France climate goals off track as emissions cuts slow again

France’s emissions cuts slowed for a second straight year in 2025 and remain off track to meet its pledged climate goals, according to a provisional government-commissioned forecast published on Tuesday (January 13, 2026).

Emissions were estimated to decline 1.6% year-on-year, said Citepa, a non-profit organisation tasked by France’s Ecology Ministry with tallying the country’s greenhouse gas inventory.

The reduction of 5.8 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent was “far below the pace needed to reach 2030 targets” and extended a slowdown seen in recent years, Citepa said.

The country unveiled in December its updated pathway for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. To stay on track, emissions need to fall 4.6% every year until 2030.

After France slashed its emissions output by 3.9% in 2022 and 6.8% in 2023, the rate slowed sharply to 1.8% in 2024.

Citepa had earlier predicted a decline of just 0.8% in 2025 but said fresh data and updated methods of calculation had allowed a “more accurate” estimate for the full year.

While improvements were recorded in heavy-emitting sectors like industry, agriculture and transport, they remained virtually flat in energy and waste treatment, Citepa said.

Cleaning up these sectors poses an enormous challenge for industrialised countries like France, a major economy seen as a leader in transitioning to a low-carbon future.

This latest assessment highlighted the urgency for France to phase out its use of fossil fuels, said Anne Bringault, a director at Climate Action Network France.

“It is high time to take seriously the climate risk, but also the geopolitical risk of making us suffer from our dependence on fossil fuels, which are overwhelmingly imported,” she told AFP.

Big, historic polluting nations are under pressure to make faster and deeper cuts to the heat-trapping emissions driving global warming.

The result in France echoes a slowdown in neighbouring Germany, where emissions fell just 1.5% in 2025, the Agora Energiewende expert group said in its annual report last week.

The European Union has pledged to cut its net greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by 2040 compared to 1990 levels. It had already achieved a 37% reduction by 2023.