Simulation, Lies and Deception: Mexico’s Climate Change Battle

Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are considered the core of the Paris Agreement and can be defined as each country's commitment to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions (GHG).

For context, it is estimated that during 2021, some 36.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (PgCO2e) were emitted across the planet. There is consensus that emitting 500 PgCO2e will exceed the 2°C increase in global average temperature. In other words, at this rate, we have about 16 years in which not only must emissions be reduced, but we must return to this negative rate.

In the recent appearances of the head of SEMARNAT, María Luisa Albores Guillén, before the environmental commissions of the chambers of deputies and senators, the public official claimed, without naming names, that there is a current that minimizes Mexico's reduction efforts, based on the low contribution of our country, compared to China (10.06 PgCO2e) or the US (5.4 PgCO2e).

In both appearances, Albores Guillén did not miss the opportunity to boast about the government's Sembrando Vida (sowing life) program, as the main tool to meet the NDCs announced by Mexico in the 2022 update.

Anyone with a little time and curiosity can recognize the incongruence of the current administration of the federal Executive Power. Suffice it to recall that the 2020 NDCs were strongly criticized at the Conference of the Parties held in Glasgow (COP26) and gave rise to the filing of an injunction that forced our government to update them (NDCs of 2022), which were recently presented in Sharm el-Sheikh (COP27).

The updated NDCs presented this year, with great pomp by the Mexican government, were, once again, severely criticized for their lack of ambition.

Let us recall that the objective initially set out in the General Law on Climate Change (LGCC) in 2012 was to commit to a reduction of GHG emissions on the order of 30 percent by 2020 and 50 percent by 2050, in relation to emissions in 2000.

In 2018, following the publication of the 2015 NDCs, the LGCC was modified to commit to a 22 percent GHG reduction by 2030, again considering 2000 as the base of comparison.

The 2020 NDCs unveiled by the 4Ts government maintained the 22 percent GHG reduction target for 2030 but, peccata minuta, considered the baseline scenario using  2013. This implied a 0.210 PgCO2e GHG reduction.

Fortunately, the granted amparo forced the 4T to reformulate the NDCs in the updated 2022 version, where the reduction for 2030 is increased to  35 percent of GHGs, using 2013 as a baseline; even so, the figures are more than misleading.

In this dance of figures, Albores Guillén demonstrated during her appearances commitments to reduce GHG emissions by 0.141 PgCO2e by 2030, with the NDCs updated to 2022.

Based on the National Inventory of Greenhouse Gas and Compound Emissions (INEGYCEI) as of 2019, Mexico reported net emissions on the order of 0.535 PgCO2e, with the energy sector being the largest contributor with 87.5 percent of total national emissions.

In this sense, a reduction of 0.141 PgCO2e committed by the 4T is not only unambitious, but could even be described as offensive, especially since it is based on the increase in carbon sequestration of 44 percent by the Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU) sector and a reduction of only 0.052 PgCO2e by clean energy.

Let us return to the international context. In 2019, Mexico contributed only 1.15 percent of global GHG emissions; however, with reduction targets such as those proposed by the 4T in the 2022 NDC update, forced by international criticism, we show an irresponsible attitude for the 15th-largest economy in the international ranking for 2021.

Considering that there are fossil fuel reserves that, when transformed, represent some 3,000 PgCO2e, the outlook is not encouraging.

The attitude of the head of SEMARNAT shown in the hearings, with incomplete data that were not detailed in the text of the 4th Annual Report of the SEMARNAT, where the NDCs are not even mentioned, obliges the private sector to take the baton and seek significant reductions in GHG emissions in a clear commitment to society in general.

With a head of SEMARNAT who has nothing for her predecessors to envy   given her biased vision of the environmental sector, and who, without ambiguity, boasts that her agency has not delivered a single mining concession, when the area responsible is the Ministry of Economy, our problem goes beyond not understanding the data or the commitments. Perhaps, we should start thinking about listening to Kim Stanley Robinson and promote the creation of a “Ministry for the Future” to defend the interests of future generations and of all those entities that cannot express their opinion, such as animals and water.