Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C target now unattainable, study finds

Global action to reduce fossil fuels is not moving fast enough to prevent dangerous climate change, according to a Global Carbon Budget study released Tuesday.

The Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels is now unattainable. This is what emerges from a study by the Global Carbon Project scientific team published Tuesday, December 5. While COP28 is currently being held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, “it now seems inevitable that we will exceed the 1.5°C target of the Paris Agreement” signed in 2015 during COP21, estimates Professor Pierre Friedlingstein, from the Global Systems Institute in Exeter, who led the study.

“Leaders at COP28 will need to agree on rapid reductions in fossil fuel emissions, even to maintain the 2°C target”, warns Pierre Friedlingstein. The report notes that emissions of fossil carbon dioxide (CO2) increased further overall in 2023. They amount to 36.8 billion tonnes in 2023, up 1.1% compared to 2022. However, in in certain regions, notably in Europe and the United States, fossil CO2 emissions are decreasing, by 7.4% in the European Union, and by 3% in the United States. Conversely, they are up 8.2% in India and 4% in China.

Scientists say global action to reduce fossil fuels is not fast enough to prevent dangerous climate change. And while emissions linked to land use change, such as deforestation, should decrease slightly, they remain too high to be offset by current levels of reforestation and the establishment of new forests. The report estimates that overall, total global CO2 emissions (fossils and land use change) will reach 40.9 billion tonnes in 2023, roughly the same level as in 2022.

At this rate, the Global Carbon Budget study estimates there is a 50% chance that global warming will exceed 1.5°C consistently in about seven years. Scientists emphasize “that the remaining carbon budget – and therefore the time remaining to reach the 1.5°C target and avoid the worst impacts of climate change – is rapidly running out”. Philippe Ciais, research director at the Climate and Environmental Sciences Laboratory and one of the co-authors of the study, believes that “all countries must decarbonize their economies much faster than they currently do to avoid the worst impacts of climate change”.

The Paris Agreement signed in 2015 set the goal of maintaining the increase in global average temperature “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and continue efforts “to limit the increase in temperature to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels”. To limit global warming to 1.5°C, greenhouse gas emissions must peak before 2025 at the latest and decrease by 43% by 2030.

The Global Carbon Budget study is produced by an international team of more than 120 scientists. It provides an annual, peer-reviewed update of the planet’s carbon footprint, based on established methodologies in a fully transparent manner.