(Glasgow) After the agreement reached on the wire by nearly 200 countries on Saturday in Glasgow, the world must act very quickly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and move away from “catastrophic” global warming , warn scientists and politicians.
At the end of two weeks of negotiations carried out day and night until the last second, almost all the nations of the planet have agreed on a compromise to accelerate the fight against the rise in temperatures.
But while each additional tenth of a degree has major consequences, the decisions of this “Glasgow Pact” will not lead to a warming limited to 1.5 ° C compared to the pre-industrial era, the most ambitious goal of the Paris Agreement, which in 2015 laid the foundations for climate action.
“The climate catastrophe is still knocking on the door,” warned UN boss Antonio Guterres. “We have kept +1.5 ° C within our reach […] but the pulse is weak ”, declared the president of the COP26, the Briton Alok Sharma.
“Global emissions must decrease, immediately, quickly, with absolute urgency”, while they continue to increase, pleaded Joeri Rogelj, of Imperial College London, believing that “science had never been so present in the decisions of a COP ”.
Shut down coal-fired power stations
Glasgow, the cradle of the coal-fueled industrial revolution, will nevertheless remain the city where for the first time at the highest level, after 26 conferences, the words “fossil fuels” and “coal”, which designate the main causes of global warming, will have been used. lying on the paper.
“It is coming very late but it is really welcome,” commented Chris Littlecott, energy transition specialist at the E3G think tank. “2021 saw the shutdown of the coal financing tap, the COP26 opened a new chapter, that of accelerating the retirement of existing coal-fired power stations”.
Finally, to name coal and oil was painful, India and China succeeding at the last moment, in the very room where the final hammer blow was to resound, to further attenuate the formulation in “reduction” instead of ” out ”of the coal, prompting a tearful Alok Sharma to apologize to the world.
This shift in China came after it announced on Wednesday a surprise agreement with the United States, the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases after it. President Joe Biden, who attacked his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at the start of the COP for his absence in Glasgow, must have a video conference with him on Monday.
“Indescribable suffering”
“Beijing must in the near future keep the promises of the Glasgow Climate Pact by setting a date for the end of coal on its territory,” said Byford Tsang, E3G.
“The way in which countries will forge new cooperation to achieve faster actions over the next 12 months will be the real Glasgow passing exam”, sums up E3G, recalling the other promises of COP26 on the reduction of methane emissions , a powerful greenhouse gas, on deforestation, the financing of fossil fuels.
“If countries and in particular large emitters stick to their policies of small steps and ‘business as usual’, they will condemn current and future generations to a world of indescribable suffering and damage,” warns the UCS (Union of Concerned Scientists).
Suffering already experienced by the poorest countries, the least responsible for global warming but on the front line facing its impacts and which fought in Glasgow to obtain specific funding for their “losses and damages”.
They reluctantly gave in, agreeing to continue the dialogue so as not to lose the progress on the fight against global warming.
“We have always known that Glasgow was not the finish line,” US envoy John Kerry said on Saturday evening.
Twelve months separate Scotland from Egypt, where the 27e Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Climate Change Convention (COP).