The latest UN report on climate change reveals that Europe has been taking insufficient measures to rise to the current environmental challenges and urgently needs to increase its climate targets, international environmental organization Greenpeace said on Monday.
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th October, 2018) The latest UN report on climate change reveals that Europe has been taking insufficient measures to rise to the current environmental challenges and urgently needs to increase its climate targets, international environmental organization Greenpeace said on Monday.
Earlier in the day, UN's Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) unveiled a report, stressing the need for the world to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2030 instead of the 2 degrees Celsius target agreed in 2015. To meet the new target, global net human-caused CO2 emissions would need to be cut by 45 percent from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching "net zero" around 2050.
"This report is the scientific equivalent of a kick in the ass. It clearly exposes the inadequacy of Europe's action on climate change, in a year when millions of Europeans have suffered tragic forest fires, deadly heatwaves and devastating drought. The world's top climate scientists have spelled out how much worse it will be if we go over 1.5�C of warming, but they've also said we still have a fighting chance," Tara Connolly, the Greenpeace EU climate and energy policy director, said as quoted in the organization's statement.
Connolly suggested that Europe could much contribute to "turning the tide on climate change," citing the rising public awareness about the issue in the form of protests against the expansion of coal mines in Germany or the developments of solar energy projects in Greece.
According to the environmental organization, the European Union should support the trend and respond with more ambitious pledge rather than a 40 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions compared to 1990 levels by 2030.
"Our governments and the EU need to catch up fast: the first steps must be to radically increase 2030 climate targets and commit to a carbon-neutral Europe by 2040," Connolly concluded.
The statements come a day before EU environment ministers are set to meet in Luxembourg to agree the EU negotiating position for the UN climate conference slated to take place in Poland in December.
