An interactive
website with results for all G20 countries is available
at
www.mitigation-contributions.org
(October 26, 2015) Though
most countries around the globe agree that warming must be limited to 2 degrees
Celsius to avoid the raft of climate risks, they clash about who should do what
to reach this target. Hence the issue of allocating greenhouse-gas emissions
reductions will be key for the outcome of the world climate summit COP21 in
Paris. Scientists now found what amount of emissions reductions it takes for a
major economy to lead out of the climate gridlock. They conclude that
effectively limiting climate change is possible if a major economy acts as a
forerunner, while other nations follow – and, importantly, by doing so they do
not have to agree on common criteria for fairness.
“If either the European Union or the US would pioneer and
set a benchmark for climate action by others, the negotiation logjam about fair
burden sharing could be broken,“ lead author Malte Meinshausen from the Potsdam
Institute for Climate Impact Research and the University of Melbourne says.
“Our analysis shows that they would have to roughly double their current
domestic 2030 emissions reductions targets – which would certainly require
substantial efforts. Yet it seems to be one of the few options to stay on track
for eventually limiting warming below 2°C and fend off a drastic increase of
weather extremes and sea-level rise.“