The chance to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis will be lost if global greenhouse gas emissions do not start to fall in less than three years, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has warned.
Without “immediate and deep carbon emissions reductions across all sectors, limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees is beyond reach”, it concludes in the final part of a global assessment published on Monday.
"It's now or never, if we want to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees," said report co-chair Prof Jim Skea.
The report says drastic cuts to fossil fuels combined with scale-up of renewable energy is the single most effective option. Existing and currently planned fossil fuel projects are already more than the climate can handle, it finds. In spite of this, countries are considering increasing fossil fuel use because of uncertainty over supplies of Russian oil and gas.
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‘Broken promises’
The report reflects “a litany of broken climate promises”, said UN secretary general António Guterres. “Some government and business leaders are saying one thing but doing another. Simply put, they are lying. And the results will be catastrophic.”
Minister for Climate Eamon Ryan acknowledged the need to “radically and rapidly scale up global climate action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions”.
Ireland’s emissions are currently on a rising trajectory, and green initiatives have been slow to get off the ground.
An Oireachtas committee will hear on Tuesday that only two companies are fully registered so far to provide the all-in service for homeowners who wish to undertake a complete home energy upgrade on their houses.
€8bn package
The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland has responsibility for implementing a new €8 billion package announced by the Government in February to improve insulation standards in Irish homes. However, it says just two companies are fully registered to provide one-stop shop services, while a further 17 companies are engaged in the process of registering.
The Government is to press ahead with carbon tax increases, according to senior figures in the three coalition parties. However, privately, several admitted that while the actual increase itself would be relatively small in monetary terms, the political fallout from it could be very damaging to the Coalition.
Two Government Ministers, speaking on the basis of anonymity, said an alternative compensatory package would be needed, to “lance the boil” – as one put it.