Bridging the Emissions Gap Showcasing successful climate action from leading cities in Wwfs One Planet City Challenge

We invite you to hear how progressive cities around the world are increasing not only their own ambition levels, but also contributing to more impactful climate commitments, and actions, at a national level.
Leading authors of the recent UN-Habitat report “Urban Content of NDCs” and pioneering city practitioners will discuss how this is happening and what more could be done to further advance this agenda.
In addition, we bring you best practices and inspiration from over a decade on the global cities arena through WWF’s One Planet City Challenge that has engaged over 900 cities on 5 continents to date.
It’s widely recognized that cooperation between stakeholders at local, national and global levels is crucial. An example of this is the recent CHAMP agreement signed by 72 countries. Still 1.5 °C alignment has yet to happen at scale. What can we do to further boost ambition levels in our effort to create a world where people and nature thrive?

Cities represented: Istanbul (Turkey), Peñalolen (Santiago-region, Chile), Lund (Malmö-Copenhagen-region, Sweden).

Read more below.
Home to over 55% of population and responsible for 70% of carbon emissions, cities are also vulnerable to the consequences of climate change. Cities sit at the frontline of the dual climate challenge and are increasingly acting. Within WWF’s One Planet City Challenge (OPCC) we have witnessed a growing number of local governments creating integrated and inclusive climate plans in line with the Paris Agreement’s goal of 1.5 °C global warming, while improving urban resilience.
The global policy space is also taking note: the recent UN Climate Change conference, COP28, launched the Coalition for High Ambition Multilevel Partnerships (CHAMP) for Climate Action. With over 72 countries signing CHAMP, there is growing commitment to work across levels of government to set more ambitious climate targets.
Despite policy pledges and examples of city action, this is not happening at scale. UN-Habitat’s recent report, entitled, “Local Action for Global Goals: An Opportunity for Enhancing Nationally Determined Contributions” (2024) found that only 27% of reviewed Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) revealed strong urban content as a space for climate action. Moreover, despite positive examples of cities aligning to the 1.5 °C target or improving resilience, most cities are not adopting or implementing sufficiently ambitious or holistic climate actions.
Here we see an opportunity to bridge this gap from the top down and bottom up: building momentum in the climate policy space, we will lift tangible examples from leading cities that are implementing climate action. City leaders will share climate actions, including methods on what works and what doesn’t, while highlighting co-benefits of climate action, including for health, equity, and economic opportunities.