Ten years ago today, during COP21, 196 nations agreed to limit warming “well below 2ºC” above pre-industrial levels and “pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C”. This Paris Agreement was hard won in negotiations through the cooperation of big polluters’ and the powerful campaigning of island nations. At the time, the media reported this momentous global commitment as the “signals that deniers have lost the climate wars”.
However, ten years on we are off track and on course for 2.6ºC of warming. So what’s going on?
Since the Paris Agreement we have seen $8.7 trillion invested in the oil and gas industry, the key driver of climate-nature breakdown. And despite claiming to be a world leader in decarbonisation, the UK still invests an estimated £17.5 billion in fossil fuel subsidies and support per year.
These statistics are a devastating sign that the Paris Agreement has failed to deliver its goal, with subsequent COP agreements refusing to even mention fossil fuels. To many this will come as no surprise, given that the global climate negotiations have been packed with fossil fuel lobbyists, who often outnumber entire countries’ delegations, and that they are even being hosted by petrostates and former oil executives.
And yet, despite the under delivery, the climate and biodiversity COPs remain the strongest international mechanism for accountability and collective action. In a period of geopolitical tension and increasing presence of climate skeptical political leaders, we need international cooperation and solidarity more than ever. Even though we are seeing ongoing investment in fossil fuels, airport expansions and continued deforestation, we have started to slow the curve. In 2015, the world was heading towards a catastrophic 4ºC of warming. And while we are right to ring the alarm bells, today’s projections of 2.6ºC demonstrates global progress and shows that collaboration can reduce warming if action follows words. Every degree of warming has devastating consequences, not just to more vulnerable nations in the global south, but here in the UK with impacts on food security, energy bills and increasing risks of wildfires and flooding.
It is precisely because of the devastating consequences to the UK, that we must play a leading role in delivering international agreements. The UK has played this role before when we introduced the 2008 Climate Change Act, when we became the first major economy to legislate for net zero in 2019. Now is the time for the UK to show leadership again by introducing a Climate and Nature Act to align national action to our international commitments on climate and nature.
The cost of inaction will cost everyone
Reports have suggested that the cost of inaction of climate change could cost the UK economy 3.3% of GDP by 2050, equivalent to £91bn to UK taxpayers. The cost of acting, on other hand, is projected by the Office of Budget Responsible to equate to less than £70 per person, per year. It’s not just the economy that suffers the consequences: already 38,000 deaths a year are attributable to air pollution and the rate of heat-related deaths has risen by 23% since the 1990s, reaching an average of 546,000 annual deaths between 2012 and 2021.
To find out more about the impacts of climate-nature breakdown on economy, health, nature, extreme weather and more watch the National Emergency Briefing talks here.
The climate targets of the Paris Agreement and the nature targets set in the Montreal Kunming Agreement are too essential to UK national security to be left as a voluntary international commitment. We can’t leave our futures to ‘a hope and a prayer’. The only way to hold the government accountable for action on climate and nature is to update our legislation with the Climate and Nature Bill.
It’s not too late, just.
Despite being on course for 2.6ºC of warming—and the UN Secretary-General calling the loss of the 1.5°C goal a moral failure—researchers have made evident that we still have an opportunity to stay within the Paris Agreement’s ambition. The pathway for UK contribution must start with adopting a Climate and Nature Act to ensure that we are legally bound to meet our nationally determined contribution, prevent offshoring our pollution and that we have a joined-up strategy to drive forward the action we need to see.
