A Less Fragmented Approach
The UN must bring about greater international cooperation to realise Paris goals, according to Antoine Rostand, President and Co-founder of Kayrros.
As the leading global authority on the climate, the UN has played an outsized role in pushing countries to address climate change. The most well-known act in this respect was the creation of the Paris Agreement, the aim of which is to limit global warming to 1.5°C by 2050. As part of this, the UN mandates that countries should submit Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC), which outline their strategies to cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in line with the Paris goals.
The problem is that these commitments vary wildly in ambition. The EU and UK have both set stringent targets aligned with limiting global warming to 1.5°C. But other major emitters, such as China, have set goals or put in place policies that are woefully short of what’s required.
The upshot is that there’s a gross misalignment between the Paris Agreement and NDCs which, in theory, should together comprise our roadmap to get there. Consider one sobering statistic published by the World Economic Forum: even if every country were to implement their current climate pledges fully, the world would still be on track for a 2.4°C increase in global temperatures by the end of the century. In other words, success in respect of national climate goals is not success for the world. Rather, it would be catastrophic for the world.
And that is only if countries keep to their climate promises. Many don’t. For a variety of reasons – such as rising costs for individuals or political instability – some have considered rowing back. But the fact is, we don’t always know what countries are up to. We’re reliant on their own self-reporting to get a picture of where we are in the journey to combat the climate crisis. And you don’t have to be a cynic to acknowledge that countries, like companies or individuals, can – and do – lie. Even those countries committed to tackling methane emissions face the challenge of historically unreliable reporting mechanisms. Economic powerhouses, like the US, are in fact emitting far more than they believe they are, further distorting the reality of our fight against methane.
What’s the solution?
One is independent monitoring. We now have sufficiently sophisticated technology to track countries’ progress towards their climate goals and discrepancies in emissions reporting in close to real time. We call this Earth observation. By processing the terabytes of data captured every day by satellites, a vivid picture of the state of the planet comes into view.
Our recent study revealed that methane emissions from the 42 largest oil and gas producers were 16.1 times higher than reported, highlighting, in stark terms, the urgent need for robust, real-time, independent monitoring.
That information must lead to action, but it is half the battle. Independent monitoring can help us verify the effectiveness of initiatives like the Global Methane Pledge, which aims to reduce methane emissions by 30% from 2020 levels by 2030. We have found that, despite the pledge’s potential to avert over 0.2°C of warming by 2050, thanks to the potency of methane over a 20-year period, the overwhelming majority of those who have signed the pledge have, regrettably, failed to follow through on their commitments. Without technology, we might have found ourselves assuming the opposite – until it was too late.
Legislation also has a role to play. There must be clear and unified legislation to guide how technology is used. The kind of technology that monitors emissions, reports on deforestation rates and/or tracks the progress of the clean energy transition must be worked into a cohesive policy framework. This will ensure that good intentions on the part of countries translate into good outcomes. This is an often-overlooked feature of Earth observation tools: they are there, in the main, to guide us on our journey to net zero, not simply to call out bad actors. They have a positive function, in other words. They do not exist merely to ‘catch people out’.
That the UNFCCC is setting up a Recognition and Accountability Framework is a hugely promising development, reflecting the value in accurate and independent monitoring mechanisms as a means of galvanising collective action, accountability and due praise.
New York Climate Week, as well as the upcoming COP29, are important stages for the UN and its member states. They could use these major events to demonstrate their commitment to unified climate action. In the past, there have been plenty of conversations, discussions and commitments at events like these, and these have been valuable. But they must also now be about practically putting in place the means to monitor progress and bring accountability to the climate conversation. As New York Climate Week’s theme for the year puts it: It’s Time.
As unworkable as it may sometimes seem, the UN must strive to bring about greater international cooperation. We must remember that COP, for all its drawbacks, is an outstanding example of international collaboration that would not have been possible a few decades ago. If the UN could rally the countries of the world around its most important cause – addressing the climate crisis – then we could really start to make progress. As it is, we have excellent policies like the EU’s Nature Restoration Law, requiring countries to restore 20% of their land and marine areas by 2030, but we have other important regions where nothing remotely as comprehensive exists. This inconsistency in follow-through makes international agreements seem optional, to be honoured or not by whomever is currently in charge.
Encouraging every member state to adopt a legally binding net zero target is a start. Urging them to align their NDCs with the goal of limiting warming to 1.5°C is progress. The Global North must step up its financial and technical support to the Global South, and make sure that global climate action is fair and inclusive, as well as effective.
Objective, empirical data must be our sole guide to that action. We’ve witnessed vehement disagreement over the viability of the voluntary carbon market, with some suggesting that it is a form of avoiding direct value emissions reductions, and yet the data – our data, in fact – shows the VCM is working.
Ideology, utopianism and speculation have no place in the climate conversation. It is too important. We need to do what works, now.
By making use of the cutting-edge technology that we, as the planet’s most intelligent and creative species, have developed, we can begin to make up for the damage that we, as the planet’s most destructive species, have caused. We can bring transparency and accountability to the climate. We start to build a global culture of data-driven action. We can weed out bad actors and celebrate good ones. And we can mitigate the worst impact of climate change, together.
Let COP29 mark the start of this process. Let it be the COP that ends not solely with promises. Let this be the COP where global climate action really gets going.
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