 EU ready to 'strengthen cooperation' with Paris accord partners Brussels (AFP) Nov 5, 2019 - The European Union is ready to "strengthen cooperation" with the other parties to the Paris climate accord, which it views as still solid despite the US pull-out, the bloc's climate commissioner said Tuesday. The agreement "has strong foundations and is here to stay," commissioner Miguel Arias Canete said on Twitter. "The EU with our partners stand ready to strengthen cooperation with all parties to implement it," he said. Arias Canete was the EU's chief negotiator in Paris in December 2015 to seal the historic deal. The EU affirmation came a day after the United States gave formal notification that it was following through with President Donald Trump's 2017 order to withdraw from the Paris agreement, to be effective in a year's time. "We regret the US notification to withdraw from the Paris agreement," European Commission spokeswoman Mina Andreeva told reporters in Brussels. She too said the EU would work with its partners towards the greenhouse gas mitigation goals set out in the accord, including "with stakeholders and entities in the US". "Our door and the door to the Paris agreement remain open," she said, adding that there was still hope that the United States would return to supporting the accord.
Last month hottest October on record: EU climate service Globally, temperatures were 0.69 degrees Celsius (1.25 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the average October from 1981 to 2010, and 0.01 C warmer than the previous record holder, October 2015. This is equivalent to 1.2 Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the Copernicus Climate Change Service said in a statement. September was also a record-breaking month, and July was the hottest since temperature records began. "With continued greenhouse gas emissions and the resulting impact on global temperatures, records will continue to be broken in the future," Copernicus head Jean-Noel Thepaut said in July. The EU data showed that temperatures were above average across most of Europe last month, and "markedly above average" in parts of the Arctic, the eastern parts of the United States and Canada, the Middle East and much of North Africa and Russia. However, temperatures were below average in the western parts of the United States and Canada, parts of tropical Africa and Antarctica. Twenty of the last 22 years have been the hottest on record, according to the UN World Meteorological Organization. Three special reports from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in the last year have detailed dire consequences if humanity fails to cap global warming, including deadly heat waves, flooding and storm surges amplified by rising seas. Last month, scientists released new climate models showing that greenhouse gases are warming Earth's surface more quickly than previously thought. The models suggested average temperatures could spike to between 6.5 and 7.0 Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2100, if emissions continue unabated.
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More than 11,000 scientists warned Tuesday of "untold suffering" due to global warming, even as another team said Paris carbon-cutting pledges are "too little, too late".
The European Union, meanwhile, confirmed that last month was the warmest October ever registered, fast on heels of a record September and the hottest month ever in July.
Three-quarters of national commitments under the Paris climate accord to curb greenhouse gases will not even slow the accelerating pace of global warming, according to a report from five senior scientists.
The sobering assessment came a day after President Donald Trump formally notified the United Nations of the US withdrawal from the 2015 Paris climate pact, triggering concerns of how other nations might react.
"With few exceptions, the pledges of rich, middle-income and poor nations are insufficient to address climate change," said Robert Watson, who chaired both the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the UN's science body for biodiversity.
"As they stand, the pledges are far too little, too late."
In parallel, more than 11,000 scientists sounded a five-bell alarm in the peer-reviewed journal BioScience, noting that the world had failed to act on global warming despite the accumulation of evidence over 30 years.
"We declare, clearly and unequivocally, that planet Earth is facing a climate emergency," the statement said.
Emissions of the gases warming Earth's surface must drop 50 percent by 2030 and to "net zero" -- with no additional carbon entering the atmosphere by mid-century -- if the Paris treaty's goal of capping warming at 1.5 to 2.0 degrees Celsius is to be met, the IPCC concluded last year.
And yet 2018 saw unprecedented global carbon pollution of more than 41 billion tonnes, two percent higher that 2017, also a record year.
Global temperatures have increased 1 C above pre-industrial levels -- enough to boost the impact of deadly heatwaves, floods and superstorms -- and are on track to rise another two or three degrees by the end of the century.
"Failing to reduce emissions drastically and rapidly will result in an environmental and economic disaster," said James McCarty, a professor of oceanography at Harvard University, and co-author of the analysis of voluntary Paris pledges to reduce carbon pollution.
Just over half of greenhouse gas emissions from power, industry, agriculture and deforestation -- the main drivers of global warming -- came from four nations last year: China, the United States, India and Russia.
Accounting for 13.1 percent of the total, the US has turned its back on the Paris deal.
"China and India could say 'damn it, we're going to demonstrate to the world that we are climate leaders'," Watson told AFP.
- EU gets passing marks -
"Or they could say 'if the US is not going to do it, we're not going to either'. It could go either way."
China has said it will lower carbon intensity and peak emissions by about 2030.
But the size and staggering growth of its economy will likely overwhelm such marginal improvements, the scientists said.
At 29 percent of the global total, China alone pumps out more CO2 than the next three nations combined, though about 13 percent of those emissions are generated by exports destined for rich nations, recent research has shown.
India, which is ramping up both renewable energy and carbon-intensive coal-fired power, accounted for seven percent in 2018, and Russia -- which has made no pledge at all -- added 4.6 percent.
The efforts of the world's top four emitters was deemed "insufficient", according to the report.
All told, nearly three-quarters of 184 registered pledges were judged inadequate to stop climate change from continuing to accelerate in the next decade.
All but a handful are unchanged since being submitted in 2015 and 2016.
Among major economic blocs, only the European Union, with its 28 member states, got a passing mark.
"The EU is clearly in the lead in trying to address the climate crisis," Watson said.
The emissions of the world's poorest nations have been and continue to be negligible, but steps must be taken today to shape their energy futures.
"Sooner or later, they will start to grow, and we don't want them to become dependent on cheap fossil fuel energy," Watson noted.
"They need financial and technical assistance."
Under the Paris treaty, developing nations are to receive $100 billion annually from next year to help curb climate change and cope with its impacts.
Related Links
Climate Science News - Modeling, Mitigation Adaptation
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