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Short-lived climate pollutant mitigation and the Sustainable Development Goals

Nature Climate Change volume 7, pages 863–869 (2017)Cite this article

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An Author Correction to this article was published on 22 February 2018

This article has been updated

Abstract

The post-2015 development agenda is dominated by a set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that arose from the 2012 Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. The 17 goals and 169 targets address diverse and intersecting aspects of human and environmental needs and challenges. Achieving the SDGs by 2030 requires implementing coordinated and concerted strategies and actions that minimize potential trade-offs and conflicts and maximize synergies to contribute to multiple SDGs. Measures to mitigate emissions of short-lived climate pollutants are an example of actions that contribute to multiple outcomes relevant to development. This Perspective highlights the interlinkages between these pollutants and the SDGs, and shows that implementing emissions reduction measures can contribute to achieving many of the SDGs.

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Fig. 1: Estimated annual benefits by 2030 from SLCP mitigation.

Change history

  • 22 February 2018

    In the version of this Perspective originally published, Fig. 1 incorrectly had two entries of ‘Reduced rate of sea-level rise by 20% by 2050’; the first entry (row 2, column 3) should instead have read ‘Reduced disruption of weather patterns’. This has now been corrected in the online versions of the Perspective.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are members of the Scientific Advisory Panel of the CCAC, S.L. is the former Secretary of the SAP, and N.B.P. is the Science Affairs Officer of the CCAC.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social and Environmental Health Research, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK

    Andy Haines

  2. Department of Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK

    Andy Haines

  3. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Laxenburg, Austria

    Markus Amann

  4. Climate and Clean Air Coalition, United Nations Environment, Paris, France

    Nathan Borgford-Parnell

  5. Climate and Clean Air Coalition, United Nations Environment, Paris, France

    Sunday Leonard

  6. Stockholm Environment Institute, Environment Department, University of York, York, UK

    Johan Kuylenstierna

  7. Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    Drew Shindell

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  1. Andy Haines
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  4. Sunday Leonard
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A.H. had the original idea for the paper and coordinated the drafting process. All authors contributed to the drafting and approved the final draft for submission.

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Correspondence to Andy Haines.

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A correction to this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0073-5.

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Haines, A., Amann, M., Borgford-Parnell, N. et al. Short-lived climate pollutant mitigation and the Sustainable Development Goals. Nature Clim Change 7, 863–869 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-017-0012-x

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