The World Finally Started Cutting Climate Pollution. Now It Needs To Multiply That By 10.

The World Finally Started Cutting Climate Pollution. Now It Needs To Multiply That By 10.

Before COVID-19, many countries started slashing emissions, but those reductions require a tenfold increase to keep warming in a relatively safe range, a new study has found.

From 2016 through 2019, 64 countries ― including most wealthy nations and one-third of the middle-income bracket ― slashed roughly 160 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, thanks to a slate of roughly 2,000 new climate laws worldwide.

Keeping the planet from warming to a maximum of 1.8 Celsius above preindustrial levels requires multiplying those cuts by 10, to roughly 2 billion metric tons per year, according to research published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed journal Nature Climate Change. The planet is already 1.1 C hotter than before humans started burning fossil fuels en masse.

The findings come at a turning point, when the world is gearing up to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, which sent emissions in 2020 tumbling by an unprecedented 7% compared to 2019 levels. But as vaccines and public health measures allow economies to reopen and countries seek to restore their fortunes and quell social unrest, scientists fear an embrace of short-term fossil fuel use.

Yet Corinne Le Quéré, the University of East Anglia professor who led the analysis, said the findings