New Scientist - USA (2022-04-09)

9 April 2022 | New Scientist | 7

GREENHOUSE gas emissions

must peak within three years

to hold global warming to 1.5°C,

according to the latest research

from the Intergovernmental

Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

In a report on how countries

can tackle the climate crisis,

published on 4 April, the IPCC

warned that the window for

staving off highly dangerous

warming has shrunk drastically

due to past failures to act. It found

that the world can afford to emit

just 500 gigatonnes of carbon

dioxide from 2020 onwards for

a 50 per cent chance of holding

temperature rises to 1.5°C.

Scenarios modelling how to

meet that tight “carbon budget”

require emissions to peak by 2025,

before falling 43 per cent by 2030

on 2019 levels. That would require

a gargantuan effort, given global

emissions rose by a record 5.5 per

cent in 2021. Many governments

are also preoccupied with the war

in Ukraine and the coronavirus

pandemic, and some are mulling

extra oil and gas production.

Coal use must drop by 95 per

cent by 2050 on 2019 levels, oil by

60 per cent and gas by 45 per cent

to meet the 1.5°C goal, figures

that Jan Christoph Minx, one of

the authors of the report, said are

“very striking”. Even meeting the

Paris Agreement’s weaker target

of 2°C would leave “a substantial

amount of fossil fuels unburned”

and render up to $4 trillion

of fossil fuel infrastructure

“stranded”. “We need to end the

age of fossil fuels,” said Minx,

speaking at a press briefing.

The report says governments

aren’t doing enough yet. Tallying

pledges made before last year’s

COP26 climate summit, the world

will “likely exceed” 1.5°C this

century, a vital threshold for

avoiding the most extreme effects.

“[The report] is a file of shame,

cataloguing the empty pledges

that put us firmly on track towards

an unlivable world,” said Antonio

Guterres at the UN in a statement.

UN panel says the world must make rapid, deep cuts to emissions

to hold off extreme climate change, reports Adam Vaughan

Urgent climate warning

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Climate change

Yet, the IPCC found reasons

for hope. At least 18 countries have

managed continued emissions

cuts for more than a decade, while

the costs of key technologies for

decarbonisation plummeted

between 2010 and 2019.

“Rapid and deep” reductions

will be needed across all sectors,

using a mix of renewable energy,

carbon capture and storage (CCS),

lower energy demand, better

energy efficiency and a huge

ramp-up of ways to remove CO

from the atmosphere, such as

direct air capture machines,

says the report. CCS use was found

to be “far below” the amount

needed to reach climate goals.

For the first time, the IPCC also

considered the role of behavioural

change on emissions reductions,

such as shifting diets. “The way

we move around, the way we eat,

the way we generate energy,

everything needs to change,”

says Pete Smith, an IPCC author.

Despite claims in some

quarters that cutting emissions

will be too expensive, the IPCC

says that mitigation costs for

meeting the 2°C target would be

“small” compared with global

GDP growth, and would be 1.3 to

2.7 per cent lower in 2050 than

in a business-as-usual world.

The report is the third of four

that make up the IPCC’s “sixth

assessment report”: the first was

on the causes of climate change;

the second on the impacts. The

new report was signed off after

an approval session that saw the

launch postponed by 6 hours. The

delay was due to Saudi Arabia’s

requests around language on long-

term fossil fuel use, India’s views

on carbon budgets and future

economic growth, and a row

between the US and China over

financing to act on climate change,

delegates told New Scientist. ❚

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News

“ The report catalogues

the empty pledges that

put us on track towards

an unlivable world”