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Today's Top News
Carbon Cuts 'Only Give 50/50 Chance of Saving Planet'
As states negotiate Kyoto's successor, simulations show catastrophe just years away
The world's best efforts at combating climate change are likely to offer no more than a 50-50 chance of keeping temperature rises below the threshold of disaster, according to research from the UK Met Office.
Scorched earth: drought and famine could ravage the world despite emissions cuts (EPA) The key aim of holding the expected increase to 2C, beyond which damage to the natural world and to human society is likely to be catastrophic, is far from assured, the research suggests, even if all countries engage forthwith in a radical and enormous crash programme to slash greenhouse gas emissions - something which itself is by no means guaranteed.
The chilling forecast from the supercomputer climate model of the Met Office's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research will provide a sobering wake-up call for governments around the world, who will begin formally negotiating three weeks today the new international treaty on tackling global warming, which is due to be signed in Copenhagen in December.
The treaty, which is due to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, is widely seen as the Last Chance Saloon for the community of nations to take effective action against the greatest threat the world has ever faced. But the Met Office's new prediction hits directly at the principle guiding all those hoping for an effective agreement, with the European Union in the lead: that of stopping the warming at two degrees Centigrade above the "pre-industrial" level (the level of average world temperature pertaining two hundred years ago).
Today, world average temperatures stand at about 0.75C above the pre-industrial, and many scientists and politicians agree that further increases have to be stopped at 2C if catastrophic impacts from the warming are to be avoided, ranging from widespread agricultural failure and worldwide sea level rise, to countless species extinctions and irreversible melting of the world's great ice sheets.
But the Hadley Centre's simulation indicates that even if global emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas causing the warming, were to be slashed at a very high rate the chances of holding the rise at the C threshold are no better than even. The scenario, prepared for Britain's Climate Change Committee, the body recommending the UK's future carbon "budgets", visualises world CO2 emissions peaking in 2015, and then falling at a top rate of 3 per cent a year, to reach emissions of 50 per cent below 1990 levels by 2050.
At the moment, global emissions are thought to be rising at nearly 3 per cent a year - so turning that into a 3 per cent annual cut would be a gigantic slashing of what the earth's factories and motor vehicles are pumping into the atmosphere. There is as yet nothing remotely like that on the table for potential agreement in Copenhagen, and if a deal of this ambition were to be done, it would be regarded as a triumph.
Yet even with that, the Hadley Centre research suggests, the chances of keeping the rise down to about 2C by 2100 would be only 50-50. Furthermore, the simulations suggest that there is a worst-case scenario - about a 10 per cent chance - of the rise by the end of the current century reaching, even with these drastic cuts, a level of 2.8C above the pre-industrial, which is well into disaster territory.
With any action that is slower than the scenario above, the likeliest outcome is a much higher eventual temperature - and in fact, the model indicates that each 10 years of delay in halting the rise in global emissions adds another 0.5C to the likeliest end-of-the-century figure. So if emissions do not peak and start to decline until 2025, we can expect a 2.6C rise by 2100, and if the decline only begins in 2035, the figure is likely to be 3.1C - even with 3 per cent annual cuts.
These new figures suggest quite unambiguously that the world is on course for calamity unless rapid action can be taken which is far more drastic than any politicians are so far contemplating - never mind the general public.
If action is sluggish or non-existent, the model suggests that climate change is likely to cause almost unthinkable damage to the world; under a "business-as-usual" scenario, with no action taken at all and emissions increasing by more than 100 per cent by 2050, the end-of-the-century rise in global average temperatures is likely to be 5.5C, with a worst-case outcome of 7.1C - which would make much of life on earth impossible. "Even with drastic cuts in emissions in the next 10 years, our results project that there will only be a 50 per cent chance of keeping global temperatures rises below 2C," said Dr Vicky Pope, the Met Office's Head of Climate Change Advice.
"This idealised emissions scenario is based on emissions peaking in 2015 and changing from an increase of 2-3 per cent per year to a decrease of 3 per cent per year. For every 10 years we delay this action another 0.5C will be added to the most likely temperature rise. If the world fails to make the required reductions, it will be faced with adapting not just to a 2C rise in temperature but to 4C or more by the end of the century."
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17 Comments so far
Show AllI don't like environmental groups saying either "we have a 50-50 chance" or "we only have 10 years". Both statements aren't completely accurate. The Arctic is melting this year and we have 0% chance of only taking minor damage.
Having said this, I of course advocate cutting carbon emissions in many ways, taking measures to restore the Arctic's albedo, and sequestering carbon from the atmosphere as charcoal or as biofuel oil.
I'd like to amplify paul k's comments a bit.
This article is just stating the obvious probabilistic outcome of how the IPCC and most climate scientists approached this problem.
their "best prediction" approach It is completely inapproprate for what we need. Don't these climate scientists ever work with engineers? When designing a critical dam or building where failure would result in loss of life, we don't ask the climate experts or seismologists what kind of rainstorm or earthquake is "expected" to occur over the life of the structure. Such an "expected" event has a 50% chance of being exceeded, and we would be designing a structure that would stand a 50% chance of failing over its life. Not acceptable!
Instead we design for a maximum theoretical storm (the "PMP") and a maximum credible earthquake (the "MCE"). These have only a very small chance of actually happening over the life of the structure, but protection of the public demands such conservative measures.
We need similar "worst case" global climate predictions for various action alternatves. I suspect that many scientists know very well that such a "worst case" for some of the action alternatives would probably be the extinction of most or all life on earth. But they are afraid of sounding alarmist, so instead, we only see these relatively mild predictions and not the doomsday scenarios that may be lower probability, by must be prevented at all costs through appropriate action.
---USAn---
By the time polluters feel global warming, it could be too late to reverse it.
The planet isn't what needs to be "saved." The planet will continue to be a planet until it's shattered by a collision with another celestial object or becomes engulfed in the sun's corona as it expands into a red giant some billions of years in the future. So, if it's not the planet that needs saving, what does? Could it be the status quo? Could it be the necks of denialists? No one reputable is predicting the demise of homo sapiens, so it's not humanity that needs saving; and humanity isn't civilized, so civilization isn't in need of being saved. Is it the climate that needs to be saved? But the climate has natural pertubations most of which provide a much different weather pattern than that existing over the past 12 thousand years or so. So is it the current climate type that needs saving given the way humanity has evolved? That sounds pretty close doesn't it? But that's already impossible to save as most experts admit. Maybe the word needs to be salvage instead of save, thus making the question: What can be salvaged from our overly complex societies given the current lack of carbon cuts?
No one reputable is predicting the demise of homo sapiens..."
Ask anyone with a background in geology.
The idea that humans are immune from extinction are speaking from the height of arrogance. If anything, humans are the most fragile species on the planet right now.
The rest of your remarks are nihilistic to the extreme, plus sophomoric too.
---USAn---
Where, PJD, in my comments do I invoke "A doctrine that nothing exists, is knowable, or can be communicated," which is the definition of nihilism. Do, please, read your dictionary prior to typing.
So glad you looked the word up in a pocket dictionary of philosophy,
But in it's more common sociological/political sense, it means a belief that nothing really matters, and that humanity is not worth defending, because whatever happens, happens.
That appeared to be your defense for inaction on global warming.
---USAn---
Jeevee
What's stopping us from getting after our newspapers and TV to do a more realistic assessment of our present extreme danger, and to educate the public MUCH more about what EACH and EVERY ONE of us must do to pull back from rapid extinction?
Prayer is an essential part of our hope to stop our narcissistic madness!
Jeevee
Let's stop the insane idea that mankind alone can save itself from this final catastrophe. It is not "fundamentalism" to suggest that we must all do our utmost to salvage plant and animal life: human effort — 5%;God's Grace — 95%. Both are absolutely essential.
"
About time.
Let's see....Mass extinctions in 100 years...Or, change out of fossil fuels...?
But what if it crashes the tricked-out, wealth-concentrating, war-wracked, plutocratic, unsustainable economic system?
After all it seems like the Biblical prophecies will come to pass. For a moment I thought it was all make-believe. Thank God.
The formulation of 50-50 chance is undoubtedly intended to place the debate within the comfort zone of the vast hordes of lottery players.
Its ironic that the same Vicky Pope who scolded alarmists for being too scary then says something like "BTW, our model says odds are 50:50 we're toast by 2100 no matter what we do". Her bedside manner isn't any better than Hansen's.
Siggi, if you are reading this, these are the same people who publish the HadCRUT temperature chart you always tell us shows warming is over. Maybe you should supervise them. Set Dr. Pope right.
Its all very discouraging.
The leaders of the entire world are currently working feverishly to re-ignite a 'robust' rate of economic growth. They are working very hard to INCREASE emissions of CO2!
I hosted, with some friends, at my former univ. campus a global warming event and we got a paucity of interested people. We even had trouble getting interest from many good professors to make brief speeches. Their excuse was that they were too busy, etc... I made a speech about the meat industry's contribution to global warming and even the handful in the room listening were overweight meat eaters except for one spoiled high schooler who came for extra credit who didn't really give a damn obviously.
Well, I can guarantee that you won't see diddly squat done until the worst case scenario starts happening. By then it will be too late. Look at your worst case projections for temperature increases and multiply that threefold.
Unfortunately I might still be alive by the time the shit hits the fan.