Brazil submits ratification document of Paris Agreement

President Michel Temer delivered today (Sep. 21) to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon the document in which Brazil ratified the Paris Agreement on climate change. The document established goals to be achieved by the country, in order to limit the world's temperature rise.

According to the UN, 30 countries shall submit the document today (21) during the ceremony at the United Nations headquarters in New York. The agreement will enter into force after at least 55 countries accounting in total for at least 55 percent of the total global greenhouse emissions have ratified (approved as law) it.

Signed by 197 countries of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the agreement was approved by the Brazilian National Congress in August this year.

Goals

Under the agreement, countries officially commit to try to keep global temperature rises below 2C and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature rise to 1.5 by 2100, based on pre-industrial levels.

The agreement also intends to continue their collective mobilization goal from a floor of $100 billion per year, taking into account the needs and priorities of developing countries, and requests the countries to update every five years their contribution to limit climate change.

The agreement set individual goals for each country, Brazil is committed, for example, to curb greenhouse emissions by 37% below 2005 levels in 2025; and 43% below 2005 levels in 2030.

Brazil will also contribute by achieving 45% of renewables in the energy mix, of which between 28% and 33% would be renewable energy sources other than hydropower, including wind and solar energy. Currently, 43.1% of the total energy mix is renewable, and 56.9% is non-renewable, and 38.5% uses petroleum and oil products.

Translated by Amarílis Anchieta