The United Nations Climate Conference ended in Qatar earlier this month delivering a weakened Kyoto Protocol although participants will continue to work toward a new agreement by 2015.
Australia has signed up to a second commitment for the Kyoto Protocol, the first global treaty in the world to set binding obligations on countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
The second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol will commence on January 1, 2013 and end in 2020. Australia has agreed to a Kyoto target to reduce its emissions in line with the bipartisan target of reducing emissions to five per cent below 2000 levels by 2020.
Australia retains the option of moving up its 2020 target range of five to 15 per cent, or 25 per cent, below 2000 levels if our target conditions relating to the extent of global action are met.
The parliamentary secretary for climate change, Mark Dreyfus, said the Kyoto Protocol on its own is not enough which is why the Doha conference also made progress towards a new global emissions reduction agreement.
"This was the first year of a four-year negotiation on the new agreement and progress was encouraging. The new agreement will be concluded by 2015 and take effect from 2020," Dreyfus said.
It will be the first international climate change agreement to require action by all major emitters including the United States, Japan, India and China.
The UN secretary general Ban Ki Moon also announced a global leaders summit will be held in 2014 to increase climate action before the new agreement begins in 2020.
Dreyfus said countries are not waiting for the global agreement to commence before cutting emissions.
"Like Australia, they are taking action to transition their economies now," he said.
"By the time the global agreement comes into operation, a carbon price will already be operating in 50 countries covering around three billion people."
However, the reality is that global emissions continue to rise at an alarming rate.
The gap between carbon dioxide emissions and the reductions needed to keep global warming to 2°C or below is becoming wider.
Global Carbon Project leader and CSIRO scientist Pep Canadell said the latest CO2 emissions continue to track at the high end of a range of emission scenarios.
Global CO2 emissions have increased by 58 per cent since 1990, rising three per cent in 2011, and 2.6 per cent in 2012.
Dr Canadell heads the Global Carbon Project which reported the new calculations in the most recent edition of Nature Climate Change.
"A shift to a 2°C pathway requires an immediate, large, and sustained global mitigation effort," Dr Canadell said.
