S.Korea to raise emissions reduction goal to 40% by 2030

Seoul: South Korea's government on Friday said it would raise its greenhouse gas reduction goal from 26.3 percent to 40 percent by 2030, as part of efforts to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. The revised nationally determined contribution (NDC) was proposed by the ruling party in June and will be officially introduced at the 26th U.N. Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in November, with a government plan presented to the United Nations in December.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in has proposed a "Green New Deal” aimed at helping his country bounce back from the COVID-19 pandemic while eventually reaching the goal of zero emissions by 2050.

"I believe we are living in an unprecedented era that we have never seen or heard of," Jeon Eui-chan, the chairman of the presidential committee on carbon neutrality told a televised conference on Friday, noting that assessment reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that humankind is living under atmospheric CO2 concentrations higher than at any time in at least 2 million years.