Current climate pledges will cut emissions by just 6% by 2035, far off track: UN report

If countries implement their current climate pledges, global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are expected to drop only 6% below 2019 levels by 2035, meaning the projected reduction is substantially off track compared to the cut required to limit global warming, a UN report released on Tuesday (October 27, 2026) said.

The ‘2026 Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) Synthesis Report’, by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said that even if these commitments, called NDCs, are fully implemented, including conditional elements, emissions are likely to be just 9% below 2019 levels by 2035.

The report comes days after another UN report revealed that the 1.5°C temperature target was now completely out of reach. It also said the best the world could do was restrict the global rise in temperatures to 1.8°C, and try to pull it back.

The new report said most of the new NDCs are linked to long-term decarbonisation targets, which involve reaching net zero emissions between 2040 and 2070, with the majority aiming for 2050.

Implementation of the NDCs and these long-term targets would imply a best-estimate warming of 1.7°C-2.3°C by the end of the century. “However, returning warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius would require substantial additional GHG emission reductions in the coming years,” the report said.

The findings are based on an examination of 127 new NDCs, representing 154 parties to the 2015 Paris Agreement, submitted between January 1, 2024, and August 31, 2026. Under the Agreement, nations decide their climate actions on their own, and every subsequent set of NDCs must mark a progression over existing ones.

The report said the new generation of NDCs showed climate action was becoming more deeply embedded across economies and societies. “Increasingly, NDCs involve local and regional authorities, civil society and the private sector in planning, implementing and monitoring climate action,” it said. But a lot more is required in terms of cutting GHG emissions to curb global warming.