A UN special rapporteur on human rights and environment on Thursday expressed his disappointment at the global energy structure, noting that the share of the world's total energy provided by fossil fuels remained unchanged during the 1992-2018 period.
Briefing the UN General Assembly's Third Committee, also known as the Social, Humanitarian, and Cultural Committee, UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment David R. Boyd said that in 1992, when the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change was negotiated, the share of the world's total energy provided by fossil fuels was 81 percent.
"Today, 27 years later, the share of the world's total energy provided by fossil fuels is 81 percent" as well, he said.
The statistics "illustrates our collective failure to address climate change," he said.
"Coal use is up 68 percent. Oil use is up 36 percent. Natural gas use is up 82 percent. Overall global greenhouse gas emissions are up more than 65 percent since 1992," he noted.
"Clearly our efforts to date have failed," he said.
"Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for 2030, even in the unlikely event that all states fulfill all of their NDC commitments, would not come close to achieving the objectives set forth in the 2015 Paris Agreement of limiting climate change to 1.5 degrees Celsius or at worst 2 degrees Celsius," he said.
Editor:Iris
