Conference of the Parties (COP): The supreme body of the Convention. It currently meets once a year to review the Convention’s progress. Current policy trajectory: This trajectory is based on estimates of 2020 emissions considering projected economic trends and current policy approaches including policies at least through 2012. Estimates may be based on either official data or independent analysis. Decarbonization: The process by which countries or other entities aim to achieve a low-carbon economy, or by which individuals aim to reduce their carbon consumption. Deforestation: The direct human-induced conversion of forested land to non-forested land (Marrakesh Accords). The conversion of forest to another land use or the long-term reduction of the tree canopy cover below the minimum 10 per cent threshold. Degradation (forest): Changes within the forest that negatively affect the structure or function of the forest stand or site, and thereby lower its capacity to supply products and services. Delayed-action scenarios: See Later-action scenarios. Double counting: In the context of this assessment, double counting refers to a situation in which the same emission reductions are counted towards meeting two countries’ pledges. Emissions gap: The difference between the GHG emission levels consistent with having a likely chance (>66 per cent) of limiting the mean global temperature rise to below 2°C or 1.5°C in 2100 above pre-industrial levels and the GHG emission levels consistent with the global effect of the INDCs, assuming full implementation from 2020. Emission pathway: The trajectory of annual GHG emissions over time. Forest: Land spanning more than 0.5 ha with trees higher than 5 m and a canopy cover of more than 10 per cent, or trees able to reach these thresholds in situ. It does not include land that is predominantly under agricultural or urban land use. Forest landscape restoration: A process which aims to regain ecological integrity and enhance human wellbeing in deforested or degraded forest landscapes to meet present and future needs and accommodate multiple uses over time. Global warming potential: An index representing the combined effect of the differing times GHGs remain in the atmosphere and their relative effectiveness in absorbing outgoing infrared radiation. Greenhouse gases (GHGs): The atmospheric gases responsible for causing global warming and climatic change. The major GHGs are carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O). Less prevalent, but very powerful, GHGs are hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulphur hexafluoride (SF6).
Grid parity: This occurs when an alternative energy source can generate power at a levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) that is less than or equal to the price of purchasing power from the electricity grid. Gross domestic product (GDP): The sum of gross value added, at purchasers’ prices, by all resident and non-resident producers in the economy, plus any taxes and minus any subsidies not included in the value of products in a country or geographic region for a given period, normally one year. GDP is calculated without deducting for depreciation of fabricated assets or depletion and degradation of natural resources. ‘Hot air’: Refers to the concern that some governments will be able to meet their targets for GHG emissions under any formal agreement with minimal effort and could then flood the market with emission credits, reducing the incentive for other countries to cut their own domestic emissions. Integrated assessment models: Models that seek to combine knowledge from multiple disciplines in the form of equations and/or algorithms in order to explore complex environmental problems. As such, they describe the full chain of climate change, from production of GHGs to atmospheric responses. This necessarily includes relevant links and feedbacks between socio-economic and biophysical processes. Intended nationally determined contribution (INDC): Submissions by Parties which identify actions each national government intends to take under the future UNFCCC climate agreement, due to be negotiated in Paris in December 2015. INDCs are, in effect, the basis of post-2020 global emission reduction commitments that will be included in the future climate agreement. International cooperative initiatives (ICIs): Initiatives outside the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change aimed at reducing emissions of climate forcers by, for example, promoting actions that are less GHG intensive, compared to prevailing alternatives. Cooperative initiatives also involve national and sub-national partners (they are often referred to as, simply, ‘cooperative initiatives’). Kyoto Protocol: An international agreement, standing on its own, and requiring separate ratification by governments, but linked to the UNFCCC. The Kyoto Protocol, among other things, sets binding targets for the reduction of GHG emissions by industrialized countries. Land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF): A GHG inventory sector that covers emissions and removals of GHGs resulting from direct human-induced land use, land-use change and forestry activities. Later-action scenarios: Climate change mitigation scenarios in which emission levels in the near term, typically up to 2020 or 2030, are higher than those in the corresponding least-cost scenarios. Leakage: That portion of cuts in GHG emissions by developed countries – countries trying to meet mandatory limits under
The Emissions Gap Report 2015 – Glossary
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