Many are talking about ecological transition, but the planet continues to grind CO₂ as if nothing happened. The Global Carbon Project—the most up-to-date X-ray of fossil emissions, signed by 130 scientists—comes to COP30 as a slap in the face. In 2025, emissions from coal, oil and gas will hit a new record: 38.1 billion tonnes. A 1.1 per cent increase from last year.
Renewables are growing, electricity is advancing, deforestation is slowing in some countries. But collectively, we are still off track. Glen Peters, one of the study’s authors, says it without turning around: the world “is not up to it.”
The hardest part to digest is the so-called “carbon budget,” the amount of CO₂ we can still emit before we permanently exceed 1.5°C. That leaves 170 billion tonnes: if we continue at the current rate, that’s four years. Then that’s it: the metre goes to zero. Pierre Friedlingstein, of the University of Exeter, cuts to the chase: meeting that limit “is, in practice, impossible.” The realistic goal is no longer to prevent the 1.5°C threshold from being exceeded, but to contain the duration of the period beyond the safe threshold. And we are still talking about decades.
The actual trajectory: 2.3 to 2.6°C
Based on current commitments, the UN sees a world heading towards +2.3/+2.5°C by the end of the century. Climate Action Tracker, which has published new estimates in parallel, pushes +2.6°C. So there is still a long way to go. Here we are, in Belém, with the emissions curve still pointing upward.
Coal—the dirtiest fossil source—signals a new high in 2025: +0.8 per cent on a global basis. Growing in the United States, growing in India. Oil and gas are not far behind, +1 per cent and +1.3 per cent respectively. For gas, researchers say, we are back to the pre-war trend in Ukraine: steady growth, as if the 2022 energy crisis is already a faded memory.
The most embarrassing figure comes from rich countries, the ones that should be showing the way. In 2025, the United States goes up 1.9 per cent in emissions and the European Union 0.4 per cent. China, the largest global emitter, appears to be stabilising: +0.4 per cent. But the study’s authors themselves curb enthusiasm: too early to say Beijing has reached its historic peak.
A world running in the wrong direction
So COP30 opens with a very bad fact: global emissions are not going down. And current trajectories are leading us straight towards a much hotter, more unstable and more expensive world.
If there is a thread of optimism, it is in the realisation that the economy based on renewables, energy efficiency, and materials recovery is gaining ground. And that, sooner or later, even diplomacy will have to take notice. Sooner would be better, because the longer we delay, the more the cost of contingency planning goes up. Going forward like this we will pay a much higher price than the transition we are still putting off.
