The head of the United Nations has conceded that the global average temperature will rise by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, breaching a key limit set in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
In a video message commenting on a new UN report on the gap between national plans to cut emissions and what is needed to meet global climate goals, António Guterres said “scientists tell us that a temporary overshoot above 1.5 degrees is now inevitable – starting, at the latest, in the early 2030s”.
The 1.5C threshold is symbolically important, as all governments agreed in the Paris climate accord to try to limit global warming to that level. Since then, diplomats at climate talks have described the temperature goal as the world’s “North Star” and pledged to “keep 1.5 alive”.
In May, however, scientists with the World Meteorological Organization predicted there was a 70% chance that the 2025-2029 period will be more than 1.5C hotter than pre-industrial times and said only a “fortuitous intervention of natural climate variability” like a volcanic eruption could prevent the 1.5C limit being breached in the longer term.
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Guterres’ reflections on the emissions gap report are the first time the UN has formally accepted that the 1.5C limit will definitely be breached. The report finds that “the multi-decadal average of global temperature will now exceed 1.5C, very likely within the next decade.”
Rachel Cleetus, a senior policy director at the nonprofit Union of Concerned Scientists, said the report’s findings were “alarming, enraging and heart-breaking”, adding that “years of grossly insufficient action from richer nations and continued climate deception and obstruction by fossil fuel interests are directly responsible for bringing us here”.
Hopes for return to 1.5C
The UN’s rhetoric has now shifted to bringing the temperature back down below 1.5C as quickly as possible within this century. It says this can be done by reaching global net zero and then net negative emissions, whereby the world absorbs more greenhouse gas than it produces using natural sinks like forests or carbon removal technologies.
Guterres said breaching the 1.5C limit was “no reason to surrender. It’s a reason to step up and speed up. 1.5C by the end of the century remains our North Star. And the science is clear: this goal is still within reach. But only if we meaningfully increase our ambition.”
The head of the UN’s climate arm, Simon Stiell, said last week that “temperatures absolutely can and must be brought back down to 1.5C as quickly as possible after any temporary overshoot, by substantially stepping up the pace on all fronts.”
Last year’s Emissions Gap Report measured the “likelihood of warming exceeding a specific temperature limit”. This year’s report changed this to the “likelihood of limiting warming below a specific temperature limit over the 21st century”.
The report found that even in the most ambitious scenario – where governments’ NDC climate plans and net-zero pledges are achieved in full – there is only a one-in-five chance of limiting global warming to 1.5C in this century.
If governments continue with their current policies rather than strengthening them to meet their climate targets, the likelihood of limiting global warming to 1.5C this century drops to 0% and to 2C to just 8%. The report noted that for the G20 group of big economies, implementation of policies to meet net zero targets “remains generally weak”.
Net-negative emissions goals
While most governments have targets to reach net zero, few have net negative goals. Finland plans to reach net netagive by 2040, Sweden by 2045, Denmark aims for a 110% cut in emissions by 2050 while Germany aims to reach net negative by 2060.
The German government argues that net-negative emissions will be necessary in some countries to balance out others’ continued emissions and to cancel out greenhouse gas emissions that can’t be avoided, like methane from farming.
Denmark is investing in direct air capture machines to suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and in paying fossil fuel companies to store the gas under the seabed, where it does not contribute to climate change.
Some heavily-forested countries like Guyana claim to be net negative already, although Guyana’s argument rests on forestry accounting methods criticised by some scientists.
The Emissions Gap Report’s authors said that the faster net zero is reached, the cheaper it will be to get the temperature back down to 1.5C. “Each year of inaction makes the path to net zero by 2050 and net-negative emissions thereafter steeper, more expensive and more disruptive,” they warned.
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UN accepts overshooting 1.5C warming limit – at least temporarily – is “inevitable”
Climate Change
Australia’s climate credibility tested at Pacific Pre-COP talks, as High Court fossil fuel ruling puts government on notice
NADI, FIJI Thursday 8 October 2026 — As the Pacific Pre-COP talks wrap up and Australia prepares to take the reins of COP31 Negotiations in Türkiye next month, Greenpeace Australia Pacific says the government is on notice over fossil fuel expansion and exports, and must accelerate action to align with a 1.5°C pathway.
Following yesterday’s landmark High Court ruling that the climate impacts of coal and gas exports must be considered by New South Wales planning authorities, Greenpeace Australia Pacific is calling on the Albanese government to find the “courage, leadership and grit” to chart a new course away from fossil fuels.
High res images and video from yesterday’s ‘Keep 1.5C Alive’ flotilla in Nadi can be found here
Speaking from Nadi, Shiva Gounden, Head of Pacific at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said:
“The outcomes of this week’s talks are a drop in the ocean given the scale of need, and urgency of the crisis our communities are facing. It is like taking a glass of water to a burning house if we do not urgently act to address the root cause of the existential threat facing Tuvalu, Fiji and all Pacific countries: fossil fuel expansion.
“The Electrification Pledge must end fossil fuel dependence, not be an end in itself — its ultimate success depends on ensuring electricity comes from renewable sources that displace fossil fuels and align with a 1.5°C pathway. It must be underpinned by justice and backed by finance flowing from polluters to communities.
“Limiting global warming to 1.5°C is a non-negotiable survival line for humanity and Australia must act. The landmark climate advisory ruling from the ICJ is clear — 1.5°C is the moral, the scientific and the legal limit. Continuing down the fossil fuel path, and failing to align efforts with limiting warming to 1.5°C, is a breach of our international legal obligations, and risks making Australia liable for future reparations from climate-vulnerable nations.”
Also in Nadi, Dr Simon Bradshaw, COP31 Lead and climate expert at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said: “The Pacific was never going to be a mere backdrop for Australia in its role as incoming chair of the COP31 climate talks, but where its credibility and commitment to climate leadership would be tested.
“Here we see communities fighting for their survival and doing everything possible to hold the line on returning warming to 1.5°C. When governments profess to take their concerns seriously, only to then throw more fuel on the fire, the pain and sadness is visceral.
“This week the High Court of Australia recognised what the Federal Government refuses to — that Australia is responsible for the climate damage of our fossil fuel exports and if governments don’t act, the courts will intervene. The message is simple: this is not someone else’s problem, it is ours.
“We must now follow other countries in developing a national roadmap away from fossil fuels that ensures a managed wind-down of fossil fuel production, including exports, in line with our legal obligation to help return warming to 1.5°C.”
ENDS
Media contact: Kate O’Callaghan in Nadi on +61 406 231 892 (Whatsapp/Signal)
A Dutch NGO has filed the first climate complaint under the European Union’s trade rules, arguing that New Zealand violated the environmental provisions of its free trade agreement with the bloc by weakening its climate regulations.
The case will test whether binding climate provisions in the EU’s free trade deals can be enforced to hold governments accountable to their climate obligations, experts told Climate Home News.
The EU-New Zealand free trade agreement, which came into force in 2024, was the first in the world to include legally-binding climate provisions and possible sanctions for violating them, as the EU seeks to use its trade partnerships to advance greater environmental protection.
Under the deal, both parties committed not to weaken their environmental law to promote trade or investment and to “refrain from any action or omission that materially defeats the object and purpose of the Paris Agreement”.
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At the time the agreement was signed, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the agreement included “unprecedented social and climate commitments”. But experts warned it was unclear how the Paris Agreement provisions would be enforced.
The EU included a similar “trade and sustainable development” clause in 14 other bilateral trade deals in recent years, with several others, including with China, awaiting ratification or being negotiated.
Climate activists at the Dutch NGO Both ENDS argue that the New Zealand government breached these terms by reopening its waters to offshore oil and gas exploration, releasing a climate plan that barely requires any emissions reductions, and passing a law that prevents corporations from getting sued over climate damages.
“Here, we have a so-called gold standard for free trade agreements with sustainability provisions but we have a trading partner that is doing exactly the opposite: regressing, as all the evidence points to, away from the Paris Agreement,” said Marius Troost, a senior policy advisor at Both ENDS.
Can the EU enforce its climate trading rules?
The Dutch environmental group filed the complaint under the EU Commission’s Single Entry Point, a mechanism that allows civil society to request enforcement of the bloc’s trade commitments.
The EU-New Zealand trade deal includes the possibility of suspending beneficial trading arrangements between the two parties in response to serious violations of its climate provisions. This, Troost said, is a “unique” tool to enforce both parties’ obligations under the deal.
“This is an opportunity for the EU and New Zealand to show that they are actually serious about these commitments,” he told Climate Home News.
A spokesperson for New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade denied any violations of the agreement and said the government hadn’t received formal notice of the complaint. The country, they said, “takes its commitments under the NZ-EU Free Trade Agreement seriously, including the agreement’s environment and climate-related provisions”.
An EU Commission spokesperson said it will start a preliminary assessment of the complaint and engage with NGO Both ENDS. “Sustainability is a central pillar of the EU-New Zealand relationship,” they added.
The EU is New Zealand’s second-largest trading partner after China, with about 14% of the country’s exports going to the European market. Agricultural products like meat, diary, fruit and vegetables are the country’s biggest exports to Europe.
New Zealand is ‘having its cake and eating it’
Eliza Prestidge-Oldfield, a senior legal researcher at the New Zealand-based Environmental Law Initiative, which is supporting Both ENDS’s claim, told Climate Home News that if the EU upholds the complaint, both parties would begin a negotiation process.
“The idea is to try and resolve this positively with the New Zealand government acknowledging areas where it needs to change its actions in order to comply with the agreement, and get that change in place as soon as possible,” she said.
But New Zealand’s right-wing coalition government said it won’t take any directives from foreign actors regarding its policies. Trade minister Todd McClay told local media that it was “not for overseas countries, organisations or lobby groups to tell New Zealand how to meet its obligations”.
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Prestidge-Oldfield argued the complaint isn’t about “Europe telling anyone what to do at all”, but rather stressing the conditions under which they are willing to import goods from New Zealand. “The New Zealand government is trying to have its cake and eat it too,” she said.
If New Zealand refuses to adjust its policies in line with the agreement, the complaint will be assessed by an independent panel, which can require the country to make changes. If those changes are not implemented, the panel could decide that New Zealand should lose its preferential EU market access.
A negotiated resolution is more likely, however, with no prior labour-related complaints to the EU having ever reached the panel stage.
Alexander Gillespie, a law professor at the University of Waikato in New Zealand, said sanctions would be a “last resort”. “This is a test case, which will generate considerable attention – as it is not just about climate change, but how free trade and environmental sustainability have been woven together,” he said in a statement.
Trade deals as tool for climate accountability
Experts said the case could set a precedent for how trade deals can be used to hold governments accountable on climate action. The EU has enacted similar “trade and sustainable development” clauses in its trade agreements with Canada, Japan and South Korea.
While still pending ratification, the EU’s 2024 trade agreement with Mercosur – which encompasses Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay – also includes climate provisions, including a commitment to “effectively implement” the Paris Agreement and promote low-carbon trade.
In addition, legal researcher Prestidge-Oldfield noted that last year’s landmark advisory opinion on climate change by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) laid out stronger climate obligations for developed countries like New Zealand and could strengthen allegations of violations of the terms of the trade deal.
“It will be an interesting area to watch how the EU free trade agreement is interpreted in the light of this advisory opinion,” she said.
The post New Zealand accused of breaching EU trade deal over climate rollbacks appeared first on Climate Home News.
New Zealand accused of breaching EU trade deal over climate rollbacks