Legislation

In order to align with their international commitments, including the Paris Agreement, some governments have mandated scientists or established independent scientific bodies to assess what would be a fair and ambitious emissions targets.

Our studies directly informed the emissions targets of the United Kingdom, and of the state of Victoria, Australia. We also worked on an update to the methodology used to inform the emissions targets of C40 cities.

The Climate Change Committee (CCC) is an independent body providing scientific advice on how emissions objectives for the UK to align with the Paris Agreement goals.

In Figure 3.9 of the report “Net Zero - The UK's contribution to stopping global warming“ (2019), the CCC compares the ambition of the net-zero objective for 2050 to emissions allocations based on various equity considerations from our 2017 study published in Nature Climate Change (see the country page for more details). This objective was adopted by the UK.

In Figure B7.2 of the report “The Sixth Carbon Budget - The UK’s path to Net Zero“ (2020), the CCC explains that an objective of 68% emissions reduction, below 1990 levels can be seen as a fair contribution against several concepts of fairness, based on our study (2016). This recommendation of a 68% emissions reduction was adopted by the UK and represented a progress from the previous 57% objective for 2030.