The Paris Agreement

The Agreement's approach

In contrast to the Kyoto Protocol, the Paris Agreement relies on a bottom-up approach, mainly based on cooperation to encourage all types of stakeholders, both public and private, to commit to acting in favour of the climate. The basis of this approach relies on seeking benefits and co-benefits associated with climate action rather than on sharing the effort of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Through the three long-term objectives, the agreement sets a global trajectory, but allows some flexibility so that the parties can determine their own climate commitments, in the form of contributions determined at a national level (NDC, for Nationally Determined Contributions, see glossary). The NDCs describe the national efforts planned in terms of mitigation and potentially adaptation, based on their national circumstances. The approach also contributed to obtaining a final consensus at COP21. Additionally, efforts by non-state actors (cities, regions, companies, investors, civil society, etc.) are recognised in the Decision of COP21, so as to emphasise their role in the dynamic known as the “Action Agenda”..

Results of the COP21 and COP26

On December 12, 2015 at COP21, the Paris Agreement was adopted by the UNFCCC. It entered into force on November 4, 2016. By July 1, 2022, 195 parties (including the European Union) had ratified the Paris Agreement, and 194 parties (including the European Union) had submitted their initial contributions (NDCs). Following COP26, 160 countries submitted revised contributions, including 96 with enhanced GHG emission reduction targets (source: Climate Watch).

Objectives of the Agreement

The objectives of the Paris Agreement are divided into three main pillars:

• mitigation: main the increase in global temperatures "well below" 2°C by 2100 compared to pre-industrial levels and pursue efforts to limit this rise to 1.5°C;
• adaptation: strengthening the capacity of countries to cope with and recover from the impacts of climate change;
• finance: make financial flows compatible with climate goals and mobilize $ 100 billion in annual North-South climate funding by 2020.

In addition, the Paris Agreement introduced a formal review mechanism to increase national commitments, the NDCs (see glossary), every five years.

Mechanism for raising the ambition of NDCs

Source: I4CE, based on Carbon Brief, How countries plan to raise the ambition of their climate pledges, 2016

Impact of NDCs on global GHG emissions
Comparison of GHG emission levels and associated temperature increases under various scenarios with and without NDCs until 2030 and 2050

Note: The "2010 policies" scenario assumes that no new climate policies are put in place from 2010 onwards. The "current policies" scenario assumes that all currently adopted policies are implemented and that no additional measures are taken. NDCs are said to be conditional when they are conditional on certain factors, such as the ability of national legislatures to enact the necessary laws or the possibility of international support. The estimate of global warming during the 21st century was established with a probability of at least 66% for each scenario.
Source: Emissions Gap Report, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), 2021

In the run-up to COP26, countries that are parties to the Agreement were required to submit new NDCs. According to the IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), these new contributions are more ambitious than the contributions initially submitted following the Paris Agreement, reducing the gap with the trajectory to limit warming to 2 °C by 20%. However, despite this revised ambition, these new contributions are still insufficient to limit climate change to 1.5 °C by the end of the 21st century. Indeed, according to UNEP's Emissions Gap Report, the implementation of the unconditional NDCs would lead to a warming of about 2.7°C by the end of the century. This warming estimate could be reduced to 2.2°C if all state commitments to achieve carbon neutrality were also implemented.