10 years later, countries are still missing Paris Agreement deadlines

When the 2015 Paris Agreement was inked nearly a decade ago, it marked a consensus, agreed to by nearly all the countries in the world, that global temperature rise should be limited to well below 2 degrees Celsius over preindustrial levels. But the treaty hinges on those almost 200 countries periodically submitting goals outlining just how much they’ll individually cut emissions in the coming years, and then following through. Although the Paris Agreement didn’t stipulate a formal accountability mechanism, these plans — called Nationally Determined Contributions, or NDCs, and submitted every five years — were envisioned as catalysts that would signal national priorities, guide policy, and match the ambition required by the rapidly approaching 2-degree target. 

Ten years on, however, that ambition is lagging. The vast majority of countries missed a February deadline to submit updated NDCs, and many now appear likely to miss a September deadline, too. Roughly 50 countries have formally submitted their third NDCs — the first two were due in 2015 and 2020 — and 50 or so made announcements about their new emissions targets at the climate summit during the United Nations General Assembly last week. (Many of the latter have not yet formally submitted their NDCs.)

But even those commitments that have come in on time don’t appear likely to substantially move the needle on global temperature rise. According to one preliminary analysis by the World Resources Institute, a nonprofit that tracks NDC pledges, the new plans so far would only reduce emissions by 2 gigatons — just 10 percent of what experts say is needed to stay on track for the 2-degree threshold.  

“Compared to what would be required for a path that keeps to the goals of the Paris Agreement, they’re largely insufficient,” agreed Joeri Rogelj, a professor of climate science and environmental policy at Imperial College London who studies NDCs. 

At last week’s U.N. summit, Chinese president Xi Jinping announced that the country would reduce emissions 7 to 10 percent by 2035, plus expand its deployment of renewable energy by a factor of six. The country, which is currently the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter, has seen its emissions plateau in the last few years. Experts view the target as one that China will easily be able to reach, given that its transition to renewable energy is already proceeding at an unprecedented pace; some have argued that slashing 30 percent of its emissions is both necessary and feasible. (Although President Xi Jinping announced a new target at the summit, China has not yet formally submitted an NDC.)

Two of the world’s largest historical emitters, the United States and the European Union, arrived at this year’s summit with their climate commitments in question. Last year, then-president Joe Biden’s administration submitted an updated NDC touting emissions reductions that would be achieved by climate legislation recently passed by a Democratic majority in Congress, which was poised to cut emissions by up to 66 percent of peak levels by 2035. But in the months since, President Donald Trump has reversed course by repealing most of that legislation, making moves to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, and telling world leaders that climate change is a “con job.” At the summit last week, he warned countries that “if you don’t get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail.” 

Meanwhile, the European Union, which has long been setting ambitious climate targets, has been mired in its own internal politics. Countries within the union have been split on how ambitious their 2035 target should be, as well as the role of carbon offsets. The EU has submitted a statement of intent promising to have an updated NDC by COP30, the annual climate conference taking place in Belem, Brazil, later this year, and agreed to include reductions between at least 66 and 72 percent by 2035. At the summit, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the group “is working on a 2040 target of a proposed 90 percent emission reduction.”

Rogelj, the climate science and policy professor, chalked up the EU’s delayed formal commitment to the challenges of making deeper emissions cuts and a rightward shift in local politics.

“As the easier sectors are starting to become decarbonized, it becomes an increasing challenge to deliver,” he said. “The current political mood music in the EU, with clear resurgence from the right, which is not always in favor of environmental action, results in harder and more difficult negotiations.” 

The EU’s delay in committing to an ambitious target on time is already having ripple effects. At a press conference, the Australian prime minister justified the country’s lackluster target by pointing to the EU’s goals. 

The internal disputes about the EU’s target “undermine their credibility,” said Cosima Cassel, a program lead tracking climate diplomacy at E3G, a climate think tank. “In the months going forward, we’re needing to see the EU double down on their climate leadership.”

The lackluster NDCs and the United States’ about-face on its climate commitments have raised questions about whether the U.N. negotiating process, which resulted in the Paris Agreement, is still working as intended. In the years after the agreement was signed, there was optimism about what was possible, given that the world had come together and agreed that countries needed to make drastic emissions cuts to avoid the worst effects of climate change. But in the years since, right-wing governments came into power in many places, pandemic-related upheavals caused the highest inflation levels in several decades, and war in the Middle East and Ukraine diverted attention from the climate crisis. Emissions, meanwhile, have only continued to rise. 

Still, experts defended the United Nations’ multilateral process for tackling climate change. 

“It’s clear the Paris Agreement or the multilateral process is being challenged today,” said Rogelj. “But I do not see how a world in which there would not be this multilateral forum, there would be more trust or there would be more support.”