Today, Parties will get to hear both the urgency of the crisis as well as the feasibility of achieving a 1.5°C pathway straight from the horse’s (or in this case scientist’s) mouth at the SBSTA-IPCC special event on the SR1.5. While ECO does not want to steal the IPCC’s thunder, ECO did want to highlight a few key points from the report.
The scale of the task is clear: the world needs to halve CO2 emissions in little more than a decade and achieve net-zero emissions by mid-century. This will mean a rapid phasing out of fossil fuels and a transition to a 100% renewable energy future. If the world were to follow the P1 pathway it would mean close to an 80% reduction in coal use below 2010 levels by 2030, with significant cuts in oil and gas are well. Time is of the essence for Parties to strengthen their NDCs and mid-century emission reduction development strategies, accordingly!
In terms of ECO’s question on how to respond to the SR1.5, ECO hopes that the SBSTA chair listens closely to the present by the IPCC and delivers as thorough a summary report as the Chair developed for the last SBSTA-IPCC special event held in May 2016. This report should feed into the Talanoa Dialogue and its outcome.