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UN climate chief pushes for more ambitious emission plans

Steiner, the UN’s climate chief, says countries need to come up with emission reduction plans ahead of Paris summit.

More polluters need to follow the example set by the EU, the US and Russia and put forward emissions reduction plans ahead of December’s climate summit in Paris. If they don’t, the success of the summit could be put at risk, warned the UN’s climate chief.

Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Program, said that these commitments provide the “substantive framework” of the hoped-for global deal to reduce emissions in Paris. “In the absence of the [plans] we will miss a significant element that is fundamental to reaching an agreement,” he said.

Work cannot progress on issues like climate finance until these commitments are put forward.

The EU adopted its emissions reduction plan — a decrease of 40 percent by 2030 — last month. It was the only major emitter to meet an informal UN deadline of March 31, although the United States and Russia followed shortly after in early April. Together, the plans submitted so far account for 30 percent of the world’s man-made emissions.

The EU is asking all other parties to follow suit by the end of June. However an internal EU document indicates that this goal will not be met, despite a fierce diplomatic push by the EU in recent weeks. The EU has sought to make sure its partners are “sensitised to the political importance of submitting an ambitious contribution” soon.

According to the document, big emitters such as Canada, Saudi Arabia and China are expected to meet the end-June deadline. However others such as Brazil, India and Japan are not expected to submit plans by then.

A final accounting of all the emissions plans will be made by the end of September to see if they add up to a reduction large enough to limit global warming. But the EU wants the plans to come well ahead of this date so adjustments can be made in the coming months.

Steiner acknowledged that for many countries, particularly developing ones, coming forward with emissions reduction plans is difficult.

“Some of these [plans] will suggest significant transitions in energy systems and in agricultural land use,” he said. “The timeline that is needed in terms of the climate summit is not necessarily ideally aligned with what would be a natural process of domestic consultation.”

This year’s UN climate summit will be the most significant one since the Copenhagen summit in 2009, which collapsed after the United States and China refused to sign up to a binding deal. The UN is pursuing a different approach this time, setting out a flexible framework in which countries can choose their own route to reach emissions reduction goals.

“The world is a complex and very dynamic place in which countries do not all align on targets,” he said.

The Paris climate summit begins on November 30 and will last for two weeks.

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