Before the world climate conference in Egypt, researchers painted a sobering picture of progress in the fight against global warming. Several climate initiatives used 40 indicators for different areas to examine how far humanity is from reaching the 1.5 degree target of the Paris climate conference – for none of them is the development fast enough.
“The hard truth is that none of the 40 indicators we assessed are on track for the 2030 targets,” said researcher Kelly Levin on Thursday. Even compared to last year, the situation has not improved: “Unfortunately, trends have deteriorated across the board, with the exception of one indicator for meat production in ruminants.”
Progress not fast enough
The October report concludes that in six of the areas examined – including reforestation and the share of electric cars – progress is not being made fast enough to reach the 1.5 degree target. On five issues – including the use of fossil fuels in electricity production or the proportion of kilometers traveled in cars – humanity is even moving in the wrong direction. Solid data sets were missing in the assessment of eight fields of investigation.
The UN climate conference COP27 begins on Sunday in the Egyptian seaside resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. There, representatives from around 200 countries want to spend two weeks discussing, among other things, how global warming can be curbed.
