November 10, 2024

Akahata ‘current’ column

The 29th Conference of the Parties (COP29) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change will start on November 11 in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.

In recent years, the conference has focused its discussions on the goal of the Paris Agreement, an international framework adopted in 2015 to combat global warming, aiming to limit the rise in average global temperatures to below 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

However, the release of greenhouse gases that cause global warming continue to increase. According to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the global temperature has already risen by 1.1 degrees C. The EU weather information agency has forecast that it is “virtually certain” that global warming for 2024 “will be more than 1.5 degrees C” for the first time and 2024 “will be the warmest year on record.”

To cut GHG emissions is an urgent need for the planet. However, it is still far from the 1.5 degrees C target even if the reduction targets that each country has submitted to the UN are added up. The UN Emissions Gap Report 2024 warns that if the status quo continues, the world will head for a temperature rise of 3.1 degrees C by the end of this century.

Japan has been criticized for having a low reduction target (a 46% cut by 2030). The UN report predicts that Japan is unlikely to meet even its inadequate target. Among G7 states, Japan is the only country that does not plan to phase out coal-fired power generation, which is a major source of GHG emissions. The Japanese government has been trying everything in the book to preserve coal-fired power generation, and continues to depend on fossil fuels.

It is clear that this runs counter to the international effort to reverse global warming. Let’s make the COP29 a momentum to change Japan’s climate policy.