Hungary’s Second Climate Neutrality Progress Report attempts to objectively present various emission trends and the development of the key drivers behind them during 2021, compared to the year 2020 covered in the first report, thereby informing decision-makers and, in a broader sense, the entire society.
The global community of actors has failed to make significant progress towards climate neutrality.
If the national pledges received so far are fully met, the global average temperature increase is projected to be well above 2°C, which would exceed the Paris Agreement’s target of staying well below 2°C, aiming to keep it below 1.5°C. The EU and its Member States have increased their emissions by 5.1% between 2020 and 2021, instead of reducing them.
Hungary’s performance in tackling climate change was roughly in the middle range in international comparison, but there were areas where it was ahead of some benchmark countries.
In The Green Future Index, Hungary ranked 29th out of 76 countries, down 5 places from last year, while amongst the benchmark countries Austria moved ahead, the Czech Republic moved behind and Portugal’s position was unchanged from last year.
The trend of reducing Hungarian greenhouse gas emissions towards climate targets has not yet started in 2021, and emissions have increased by 2% compared to the preceding year 2020.
This should not come as a surprise, as the 2020 figures were low due to the impact of COVID-19 closures, while the ‘recovery’ started in 2021. However, if the distorting effect of the epidemic is removed, by 2021, no meaningful changes to reduce emissions have started, or at least the results are not yet visible.
The transport sector was the main contributor to Hungary’s GHG emissions growth in 2021.
Emissions from this sector increased by 10% in one year as a result of the phasing out of closures. The buildings sector also saw an increase, mainly due to increased heating demand due to colder winter. GHG emissions from power generation, agriculture, and waste management decreased slightly. Industry and F-gases showed stagnation. Land use, land-use change, and forestry as a carbon sink sector sequestered a significant amount of GHG in 2021.
There is still a significant data gap on climate neutrality indicators, so progress on 4 of the 11 dimensions (buildings, finance, lifestyles, and just transition) cannot be assessed.
In Chapter 3 of the report, there were 56 data gaps out of a total of 89 indicators examined under 11 dimensions. However, now two years (2020 and 2021) are included here, so the rate expressed in percentage has not changed significantly from the first report, with around 31% of data missing this year as well.
Of the remaining 7 dimensions, 2 (industry and technology) have overall moved in a positive direction, while 5 (energy, agriculture and land use, transport, carbon removal, and climate governance) have stagnated over the period.
These results, as well as the sectoral trends, show that the climate neutrality transition has not yet started at the right pace, but rather stagnation or slight improvement can be seen, the latter typically due to technological changes. There is also a perception that the ‘soft’ dimensions, which are not closely linked to technology but rather to individuals, are still receiving less attention.
The full report is accessible below (in Hungarian).
