Climate pledges leave emissions cuts short of the 1.5°C pathway
Current national policies point to 2.8°C of warming by 2100, while delivering all climate promises would lower that projection to 2.1°C, according to the UN's latest assessment. [6] Its lowest-overshoot pathway requires emissions to fall 18% by 2030 from 2025 levels, compared with the 5–8% reduction expected under countries' pledges, followed by large-scale carbon removal. [6][8]
Why it matters
The gap is between two different futures, not simply between promises and compliance: even full delivery of current pledges would leave warming above 1.5°C. Bringing temperatures back down would also depend on carbon removal at a scale whose feasibility remains unproven. [6][8]
Key insights
- The near-term benchmark is an 18% emissions cut by 2030, but current pledges deliver only 5–8%; the required 2035 cut is 45%, against pledged reductions of 11–15%. [2][6][8]
- Even the lowest-overshoot scenario reaches 1.7–1.8°C before offering a 50% chance of returning to 1.5°C by 2100. [6]
- The US had the largest emissions increase among G20 countries last year; the report links its increase largely to renewed coal burning. [4][8]
- The carbon-removal requirement cited in the assessment is 320 gigatonnes, equivalent to eight years of global carbon emissions, with delivery at that scale unproven. [8]