When we last met at the very ambition-less SBs to discuss how to deliver ambition through the vehicle of the Mitigation Work Program (MWP),we were not in a good place.
In Bonn and in the 5 months since then, ECO has noticed something quite strange: it seems that instead of focusing on ways to narrow the massive ambition and implementation gap, Parties have been playing at the broken telephone game.
For those who don’t know, the game is quite easy: The first player conveys a message to the second player, who then repeats the message to the third player, and so on. The last player on the line then has to announce out loud the message they heard to the entire group.
So, in the MWP telephone chain, Science is the first player putting forward the message, a very clear message: We are not on track. We have just received the NDC Synthesis and Emissions Gap reports, which have painted a very stark warning to the world. The remaining carbon budget to stay within 1.5°C is shrinking and we are on a trajectory for as much as a 2.8°C warmer world. Our total emissions in 2030 are currently on track to be approximately the same as in 2019, but instead we need to be cutting emissions by 8 per cent a year to be in line with science and the Paris Agreement. Meanwhile the oil and gas industry has garnered USD $2.8 billion a day in pure profit for the last 50 years.
This message has been clearly understood by civil society who, instead of whispering, is screaming: WE ARE NOT ON TRACK. Clearly, ambition for 2030 is not on track and the MWP must be a vehicle through which to get it back on track.
The 2030 ambition gap is not only sizable, but shameful. This trajectory will worsen impacts and will cause further injustice. For an approximately 50 per cent chance of limiting warming to 1.5°C this century, it’s estimated the gap amounts to 23.9 Gt CO2 eq.
But then something happens and the message starts getting distorted when it reaches Parties. Some countries envision the MWP as an opportunity to re-open the principles of the Paris Agreement and others as a mere talk shop for one or two years. The decisiveness of this decade is lost in the telephone chain.
ECO loves playing games but is also not a big fan of those who try to distort such an important message. So Parties, let’s focus and make sure to bring science’s correct messages to the table and act on them! Let’s have an ambitious MWP that is connected to the pre-2030 annual ministerials, that offers a sectoral-based approach to rapid decarbonization that can lead the world to transition away from the fossil fuel era, and that reflects equity, justice and fair shares, based on the principles of CBDR-RC.