A new United Nations climate change report warns emissions need to peak by 2025, and be slashed nearly in half by 2030 to keep global warming from reaching limits set by the 2015 Paris Agreement. Environmental groups in Canada say the Liberals鈥� will fall short of those goals.
鈥淥ur pledge is weaker than most major European pledges, and weaker than that of the U.S.,鈥� Environmental Defence programs director Keith Brooks told CTVNews.ca from Toronto. 鈥淐anada鈥檚 Emissions Reduction Plan is the most detailed climate plan this country has ever had, and yet it indulges in magical thinking in proposing that oil production can increase by almost a million barrels per day while emissions come down.鈥�
Released Monday by the UN鈥檚 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the says without further action, the planet will be between 2.4°C and 3.5°C hotter at the end of the century, which could expose much of the world to severe impacts like drought and wildfire. The Paris goal is to keep global warming well below 2°C, and ideally at 1.5°C.
The IPCC says reaching that target is still possible, if the world steps up efforts and reduces global greenhouse gas emissions by 43 per cent by 2030, and reaches net zero carbon dioxide emissions in the early 2050s.
鈥淚t鈥檚 now or never, if we want to limit global warming to 1.5°C,鈥� said Jim Skea, who co-chaired the group that produced the UN report. 鈥淲ithout immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, it will be impossible.鈥�
'WE MUST INCREASE OUR AMBITION'
The 3,675-page report was produced by 278 authors from 65 countries, and was approved by the IPCC鈥檚 195 member governments, which includes Canada. In released Monday, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault thanked Canadians who contributed.
鈥淭he science shows that it is vital that countries do more to address climate change and keep the Paris Agreement goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5°C within reach, and on a faster timeline,鈥� Guilbeault said. 鈥淲e must increase our ambition to avoid catastrophic climate change and fully seize the economic opportunities that ambitious action presents.鈥�
Last week, the federal government unveiled a , which aims to cut emissions to at least 40 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030, with the ultimate goal of achieving . The plan also calls for 100 per cent of all new vehicles to be electric by 2035.
鈥淐anada is warming at twice the global rate and up to three times the global average in the North,鈥� Guilbeault said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 critical to Canada鈥檚 economic and social well-being that we take rapid action to fight climate change.鈥�
'UNPROVEN AND SPECULATIVE TECHNO-FIXES'
Brooks from Environmental Defence says Canada鈥檚 emissions plan relies too heavily on future technology, and instead should be focused on phasing out the production and use of fossil fuels.
鈥淭he most troubling part is that Canada is projecting a significant increase in the amount of oil produced in this country, though at the same time, emissions are projected to drop significantly thanks largely to carbon capture and storage -- an expensive measure that isn't being done at scale anywhere in the world,鈥� Brooks explained. 鈥淩elying on unproven and speculative techno-fixes would be gambling with our lives.鈥�
Eddy Perez is Climate Action Network Canada鈥檚 international climate diplomacy manager.
鈥淎voiding short-term action by relying on long-term plans that assume that somehow, somewhere, somebody will remove our emissions from the atmosphere in large amounts sometime in the future is dangerous,鈥� Perez told CTVNews.ca from Montreal.
Like Brooks, Perez says Canada鈥檚 climate plans need to focus on the country鈥檚 largest greenhouse gas emitter: the fossil fuel industry.
鈥淲e can't forget that Canada is the only G7 country whose emissions have increased since the Paris Agreement was signed in 2015,鈥� said Perez, who previously worked at the IPCC. 鈥淲e can't be a climate leader if we are not able to tackle the sector that is destroying every possibility we have to build a safe future.鈥�
With files from the Canadian Press and the Associated Press
