Climate science says 1.5C is dead. No one wants to bury it.

Detailed summary

Leaders at COP31 want to keep the totemic goal alive, even after the U.N. declared it impossible to hit.

ANTALYA, Turkey — “Anything is possible if you believe,” croons Turkish pop megastar Tarkan in his theme song for this year’s global COP31 climate conference.

The Antalya summit marks the first climate talks since the United Nations told the world global warming would soon exceed 1.5C, effectively burying the totemic Paris Agreement target that has steered COP negotiations for more than a decade.

“We are on course to overshoot the 1.5 degree target, and every fraction of a degree matters. So we must double down,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in her speech to fellow leaders on Wednesday.

“Let’s show that the fight for 1.5C is not over,” Hilda Heine, president of the Marshall Islands told leaders.

Even before the talks began, Danish Climate Minister Samira Nawa told POLITICO her country’s priority at COP31 was “to push for keeping the 1.5C target in the heart of global climate ambitions.”

Other leaders and ministers, reviving slogans from COPs past, have exhorted their colleagues to “keep 1.5 alive” or ensure the target remains “within reach.”

The U.N. last month said that, even if countries dramatically slash planet-warming emissions starting right now, the best outcome would be a rise in global temperatures of 1.8 degrees. If they also deploy vast amounts of carbon removal tech to clean up the atmosphere, there’s a chance of getting back to 1.5 degrees after surpassing it — in theory.

In reality, though, greenhouse gas emissions are still rising and the carbon-hoovering technologies needed to achieve that reversal are unproven at scale.

The collective ambition of national climate plans, already insufficient before the U.N.’s announcement, is even weaker than projected last year. Countries that have been among the strongest proponents of meeting the 1.5-degree target are watering down efforts to achieve it.

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