Earth Today | Countries failing
Report notes need for deeper greenhouse gas emission cuts to meet 1.5 target
Published:Thursday | December 4, 2025 | 12:08 AM
IN THE decade since the historic Paris Agreement was inked, heralding new arrangements for solutions to the climate crisis, there has been progress on limiting global warming. The problem is that it has not been nearly enough.
The latest Emissions Gap report of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) reveals that there are still many miles to go, if the world is to have any real chance of preventing a rise in global temperatures above 1.5 degrees Celsius, as provided for in the Paris Agreement.
Under the global accord, countries committed to “holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels” and to “pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, recognising that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change”.
Ten years on, however, far more needs to be done, with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions – which fuel the warming of the planet – showing a 2.3 per cent increase in 2024 over 2023 levels.
“The 2.3 per cent increase in total GHG emissions from 2023 levels is high compared with the 2022–2023 increase of 1.6 per cent. It is more than four times higher than the annual average growth rate in the 2010s (0.6 per cent per year), and comparable to the emissions growth in the 2000s (on average 2.2 per cent per year),” noted the UNEP report titled Off Target.
“The increase is occurring in all major sectors, and all categories of GHGs. However, despite the key role of fossil fuels in driving total emissions, deforestation and land-use change was decisive for the rapid increase in 2024 emissions. Global net land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) CO2 emissions increased by 21 per cent in 2024, and were responsible for 53 per cent of the overall increase in global GHG emissions,” the report added.
“There are significant uncertainties in estimates of net LULUCF CO2 emissions, and the large increase in 2024 was likely exacerbated by climatic conditions. Fossil CO2 increased by 1.1 per cent and was responsible for 36 per cent of the increase in global GHG emissions,” the publication said further.
DO BETTER
The 2025 publication suggested that developed countries must do better – as should fast developing countries.
“GHG emissions of the G20 members, excluding the African Union, account for 77 per cent of global emissions and increased by 0.7 per cent in 2024. Many countries outside of G20 also showed significant increases in emissions in 2024. Of the six largest emitters of GHGs, the European Union was the only one to decrease emissions in 2024. The highest absolute increase in total GHG emissions, excluding LULUCF, was observed in India and China, while Indonesia recorded the fastest relative growth in emissions. It should be noted that current, per capita and historic emissions differ across G20 members and world regions and should be considered along with contributions to global emissions,” it said.
One way to give the matter the priority, it needs, the report said, is to prioritise the scale up of nationally determined contributions, which are individual country commitments that are provided for through the Paris Agreement.
“Despite the Paris Agreement requirement to submit new NDCs by February 2025, only 64 parties covering 63 per cent of global GHG emissions had submitted or announced new NDCs by the cut-off date for this report of September 30. Sixty of these contain mitigation targets for 2035. Only 13 parties covering less than one per cent of global GHG emissions have updated their 2030 targets as part of their new NDCs. Overall, NDCs have become modestly more robust over time, but at nowhere near the pace needed, and the new NDCs have done little to accelerate progress,” the report said.