Earth Nowhere Near Where It Needs to Be to Avoid Catastrophic Climate Change

The United Nations Environmental Programme reported in its latest emissions gap report that new Paris Agreement climate pledges have only slightly lowered global temperature projections for this century. The planet, according to the report, is still on track for catastrophic climate events and damages. 

“Unfortunately, we're really nowhere near meeting the targets and the commitments that we've set globally or as the US … to stay under 1.5°C or to even stay under 2°C,” says Patrick Drupp, Sierra Club's climate policy director. “It's sobering to see how far off we are.”

The planet’s projected temperature, based on full implementation of nationally determined mitigation goals, now ranges between 2.3°C and 2.5°C above preindustrial levels. This compares to last year’s projections of between 2.6°C and 2.8°C. However, the authors attribute a 10th of a degree of the change to methodological updates, and another will be canceled out after the Trump administration withdrew the United States from the Paris Agreement in January. 

The report’s findings offer a grim reminder of the stakes for climate action as delegates attend this year’s COP30 climate conference in Brazil. Drupp says that the lack of participation from the United States in COP30 is a major setback. “The US has a unique role. And if we're doubling down on fossil fuels and stepping back from making difficult choices [and] taking difficult actions, that gives a permission structure for the rest of the world to do it too.”

Total greenhouse gas emissions increased by 2.3 percent from 2023 to 2024, which was high compared with a 1.6 percent increase between 2022 and 2023. The increase occurred across all major sectors and all types of greenhouse gas emissions, but the greatest driver was global net land use, land-use change, and forestry, which contributed to 53 percent of the overall emissions increase. Of the six largest emitters—India, China, the Russian Federation, Indonesia, the US, and the European Union—only the EU reduced emissions. 

Another report out last week from researchers at the Global Carbon Project confirmed that global leaders have so far failed to achieve enough policy changes that would draw down greenhouse gas emissions. According to the report, fossil fuel emissions will hit record levels in 2025. 

The Paris Agreement required participants to submit new nationally determined contributions by February 2025, but only 64 parties covering 63 percent of global GHG emissions submitted or announced new NDCs by the cut-off date for the report.

Drupp says that even if we can’t make 1.5° or even 2°, it’s not a reason to give up. “Every 10th of a degree matters,” he said. Not meeting goals “doesn't mean that we just shouldn't try," he says. "Because staying under 3° or 2.5° or eventually getting back down below 1.5° will matter. And it means lives; it means economies. It means averting all sorts of different terrible climate risks and climate disasters.”