The Climate Action Tracker Guide to a good 2035 climate target

The Climate Action Tracker (CAT) argues that current 2030 climate targets and policies are insufficient, projecting end-of-century warming of 2.5°C to 2.7°C. To maintain the 1.5°C goal, the document asserts that governments must enter 'emergency mode,' peaking global emissions before 2025 and halving them by 2030. It outlines four essential elements for 2035 NDCs: ambition based on sectoral benchmarks, scaled-up climate finance for developing nations, credibility through the elimination of fossil fuel subsidies and exploration, and transparency via absolute economy-wide targets that separate land-use sinks and carbon removals from domestic reductions.

• Current global climate targets and policies are inadequate to meet the Paris Agreement goals. 2030 targets are projected to lead to a temperature increase of 2.5°C, while current policies and action are projected to result in 2.7°C warming by the end of the century.
• To limit warming to 1.5°C, global emissions must peak before 2025 and be reduced by 50% by 2030 compared to 2019 levels, following a steep downward trend to reach net-zero CO2 emissions by approximately mid-century.
• The document identifies specific global sectoral requirements for 2030 to align with 1.5°C: fossil fuel production must decrease by at least 40% from 2022 levels, energy-related methane emissions must drop by 66% from 2020 levels, and annual deforestation rates must decline by 70% from 2018 levels.
• Developed countries are urged to set domestic mitigation targets aligned with 1.5°C using their own resources and to significantly increase international climate finance. Developing countries should set ambitious conditional targets and clearly quantify the financial support required to achieve them.
• Credible NDCs require the immediate cessation of fossil fuel exploration and subsidies, and a phase-out of fossil fuel production. The document cites several countries as failing this criterion, including Australia, Norway, the UAE, Azerbaijan, the UK, and Brazil.
• To prevent 'creative accounting,' targets should be absolute, economy-wide, and cover all greenhouse gases. They must focus on domestic decarbonization and explicitly separate the contributions of forestry/land use (LULUCF), carbon dioxide removal (CDR), and Article 6 carbon markets.

APA

Gonzales-Zuñiga, S., Ellis, J., & Hare, B. (2024). The Climate Action Tracker Guide to a good 2035 climate target. NewClimate Institute. https://climateactiontracker.org/documents/1220/CAT_2024-06-10_Briefing_GuideToGoodNDCs.pdf

Chicago

Gonzales-Zuñiga, Sofia, Jane Ellis, and Bill Hare. The Climate Action Tracker Guide to a good 2035 climate target. NewClimate Institute, 2024. https://climateactiontracker.org/documents/1220/CAT_2024-06-10_Briefing_GuideToGoodNDCs.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Gonzales-Zuñiga |first1=Sofia |last2=Ellis |first2=Jane |last3=Hare |first3=Bill |title=The Climate Action Tracker Guide to a good 2035 climate target |publisher=NewClimate Institute |date=June 2024 |url=https://climateactiontracker.org/documents/1220/CAT_2024-06-10_Briefing_GuideToGoodNDCs.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{gonzaleszuiga2024climate, author = {Gonzales-Zuñiga, Sofia and Ellis, Jane and Hare, Bill}, title = {{The Climate Action Tracker Guide to a good 2035 climate target}}, institution = {NewClimate Institute}, year = {2024}, month = jun, url = {https://climateactiontracker.org/documents/1220/CAT_2024-06-10_Briefing_GuideToGoodNDCs.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }