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Journalism of Courage
A new report from the UN Environment Programme says even if all countries strictly adhered to their current pledges to cut down greenhouse gas emissions,it would still not be enough to keep the global average rise in temperatures to below 2 degree Celsius compared to pre-industrial times,as is required to avoid catastrophic impacts.
The report,released at the climate change conference here,says if all the emission reduction targets were met,the annual global emission of greenhouse gases in 2020 would be about 49 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent.
This is about 5 billion tonnes more than what science says is the level where the annual emission should be in 2020 if there has to be any chance of keeping the temperature from rising above 2 degrees Celsius.
The current annual global emissions are estimated to be about 46 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent.
If the pledges are implemented in a lenient fashion,annual emissions in 2020 could rise to 53 billion tonnes while business-as-usual scenario would take it to about 56 billion tonnes,the report says.
The report is based on the pledges made by countries in the Copenhagen Accord in the Danish capital in December last year.
The report says it was entirely feasible to bridge the 5-billion tonne gap through some more ambitious actions by countries.
The results from integrated assessment models suggest that it is possible to reach emission levels where there is no gap,using mitigation measures that are economically and technologically feasible, it says.
