Germany

Critically Insufficient4°C+ World

NDCs with this rating fall well outside of a country’s “fair share” range and are not at all consistent with holding warming to below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would exceed 4°C. For sectors, the rating indicates that the target is consistent with warming of greater than 4°C if all other sectors were to follow the same approach.

Highly insufficient< 4°C World

NDCs with this rating fall outside of a country’s “fair share” range and are not at all consistent with holding warming to below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would reach between 3°C and 4°C. For sectors, the rating indicates that the target is consistent with warming between 3°C and 4°C if all other sectors were to follow the same approach.

Insufficient< 3°C World

NDCs with this rating are in the least stringent part of a country’s “fair share” range and not consistent with holding warming below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would reach over 2°C and up to 3°C. For sectors, the rating indicates that the target is consistent with warming over 2°C and up to 3°C if all other sectors were to follow the same approach.

2°C Compatible< 2°C World

NDCs with this rating are consistent with the 2009 Copenhagen 2°C goal and therefore fall within a country’s “fair share” range, but are not fully consistent with the Paris Agreement long term temperature goal. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming could be held below, but not well below, 2°C and still be too high to be consistent with the Paris Agreement 1.5°C limit. For sectors, the rating indicates that the target is consistent with holding warming below, but not well below, 2°C if all other sectors were to follow the same approach.

1.5°C Paris Agreement Compatible< 1.5°C World

This rating indicates that a government’s NDCs in the most stringent part of its “fair share” range: it is consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit. For sectors, the rating indicates that the target is consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit.

Role model<< 1.5°C World

This rating indicates that a government’s NDC is more ambitious than what is considered a “fair” contribution: it is more than consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit. No “role model” rating has been developed for the sectors.

1.5°C Compatible< 1.5°C World

Historical emissions

Taking into account the preliminary projections for 2018 as published by the German Federal Environment Agency in April 2019 (Umweltbundesamt, 2019a). The final official inventory data on greenhouse gas emissions in Germany for the year 2018 will be published by the Federal Environment Agency on 15 January 2020

Current policy projections

The current policy projections are based on two scenarios: one from the projection report (“Projektionsbericht”) (projection report) published by the Federal Environment Agency in September 2019, which includes all measures that were adopted until 31 August 2018 (German Federal Environment Agency, 2019). This means measures proposed in the Climate and Energy Package of September 2019 are not yet included. The scenario is also the basis for the “With Existing Measures” or WEM Scenario published by the European Environment Agency.

The other scenario, builds on the projection report but includes updated emissions for the energy sector for 2019 as reported by the Federal Association of the Energy and Water Industry (BDEW) (BDEW, 2019). The BDEW emission estimates for the energy sector in 2019 are at 263 MtCO₂e and therefore 35 MtCO₂e smaller than in the projection report. As a result, the discrepancy between these two scenarios reflects what would be possible if the energy sector was to continue along that path. The figures were harmonized to the latest inventory historical data.

Global Warming Potentials

The CAT uses Global Warming Potential (GWP) values from the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) for all its figures and time series. Assessments completed prior to December 2018 (COP24) used GWP values from the Second Assessment Report (SAR).