Today’s climate change headlines often seem at odds with each other. One day, it’s catastrophic wildfires wreaking havoc around the world; the next, it’s an optimistic piece on the rapid scale-up of solar and wind power. Taken together, such stories can make it challenging to understand the broader state of climate action. Are countries deploying climate solutions effectively if greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are still rising? Where is the world making enough progress to overcome the climate crisis, and where are leaders falling short? What specific steps can get us on track?

To help answer these questions, the State of Climate Action 2023 report provides a comprehensive roadmap of what’s needed by 2030 and 2050 to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C (2.7 degrees F), the limit scientists say is necessary for preventing increasingly devastating and irreversible impacts of climate change. It sets out the specific targets each sector will need to hit to achieve Paris Agreement goals and assesses where the world is today. This year’s analysis shows that of the 42 indicators of progress assessed, only one — sales of electric cars — is on track to reach its 2030 target and help keep 1.5 degrees C within reach.

Which indicators saw the most significant movement in a year?Key Findings
This year’s State of Climate Action finds that progress made in closing the global gap in climate action remains woefully inadequate — 41 of 42 indicators assessed are not on track to achieve their 2030 targets. Progress for more than half of these indicators remains well off track, such that recent efforts must accelerate at least twofold this decade. Worse still, another six indicators are heading in the wrong direction entirely.

Within this set of laggards, efforts to end public financing for fossil fuels, dramatically reduce deforestation and expand carbon pricing systems experienced the most significant setbacks to progress in a single year, relative to recent trends. In 2021, for example, public financing for fossil fuels increased sharply, with government subsidies, specifically, nearly doubling from 2020 to reach the highest levels seen in almost a decade. And in 2022, deforestation increased slightly to 5.8 million hectares (Mha) worldwide, losing an area of forests greater than the size of Croatia in a single year.

But amid such bad news, several bright spots underscore the possibility of rapid change. Over the past five years, the share of electric vehicles in passenger car sales has grown exponentially at an average annual rate of 65% — up from 1.6% of sales in 2018 to 10% of sales in 2022. For the first time in this report series, such progress puts this indicator on track for 2030.

Global efforts are heading in the right direction at a promising, albeit still insufficient, pace for another six indicators, and with the right support, some could soon experience exponential changes. And among all indicators heading in the right direction, those focused on increasing mandatory corporate climate risk disclosure, sales of electric trucks and the share of EVs in the passenger car fleet saw the most significant gains in a single year, relative to recent trends.

Still, an enormous acceleration in effort will be required across all sectors to get on track for 2030.