To stop climate crisis, nations review a handbook of 3,000 pages

Monday’s meeting will see nearly 200 countries grapple with the same question as Covid-19 and Russia’s invasion in Ukraine. It is: How can a world dependent upon fossil fuels prevent carbon pollution causing Earth to become unlivable?

After virtual negotiations that closed-door approved a nearly 3000-page report outlining options for drawing down, a partial answer was set for April 4. TreibhausgasesExtracting them from the air.

Alden Meyer, a senior analyst from E3G’s climate and energy think-tank, said that although the impacts are mounting and expensive, there is still some time to close this window and avoid the worst.

“This report will give us the answers we need to get there if we’re serious.”

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), laid out the physical science in August 2021: the pace of Global warmingSea level rise and shifts in the frequency, duration, and intensity of cyclones heatwaves and droughts.

This was part 1 of a 3-part assessment. This is the sixth such assessment since 1990.

It was projected that Earth’s surface temperatures would rise 1.5 degrees Celsius higher than preindustrial levels, possibly within a decade.

A 1.5C cap on global warming—the aspirational goal of the 2015 Paris climate accord—has been embraced as a target by most of the world’s nations.

It’s easy to see why: a mere 1.1C of global warming has resulted in a crescendo for extreme weather around the globe.

However, our nation’s carbon-cutting commitments have been renewed and are still on a dangerous path to 2.7C of warming by 2100.

‘Overshooting’ 1.5C

Part two of the IPCC report—described by UN chief Antonio Guterres as an “atlas of human suffering”—details past and future climate impacts and the limits of our ability to adapt.

Do not delay Climate actionIt concluded that it would greatly reduce the chances for a “livable tomorrow”.

Part three focuses on how to keep the planet-warming gases from the atmosphere. It also includes chapters that focus on key sectors where rapid and profound change is required: energy, transport industry, agriculture, and industry.

“We are referring to the large-scale transformations of all the major system,” Celine Guivarch (climate economist and co-author) told AFP.

The primary focus is on removing the global economy from fossil fuelsMoving to low- or even zero-carbon energy sources from solar and wind to hydrogen, nuclear, hydro, and nuclear.

This fact is helping to ease the transition. renewable energyIt is now less expensive than energy from fossil fuels in many markets.

The IPCC also outlines ways to reduce oil, gas, and coal demand, including making buildings more efficient or encouraging lifestyle changes such as eating less beef, and not flying half-way around world for a week.

Humanity has waited so long for action that switching supply and decreasing demand are not enough. We also need to remove CO2 from the atmosphere.

In theory—because the technology does not yet exist at scale—carbon dioxide removal will compensate for hard-to-decarbonise sectors such as aviation and shipping, and extract excess CO2 if temperatures “overshoot” the Paris Agreement targets.

Most likely to fail?

“Respecting the climate commitments we’ve made nationally and internationally is far more difficult than we are prepared to accept,” said Kevin Anderson (a professor of energy, climate change and policy at the University of Manchester).

“Right now we are very likely not to succeed. He said that if we fail to try, we will fail.”

The IPCC “solutions report” draws on hundreds of models that project development pathways that keep Earth within Paris’s temperature goals.

Taryn Fransen from the World Resources Institute in Washington DC stated that there are two types of scenarios: high renewables and low nucleus.

“This report lays out these pathways. It is now up to our leaders take that into consideration.”

Meyer stated that in addition to feeding into UN political negotiation, which resume in November at COP 27, in Egypt, the IPCC findings are also important “for US and European conversation around the need for transition away from Russian oil or gas.”

This statement was made by the head from Ukraine of the IPCC delegation at a closed plenary in February. It came just days after Russian troops invaded Ukraine.

“Human-induced Climate change and the war on Ukraine have the same roots—fossil fuels—and our dependence on them,” said Svitlana Krakovska, according to multiple sources.

© 2022 AFP