The Paris Agreement now has 81 member parties after the Central African Republic, Costa Rica, Greece, Paraguay, and Sweden joined last week. Until recently, entry into force of the accord, which nearly 200 nations adopted last December at the last 21st session of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP21), seemed unlikely before 2017 or 2018. However, a massive international push resulted in the successful triggering of the milestone earlier this month.
The accord’s entry into force required domestic ratification by 55 nations representing at least 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The 55 nation threshold was surpassed during a special event at U.N. headquarters in New York in September. A total of 11 new parties ratified the agreement on Oct. 5, surpassing the 55 percent threshold, and setting up the accord to enter into force on Nov. 4, just before COP22, scheduled for Nov. 7-18 in Marrakesh, Morocco.
The accord’s full member states now represent 60 percent of global emissions.