The draft «cover decision», the final version of which must be agreed by consensus of nearly 200 countries at the Glasgow summit, was published on Wednesday, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson headed back to the talks as they entered their final days.
Scientists have warned that keeping temperature rises to 1.5C, beyond which the worst impacts of climate change will be felt, requires global emissions to be cut by 45% by 2030, and to zero overall by mid-century – but countries’ plans for this decade leave the world well off track.
The draft is published after analysis warned existing plans for this decade put the world on track for 2.4C of warming – well above the goals internationally agreed in the Paris accord to curb temperature rises to «well below» 2C and try to limit them to 1.5C.
COP26 president Alok Sharma has made it clear that there is no attempt to renegotiate the Paris Agreement, but the draft document says the impact of climate change will be much lower with 1.5C of warming than 2C.
And it «resolves to pursue efforts to limit temperature rises to 1.5C» which will require more action in this decade.
The draft urges countries to «revisit and strengthen» the targets for cutting emissions by 2030 in their national plans to align them with the Paris temperature goal, which still covers both numbers, by the end of 2022.
The document also urges countries to set out long-term strategies by the end of next year to reach net-zero emissions by about mid-century.
Alongside the political decision, negotiators are also trying to hammer out agreement on technical parts of the Paris Agreement, including common timeframes for national commitments on emissions reductions and agreed ways for countries to report on their progress, to help turn pledges into action.
There are also negotiations on providing adaptation finance and to address the issue of loss and damage.
