Yesterday I was struck by a set of graphics that helped me see an old story in a new light. That was not a particularly important old story, as history of the planet goes; but it gave the manufacturing consent theme a new shine–in technicolor, black and white, and finer shades of gray. Today, on a story that is definitely of historic proportions related to the planet, my thanks again to Brad Plumer and his occasional writing partner Nadja Popovich, especially for its accompanying graphics:
The World Still Isn’t Meeting Its Climate Goals
Three years after nearly 200 countries signed a landmark climate agreement in Paris, they are still far off-track from preventing severe global warming in the decades ahead. This month, diplomats from around the world are gathering in Katowice, Poland, to discuss stepping up their efforts.
It’s an enormous challenge. Under the Paris deal, every nation volunteered a plan to curtail its greenhouse gas emissions between then and 2030. But many large emitters aren’t even on track to meet their self-imposed targets, according to new data from Climate Action Tracker.
What’s more, even if every country did manage to fulfill its individual pledge, the world would still be on pace to heat up well in excess of 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) over preindustrial levels, the threshold that world leaders vowed to stay “well below” in Paris because they deemed it unacceptably risky.
Right now, current pledges put the world on pace for around 3 degrees Celsius of warming this century. To reach the broader Paris goals, countries would have to dramatically accelerate the transition toward clean energy over the next 12 years. But, with global emissions on pace to rise sharply this year, time is running short.
“It is plain we are way off course,” said António Guterres, the secretary general of the United Nations, in a speech in Katowice this week. “We are still not doing enough, nor moving fast enough, to prevent irreversible and catastrophic climate disruption.”
Under the Paris Agreement, former President Barack Obama pledged to slash United States emissions 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. That was already a tough task: While pollution from the country’s power plants is falling rapidly as utilities retire coal plants in favor of cleaner natural gas and renewables, sectors like transportation and heavy industry have proven harder to clean up.
But President Trump has disavowed the Paris agreement altogether and is now moving to dismantle Obama-era climate regulations like efficiency standards for cars and light trucks. And while some states, including New York and California, are pursuing their own policies on renewable energy and electric vehicles, they may not prove sufficient to close the gap…
Read the whole story here.
Organikos 