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This ranking will be unchanged even if Australia signs up to net zero by 2050, as Prime Minister Scott Morrison has flagged is his preference, unless there are strong commitments to deep emissions cuts this decade.

“This is a defining moment in the world’s response to climate change, and Australia remains the villain, and an outlier in the international community,” said Dr Simon Bradshaw, lead author of From Paris to Glasgow: a world on the move and head of research at the Climate Council.

Mr Taylor said the report, which does not include reductions attributable to changes to land use regulations, was misleading.

“Excluding sources of emissions reductions to suit a politically-motivated narrative, as the Climate Council does, shows a lack of respect for the Paris Agreement or climate science,” he said.

Australia had reduced emissions faster than every other major commodity exporting nation in the world, he said.

The Climate Council produced two new rankings that compare Australia with its peers. The first ranks wealthy developed countries on their emissions reductions, taking account of both their pledges and their actual record in reducing emissions. Australia is ranked last.

The second looks specifically at fossil fuel dependence, taking account of fossil fuel exports as well as domestic fossil fuel use. Australia ranks equal last, with Canada, for its extraction and use of fossil fuels.

Globally, the UN report found more than $US300 billion ($400 billion) in new public funds had been directed towards fossil fuel activities since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic – more than towards clean energy.

All nations must accept their responsibility to close the gap between planned fossil fuel projects and the amount of greenhouse gas that can still safely be emitted, said one of the UN report’s lead authors, Mans Nilsson, executive director at the Stockholm Environment Institute.

“As countries increasingly commit to net zero emissions by mid-century, they also need to recognise the rapid reduction in fossil fuel production that their climate targets will require.”

Lesley Hughes from Macquarie University, a climate expert and spokesperson for the Climate Council, said Australia was increasingly isolated internationally.

“The US and the UK have been personally pressuring Scott Morrison, so our status as a climate pariah is really there for all to see,” said Professor Hughes.

“Two weeks out from the COP and the government is being held hostage by a small handful of National Party MPs that are being held hostage by fossil fuel mining interests. It would be a joke if it wasn’t so serious.”

There are 80 proposed coal projects and five new large gas basins in the pipeline for Australia, as well as dozens of smaller gas projects dotted across the country.

With renewable energy resources and the large mineral reserves needed to drive the energy transition, Australia has the potential for new export industries that far exceed the value of its current fossil fuel exports, the Climate Council report finds.

As a first step, Australia should match the updated commitments of its key allies – including the US and the UK – and pledge before Glasgow to at least halve national emissions this decade, the report argues.

The Climate Council is a philanthropically and crowd-funded climate advocacy group that was established after the Coalition scrapped the Australian Climate Commission in 2013.

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