Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement

Mark Roelfsema; Heleen L. van Soest; Mathijs Harmsen; Detlef P. van Vuuren; Christoph Bertram; Michel den Elzen; Niklas Höhne; Gabriela Iacobuta; Volker Krey; Elmar Kriegler; Gunnar Luderer; Keywan Riahi; Falko Ueckerdt; Jacques Després; Laurent Drouet; Johannes Emmerling; Stefan Frank; Oliver Fricko; Matthew Gidden; Florian Humpenöder; Daniel Huppmann; Shinichiro Fujimori; Kostas Fragkiadakis; Keii Gi; Kimon Keramidas; Alexandre C. Köberle; Lara Aleluia Reis; Pedro Rochedo; Roberto Schaeffer; Ken Oshiro; Zoi Vrontisi; Wenying Chen; Gokul C. Iyer; Jae Edmonds; Maria Kannavou; Kejun Jiang; Ritu Mathur; George Safonov; Saritha Sudharmma Vishwanathan

doi:10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6

Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement

Mark Roelfsema^*, Heleen L. van Soest, Mathijs Harmsen, Detlef P. van Vuuren, Christoph Bertram, Michel den Elzen, Niklas Höhne, Gabriela Iacobuta, Volker Krey, Elmar Kriegler, Gunnar Luderer, Keywan Riahi, Falko Ueckerdt, Jacques Després, Laurent Drouet, Johannes Emmerling, Stefan Frank, Oliver Fricko, Matthew Gidden, Florian HumpenöderDaniel Huppmann, Shinichiro Fujimori, Kostas Fragkiadakis, Keii Gi, Kimon Keramidas, Alexandre C. Köberle, Lara Aleluia Reis, Pedro Rochedo, Roberto Schaeffer, Ken Oshiro, Zoi Vrontisi, Wenying Chen, Gokul C. Iyer, Jae Edmonds, Maria Kannavou, Kejun Jiang, Ritu Mathur, George Safonov, Saritha Sudharmma Vishwanathan

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

Many countries have implemented national climate policies to accomplish pledged Nationally Determined Contributions and to contribute to the temperature objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2023, the global stocktake will assess the combined effort of countries. Here, based on a public policy database and a multi-model scenario analysis, we show that implementation of current policies leaves a median emission gap of 22.4 to 28.2 GtCO₂eq by 2030 with the optimal pathways to implement the well below 2 °C and 1.5 °C Paris goals. If Nationally Determined Contributions would be fully implemented, this gap would be reduced by a third. Interestingly, the countries evaluated were found to not achieve their pledged contributions with implemented policies (implementation gap), or to have an ambition gap with optimal pathways towards well below 2 °C. This shows that all countries would need to accelerate the implementation of policies for renewable technologies, while efficiency improvements are especially important in emerging countries and fossil-fuel-dependent countries.

Original language	English
Article number	2096
Journal	Nature Communications
Volume	11
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6
Publication status	Published - 2020

Funding

We would like to thank the following people for reviewing the CD-LINKS climate policy database: Chenmin He from Energy Research Institute of the National Development and Research Commission, China (NDRC-ERI), Zbigniew Klimont, Nicklas Forsell, Jessica Jewell and Olga Turkovska from International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Amit Garg from the Public Systems Group at the Indian Institute of Management, India (IIM), Roberta Pierfederici from Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), Ucok WR Siagian from Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia (ITB), Jiyong Eom and Cheolhung Cho from Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Republic of Korea (KAIST), Takeshi Kuramochi from NewClimate Institute (NCI), Junichiro Oda from Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth, Japan (RITE), Aayushi Awasthy and Swapnil Shekhar from The Energy and Resources Institute, India (TERI), Hongjun Zhang from Tsinghua University, China (TU), Nick Macaluso from Environment and Climate Change Canada (EC), Michael Boulle, Hilton Trollipp from Energy Research Centre, South Africa (ERC) and Daniel Buira (Mexico), Vladimir Potachnikov from National Research University Higher School of Economics (Russian Federation). This work is part of a project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No. 642147 (CD-LINKS), and is supported by European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No. 821471 (ENGAGE) and European Union’s DG CLIMA and EuropeAid under grant agreement No. 21020701/2017/770447/SER/CLIMA.C.1 EuropeAid/138417/DH/SER/MulitOC (COMMIT). S. F., K. O.: supported by the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (2-1908 and 2-1702) of the Environmental Restoration and Conservation Agency. J. D., K. K.: the views expressed are purely those of the writer and may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission.

Keywords

Climate-change mitigation
Climate-change policy

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Access to Document

10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6Licence: CC BY

s41467-020-15414-6Final published version, 2.14 MBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

Roelfsema, M., van Soest, H. L., Harmsen, M., van Vuuren, D. P., Bertram, C., den Elzen, M., Höhne, N., Iacobuta, G., Krey, V., Kriegler, E., Luderer, G., Riahi, K., Ueckerdt, F., Després, J., Drouet, L., Emmerling, J., Frank, S., Fricko, O., Gidden, M., ... Vishwanathan, S. S. (2020). Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement. Nature Communications, 11(1), Article 2096. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6

@article{b444927f460a4e2cb1387eb29467956b,

title = "Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement",

abstract = "Many countries have implemented national climate policies to accomplish pledged Nationally Determined Contributions and to contribute to the temperature objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2023, the global stocktake will assess the combined effort of countries. Here, based on a public policy database and a multi-model scenario analysis, we show that implementation of current policies leaves a median emission gap of 22.4 to 28.2 GtCO2eq by 2030 with the optimal pathways to implement the well below 2 °C and 1.5 °C Paris goals. If Nationally Determined Contributions would be fully implemented, this gap would be reduced by a third. Interestingly, the countries evaluated were found to not achieve their pledged contributions with implemented policies (implementation gap), or to have an ambition gap with optimal pathways towards well below 2 °C. This shows that all countries would need to accelerate the implementation of policies for renewable technologies, while efficiency improvements are especially important in emerging countries and fossil-fuel-dependent countries.",

keywords = "Climate-change mitigation, Climate-change policy",

author = "Mark Roelfsema and \{van Soest\}, \{Heleen L.\} and Mathijs Harmsen and \{van Vuuren\}, \{Detlef P.\} and Christoph Bertram and \{den Elzen\}, Michel and Niklas H{\"o}hne and Gabriela Iacobuta and Volker Krey and Elmar Kriegler and Gunnar Luderer and Keywan Riahi and Falko Ueckerdt and Jacques Despr{\'e}s and Laurent Drouet and Johannes Emmerling and Stefan Frank and Oliver Fricko and Matthew Gidden and Florian Humpen{\"o}der and Daniel Huppmann and Shinichiro Fujimori and Kostas Fragkiadakis and Keii Gi and Kimon Keramidas and K{\"o}berle, \{Alexandre C.\} and \{Aleluia Reis\}, Lara and Pedro Rochedo and Roberto Schaeffer and Ken Oshiro and Zoi Vrontisi and Wenying Chen and Iyer, \{Gokul C.\} and Jae Edmonds and Maria Kannavou and Kejun Jiang and Ritu Mathur and George Safonov and Vishwanathan, \{Saritha Sudharmma\}",

year = "2020",

doi = "10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6",

language = "English",

volume = "11",

journal = "Nature Communications",

issn = "2041-1723",

publisher = "Nature Research",

number = "1",

}

Roelfsema, M, van Soest, HL, Harmsen, M, van Vuuren, DP, Bertram, C, den Elzen, M, Höhne, N, Iacobuta, G, Krey, V, Kriegler, E, Luderer, G, Riahi, K, Ueckerdt, F, Després, J, Drouet, L, Emmerling, J, Frank, S, Fricko, O, Gidden, M, Humpenöder, F, Huppmann, D, Fujimori, S, Fragkiadakis, K, Gi, K, Keramidas, K, Köberle, AC, Aleluia Reis, L, Rochedo, P, Schaeffer, R, Oshiro, K, Vrontisi, Z, Chen, W, Iyer, GC, Edmonds, J, Kannavou, M, Jiang, K, Mathur, R, Safonov, G & Vishwanathan, SS 2020, 'Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement', Nature Communications, vol. 11, no. 1, 2096. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6

TY - JOUR

T1 - Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement

AU - Roelfsema, Mark

AU - van Soest, Heleen L.

AU - Harmsen, Mathijs

AU - van Vuuren, Detlef P.

AU - Bertram, Christoph

AU - den Elzen, Michel

AU - Höhne, Niklas

AU - Iacobuta, Gabriela

AU - Krey, Volker

AU - Kriegler, Elmar

AU - Luderer, Gunnar

AU - Riahi, Keywan

AU - Ueckerdt, Falko

AU - Després, Jacques

AU - Drouet, Laurent

AU - Emmerling, Johannes

AU - Frank, Stefan

AU - Fricko, Oliver

AU - Gidden, Matthew

AU - Humpenöder, Florian

AU - Huppmann, Daniel

AU - Fujimori, Shinichiro

AU - Fragkiadakis, Kostas

AU - Gi, Keii

AU - Keramidas, Kimon

AU - Köberle, Alexandre C.

AU - Aleluia Reis, Lara

AU - Rochedo, Pedro

AU - Schaeffer, Roberto

AU - Oshiro, Ken

AU - Vrontisi, Zoi

AU - Chen, Wenying

AU - Iyer, Gokul C.

AU - Edmonds, Jae

AU - Kannavou, Maria

AU - Jiang, Kejun

AU - Mathur, Ritu

AU - Safonov, George

AU - Vishwanathan, Saritha Sudharmma

PY - 2020

Y1 - 2020

N2 - Many countries have implemented national climate policies to accomplish pledged Nationally Determined Contributions and to contribute to the temperature objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2023, the global stocktake will assess the combined effort of countries. Here, based on a public policy database and a multi-model scenario analysis, we show that implementation of current policies leaves a median emission gap of 22.4 to 28.2 GtCO2eq by 2030 with the optimal pathways to implement the well below 2 °C and 1.5 °C Paris goals. If Nationally Determined Contributions would be fully implemented, this gap would be reduced by a third. Interestingly, the countries evaluated were found to not achieve their pledged contributions with implemented policies (implementation gap), or to have an ambition gap with optimal pathways towards well below 2 °C. This shows that all countries would need to accelerate the implementation of policies for renewable technologies, while efficiency improvements are especially important in emerging countries and fossil-fuel-dependent countries.

AB - Many countries have implemented national climate policies to accomplish pledged Nationally Determined Contributions and to contribute to the temperature objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2023, the global stocktake will assess the combined effort of countries. Here, based on a public policy database and a multi-model scenario analysis, we show that implementation of current policies leaves a median emission gap of 22.4 to 28.2 GtCO2eq by 2030 with the optimal pathways to implement the well below 2 °C and 1.5 °C Paris goals. If Nationally Determined Contributions would be fully implemented, this gap would be reduced by a third. Interestingly, the countries evaluated were found to not achieve their pledged contributions with implemented policies (implementation gap), or to have an ambition gap with optimal pathways towards well below 2 °C. This shows that all countries would need to accelerate the implementation of policies for renewable technologies, while efficiency improvements are especially important in emerging countries and fossil-fuel-dependent countries.

KW - Climate-change mitigation

KW - Climate-change policy

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85084006106&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6

DO - 10.1038/s41467-020-15414-6

M3 - Article

C2 - 32350258

AN - SCOPUS:85084006106

SN - 2041-1723

VL - 11

JO - Nature Communications

JF - Nature Communications

IS - 1

M1 - 2096

ER -

Taking stock of national climate policies to evaluate implementation of the Paris Agreement

Abstract

Funding

Keywords

UN SDGs

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this