The global emissions of the transport sector are heading in the wrong direction, accounting for the fastest-growing source of emissions around the world. We must change this trend now and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change underlines that a pathway for transport which contributes to maintaining global temperature rise below 1.5°C is possible. Transport enables prosperity and livelihoods. In 2021, the sector contributed 7% (USD 6.8 trillion) of the global gross domestic product and employed 5.6% of the world’s workforce (193 million people). Therefore in this era of climate emergency, it is as important as ever that countries set more ambitious, robust and actionable targets and roadmaps for the decarbonisation, the adaptation to climate change impacts and the resilience of transport and mobility systems – in a just transition.
Global greenhouse gas emissions need to peak before 2025, followed by rapid and deep emission reductions throughout 2050 in order to limit global warming to 1.5°C, as assessed by the IPCC. The transport sector accounted for 20.7% of global CO2 emissions in 2022. Achieving transport pathways that align with the 1.5°C target will require at least a 59% reduction in global transport CO2 emissions by 2050.
Thus, the NDC 3.0 needs to enhance action on sustainable, low carbon transport. The COP28 Global Stocktake Outcome encourages countries to accelerate the reduction of emissions from road transport on a range of pathways, including through development of infrastructure and rapid deployment of zero- and low-emission vehicles.
Historical emissions from 1950, projected emissions in 2030 based on nationally determined contributions, and emission reductions required by the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Sources: Upper panel: Historical data from the IPCC for 1950–1989 and from the 2022 NDC synthesis report for 1990–2020; 2030 projections from NDCs; and the reduction scenarios from the AR6 Synthesis Report (IPCC. 2023. Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Core Writing Team, H Lee, and J Romero (eds.). Geneva: IPCC. Available at https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/). Lower panel: table SPM.5 in the AR6 Synthesis Report.
Abbreviation: LULUCF = land use, land-use change and forestry.
The GIZ-SLOCAT NDC Transport Tracker pays special attention to the level of ambition of the transport sector in the NDCs with the focus on target-setting, adaptation and resilience in transport and the scope of transport sub-sectors included.
As we collectively work to update and raise ambition in the next generation of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs)—the commitments made by each country under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to reduce national emissions and adapt to climate change—we would like to share a set of key recommendations. These build upon SLOCAT’s 2020 recommendations, exploring how countries can scale up transport ambition in their NDCs.
SLOCAT
SLOCAT
Changing Transport
SLOCAT, Kühne Foundation
UN-HABITAT
SLOCAT, GCAP & US Dept. of State
ESCAP, SLOCAT, Asian Development Bank and Asian Transport Outlook
SLOCAT and EUROCLIMA
SLOCAT
SLOCAT
Changing Transport
SLOCAT, Kühne Foundation
UN-HABITAT
SLOCAT, GCAP & US Dept. of State
ESCAP, SLOCAT, Asian Development Bank and Asian Transport Outlook
SLOCAT and EUROCLIMA
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