UNEP’S 2022 REPORT ON EMISSIONS: CURRENT EFFORTS ARE INSUFFICIENT AND WILL PUSH TEMPERATURE RISE TO 2.8°C
The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) published the 2022 Emissions Gap Report one week before the start of COP27.
The Emission Gap Report 2022 analyzes the gap between estimated greenhouse gas emissions in 2030 if countries implement the mitigation commitments outlined in their national commitment plans (the so-called Nationally Determined Contributions or NDCs) and the global emission levels needed to keep global temperatures below 2°C or preferably 1.5°C, as required by the Paris Agreement. This difference between "where we are likely to be and where we should be" is known as the emissions "gap."
TOWARDS COP27: THE ACTUAL SITUATION
Climate diplomacy is back on track, and in a week's time we will see delegates, technicians, ministers and civil society representatives flying to Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, to open COP27 a little less than a year after the disappointing ending for most of Britain's COP26 in Glasgow. What will set off will be a peculiar COP. Initially conceived as a time for updating and comparing governments' climate goals with respect to COP26 with a specific focus on adaptation, in fact COP27 will be above all the first climate conference since the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, a testing time for many Western countries caught between climate ambition and high utility bills.
CIVIL SOCIETY TOWARDS COP27 HUMAN RIGHTS MUST BE AT THE HEART OF LOSS AND DAMAGE
The 27th Conference of the Parties (COP27) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), will begin in just over a week, and the Egyptian chair, government representatives, technical experts, scientists, and civil society are preparing for another round of negotiations. Finding solutions for joint action on climate is dramatically urgent, but unfortunately the Parties seem to be showing no signs of breaking the stalemate created on key issues such as Losses and Damages and Climate Finance.
COP15 BIODIVERSITY: THE GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY AGREEMENT IS STILL NOT READY. MOVING TOWARDS A FIFTH NEGOTIATING SESSION
At the end of June, what was to be the fourth and final session of preparatory negotiations was held in Nairobi with a view to concluding COP15 at the end of 2022. In fact, after the March interim negotiations in Geneva, delegates had decided to schedule an additional negotiating session before COP15, held in Nairobi from June 21-26, 2022, further pushing back the closing date of COP15.