used as performance benchmarks for asset managers’ compensation, which can be tied to return outperformance relative to a “decarbonized” index.

A series of global actions have been made to address climate change. As a recent developed climate policy, Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) have renewed attention to the importance of exploring temperature rise levels lower than 2 °C, in particular a long-term limit of 1.5 °C, compared to the preindustrial level. Nonetheless, achieving the 2 °C target under the current INDCs depends on dynamic socioeconomic development pathways. Therefore, this study conducts an integrated assessment of INDCs by taking into account different Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). To that end, the CEEP-BIT research community develops the China’s Climate Change Integrated Assessment Model (C3IAM) to assess the climate change under SSPs in the context of with and without INDCs. Three SSPs, including “a green growth strategy” (SSP1), “a more middle-of-the-road development pattern” (SSP2) and “further fragmentation between regions” (SSP3) form the focus of this study. Results show that after considering INDCs, mitigation costs become very low and they have no evident positive changes in three SSPs. In 2100, a temperature rise would occur in SSP1-3, which is 3.20, 3.48 and 3.59 °C, respectively. There are long-term difficulties to keep warming well below 2 °C and pursue efforts toward 1.5 °C target even under INDCs. A drastic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions is needed in order to mitigate potentially catastrophic climate change impacts. This work contributes on realizing the hard link between the earth and socioeconomic systems, as well as extending the economic models by coupling the global CGE model with the economic optimum growth model. In C3IAM, China’s energy consumption and emissions pattern are investigated and refined. This study can provide policy makers and the public a better understanding about pathways through which different scenarios could unfold toward 2100, highlights the real mitigation and adaption challenges faced by climate change and can lead to formulating effective policies.

Analysis of the US’s intended nationally determined contribution (INDC) shows additional policies are likely to be needed for it to meet its promised emissions reduction target, and highlights where deeper cuts could be made. Current intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) are insufficient1 to meet the Paris Agreement goal of limiting temperature change to between 1.5 and 2.0 °C above pre-industrial levels2, so the effectiveness of existing INDCs will be crucial to further progress. Here we assess the likely range of US greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2025 and whether the US’s INDC can be met, on the basis of updated historical and projected estimates. We group US INDC policies into three categories reflecting potential future policies, and model 17 policies across these categories. With all modelled policies included, the upper end of the uncertainty range overlaps with the 2025 INDC target, but the required reductions are not achieved using reference values. Even if all modelled policies are implemented, additional GHG reduction is probably required; we discuss several potential policies.

A linear programming input–output model for mapping low-carbon scenarios for Vietnam in 2030

The goal of limiting global temperature rise to “well below” 2 °C has been reaffirmed in the Paris Agreement on climate change at the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21). Almost all countries submitted their decarbonization targets in their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and India did as well. India’s nationally determined contribution (NDC) aims to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions intensity of national GDP in 2030 by 33–35% compared to 2005. This paper analyzes how India’s NDC commitments compare with emission trajectories consistent with well below 2 °C and 1.5 °C global temperature stabilization goals. A top-down computable general equilibrium model is used for the analysis. Our analysis shows that there are significant emission gaps between NDC and global climate stabilization targets in 2030. The energy system requires significant changes, mostly relying on renewable energy and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. The mitigation costs would increase if India delays its abatement efforts and is locked into NDC pathways till 2030. India’s GHG emissions would peak 10 years earlier under 1.5 °C global temperature stabilization compared to the 2 °C goal. The results imply that India would need financial and technological support from developed countries to achieve emissions reductions aligned with the global long-term goal.

Rapid industrialization and urbanization in the 20th century have led to increasing volumes of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere[...]