The numbers moved the wrong way
A new tally of national climate plans finds that governments now promise about half the emission cuts the United Nations expected a year ago. The latest pledges would leave 2035 emissions only 6 percent below 2019 levels, compared with 12 percent projected in last year's assessment.
The result puts the world on a path to between 2.1C and 3.2C of warming by the end of the century, depending on what countries do after 2035. Last year's estimate was 1.9C to 3.0C. The shift is modest in degrees and large in consequence, because every fraction of a degree changes heat, rainfall and crop risk.
Why the plans got weaker
Two things changed. The United States left the Paris Agreement, removing the emissions of the world's largest historical emitter from the collective pledge. Several other governments submitted weaker targets than expected, citing costs, security and the difficulty of passing domestic legislation.
Most of the shortfall sits in the 2030s. Current policies still bend the curve downward, but the new pledges assume slower retirement of fossil plants and slower electric vehicle uptake than analysts had modelled a year ago.
Three weeks to COP31
The assessment lands before the COP31 summit opens in Antalya, Turkey, on 9 November. Trade is a live fight: China wants tariffs on clean technology discussed, while Brazil and others have tried to keep the agenda narrow. African negotiators want dedicated space for adaptation finance and the Green Climate Fund.
Attendance is another signal. Just 77 heads of state or government are scheduled to speak, about a third fewer than the peak at COP28. The European Union will push a mitigation package aimed at turning existing pledges into delivered policy rather than new announcements.
For vulnerable countries the arithmetic is blunt. Adaptation costs are rising faster than finance is arriving, and a smaller summit with weaker pledges makes a strong outcome harder to assemble. The plans submitted this year will not be revised again until the next cycle, which means the gap measured now will shape the decade.