The 70-page analysis from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research comes as nearly 200 nations kicks off a two-week negotiation to validate a landmark assessment of options for reducing carbon pollution and extracting CO2 from the air.
Some poorer nations produce only a tiny percentage of global output but are so reliant on fossil fuel revenues that rapidly removing this income could undercut their economic or political stability, the Tyndall Centre report shows. Oil and gas revenue, for example, contribute eight percent to US GPD, but the country's GDP per capita would still be about $60,000 -- second highest in the world among oil and gas producing nations -- without it, according to the report.
The principle has already been applied to coal-power generation, with the UN calling on rich OECD countries to phase out coal use by 2030, and the rest of the world by 2040.The new report, Phaseout Pathways for Fossil Fuel Production, applies the same approach to oil and gas. Another 14"high capacity" nations where per capita GDP would be about $28,000 without income from oil and gas must end production in 2039, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Kazakhstan.
"This report illustrates only too clearly why there also needs to be an urgent phase-out of oil and gas production," said Connie Hedegaard, former European Commissioner for climate, and Danish minister for climate and energy.