Reuters, Glasgow

The British hosts of the UN climate conference have called on countries to raise their ambitions to cut greenhouse gas emissions by next year, acknowledging that current pledges fall short of what is needed to avert climate catastrophe.

The first draft of the conference conclusion, which must now be negotiated by the almost 200 countries present in Glasgow and agreed by the close of the two-week talks on Friday, was released yesterday.

It asks countries to “revisit and strengthen the 2030 targets in their nationally determined contributions, as necessary to align with the Paris Agreement temperature goal by the end of 2022”.

In the landmark Paris accord, countries agreed in 2015 to limit global warming to well below 2.0 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and try to cap it at 1.5C.

Since then, scientific evidence has grown that crossing the 1.5C threshold would unleash significantly worse sea level rises, floods, droughts, wildfires and storms than those already occurring, and make some impacts potentially irreversible.

Britain has said the aim of the COP26 conference is to “keep alive” the 1.5C goal.

“It is time for nations to put aside differences and come together for our planet and our people,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a statement before leaving London for Glasgow yesterday.

“We need to pull out all the stops if we’re going to keep 1.5C within our grasp.”