(The Conversation) The 1.5c Global Warming Limit Is Not Impossible – But Without Political Action It Soon Will Be

The Conversation - Bill Hare | Carl-Friedrich Schleussner | Joeri Rogelj | Piers Forster

Shutterstock

Authors Bill Hare is Director, Climate Analytics, Adjunct Professor, Murdoch University (Perth), Visiting scientist, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research Carl-Friedrich Schleussner is Research Group Leader, Humboldt University of Berlin Joeri Rogelj is Director of Research and Lecturer - Grantham Institute Climate Change & the Environment, Imperial College London Piers Forster is Professor of Physical Climate Change; Director of the Priestley International Centre for Climate, University of Leeds

Limiting global warming to 1.5℃ this century is a central goal of the Paris Agreement. In recent months, climate experts and others, including in Australia, have suggested the target is now impossible.

Whether Earth can stay within 1.5℃ warming involves two distinct questions.

First, is it physically, technically and economically feasible, considering the physics of the Earth system and possible rates of societal change? Science indicates the answer is “yes” – although it will be very difficult and the best opportunities for success lie in the past.

The second question is whether governments will take sufficient action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This answer depends on the ambition of governments, and the effectiveness of campaigning by non-government organisations and others.

So scientifically speaking, humanity can still limit global warming to 1.5°C this century. But political action will determine whether it actually does. Conflating the two questions amounts to misplaced punditry, and is dangerous.

Staying within 1.5℃ is scientifically possible, but requires government ambition. Erik Anderson/AAP

1.5℃ wasn’t plucked from thin air

The Paris Agreement was adopted by 195 countries in 2015. The inclusion of the 1.5℃ warming limit came after a long push by vulnerable, small-island and least developed countries for whom reaching that goal is their best chance for survival. The were backed by other climate-vulnerable nations and a coalition of high-ambition countries.

The 1.5℃ limit wasn’t plucked from thin air – it was informed by the best available science. Between 2013 and 2015, an extensive United Nations review process determined that limiting warming to 2℃ this century cannot avoid dangerous climate change.

Since Paris, the science on 1.5℃ has expanded rapidly. An Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report in 2018 synthesised hundreds of studies and found rapidly escalating risks in global warming between 1.5℃ and 2℃.

The landmark report also changed the climate risk narrative away from a somewhat unimaginable hothouse world in 2100, to a very real threat within most of our lifetimes – one which climate action now could help avoid.

The message was not lost on a world experiencing ever more climate impacts firsthand. It galvanised an unprecedented global youth and activist movement demanding action compatible with the 1.5℃ limit.

The near-term benefits of stringent emissions reduction are becoming ever clearer. It can significantly reduce near-term warming rates and increase the prospects for climate resilient development.

The urgency of climate action is not lost on those who’ve experienced its effects firsthand. Evan Collins/AAP

A matter of probabilities

The IPCC looked extensively at emission reductions required to pursue the 1.5℃ limit. It found getting on a 1.5℃ track is feasible but would require halving global emissions by 2030 compared to 2010 and reaching net-zero emissions by mid-century.

It found no published emission reduction pathways giving the world a likely (more than 66%) chance of limiting peak warming this century to 1.5℃. But it identified a range of pathways with about a one-in-two chance of achieving this, with no or limited overshoot.

Having about a one-in-two chance of limiting warming to 1.5℃ is not ideal. But these pathways typically have a greater than 90% chance of limiting warming to well below 2℃, and so are fully compatible with the overall Paris goal.

Staying under 1.5℃ warming requires political will. Lukas Coch/AAP

Don’t rely on carbon budgets

Carbon budgets show the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted for a given level of global warming. Some point to carbon budgets to argue the 1.5℃ goal is now impossible.

But carbon budget estimates are nuanced, and not a suitable way to conclude a temperature level is no longer possible.

The carbon budget for 1.5℃ depends on several factors, including:

• the likelihood with which warming will be be halted at 1.5℃
• the extent to which non-CO₂ greenhouse emissions such as methane are reduced
• uncertainties in how the climate responds these emissions.

These uncertainties mean strong conclusions cannot be drawn based on single carbon budget estimate. And, at present, carbon budgets and other estimates do not support any argument that limiting warming to 1.5℃ is impossible.

Keeping temperature rises below 1.5℃ cannot be guaranteed, given the history of action to date, but the goal is certainly not impossible. As any doctor embarking on a critical surgery would say about a one-in-two survival chance is certainly no reason not to do their utmost.

Staying below 1.5°C is a difficult, but not impossible, task. Shutterstock

Closer than we’ve ever been

It’s important to remember the special role the 1.5℃ goal plays in how governments respond to climate change. Five years on from Paris, and the gains of including that upper ambition in the agreement are showing.

Some 127 countries aim to achieve net-zero emissions by mid-century at the latest – something considered unrealistic just a few years ago. If achieved globally and accompanied by stringent near-term reductions, the actions could be in line with 1.5℃.

If all these countries were to deliver on these targets in line with the best-available science on net zero, we may have a one-in-two chance of limiting warming this century to 2.1℃ (but a meagre one-in-ten that it is kept to 1.5°C). Much more work is needed and more countries need to step up. But for the first time, current ambition brings the 1.5℃ limit within striking distance.

The next ten years are crucial, and the focus now must be on governments’ 2030 targets for emissions reduction. If these are not set close enough to a 1.5℃-compatible emissions pathway, it will be increasingly difficult to reach net-zero by 2050.

The United Kingdom and European Union are getting close to this pathway. The United States’ new climate targets are a major step forward, and China is moving in the right direction. Australia is now under heavy scrutiny as it prepares to update its inadequate 2030 target.

The UN wants a 1.5℃ pathway to be the focus at this year’s COP26 climate summit in Glasgow. The stakes could not be higher.

Links

• ‘Failure is not an option’: after a lost decade on climate action, the 2020s offer one last chance
• The Paris Agreement
  
• Net-zero emissions targets are vague: three ways to fix
  
• Climate change is a security threat the government keeps ignoring. We’ll show up empty handed to yet another global summit
• Spot the difference: as world leaders rose to the occasion at the Biden climate summit, Morrison faltered
• More reasons for optimism on climate change than we've seen for decades: 2 climate experts explain
• The trucking industry has begun to turn electric — but passenger vehicles will take a little longer
• Inside the world of tiny phytoplankton – microscopic algae that provide most of our oxygen
• Watching a coral reef die as climate change devastates one of the most pristine tropical island areas on Earth
• Risky business: 54% of Australian companies plan to slow ‘green’ initiatives due to COVID

(AU ROAR) Cricket Must Start Preparing For Climate Change

ROAR - joss

Scott Barbour/Getty Images

There are few sports that will be hit harder by climate change than cricket.

Cricket depends on the weather in so many ways.

Even the slightest change in the overhead conditions can have a huge bearing on the outcome of a match, the type and quality of pitches produced are hugely affected by the weather, as are the players and even the very sport itself.

No one likes seeing an exciting match curtailed by rain, but what if games have to be delayed because the heat becomes too much for players to handle?

Cricket is already feeling the effects of rising temperatures.

Many fans will remember when Joe Root had to retire unwell and was hospitalised due to dehydration after just an hour at the crease during stifling 43-degree heat in the 2017-18 Ashes in Australia.

With cricket often being played at the height of summer in some of the world’s hottest countries, it is likely more and more cricketers will succumb to the effects of extreme temperatures as the planet warms up, making the sport a far worse spectacle for fans as players struggle in the scorching sun and a straight-up dangerous experience for those out on the pitch.

Other boards must follow Australia’s lead and introduce extreme heat policies to protect the people most fundamental to cricket – the players.

The widespread impacts of the climate crisis on cricket have become impossible to ignore: matches being delayed due to air pollution in Dehli, a cricket ground submerged due to flooding in Worcester, players being allowed to shower for just two minutes due to droughts in Cape Town and smoke from ravaging bushfires causing games to be abandoned in Australia.

Increased summer rainfall in England will only lead to more and more games being cancelled, with the number of rain-affected matches more than doubling since 2011.

On the other side of the coin, severe rainfall deficits threaten to tear matches away from many of the world’s greatest cricket cities, such as Cape Town, Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur, where past droughts have meant that there is barely enough water for people to live by – let alone water cricket pitches.

In 2016, a court ordered that 13 IPL games had to be moved due to a severe water crisis in Maharashtra, something that is only going to become more common in the future around the world unless cricket boards start to think of solutions.

Even Shane Warne has urged the cricketing world to start taking climate change seriously.

Preparations for the potential devastation climate change could wreak on cricket must start now – because if they don’t, then climate change will have free rein over cricket’s future.

Links

• (AU) Sport Set To Reckon With Impacts Of Climate Change, And Encouraged To Act Now
• (AU) Game, Set, Match: Calling Time On Climate Inaction
• (AU) Power Play: MCG Goes Solar In Climate-Change Fight
• Former Socceroos Captain Wants Australia To Show Climate Leadership As World Cup Host
• Climate Change: Sport Heading For A Fall As Temperatures Rise
• Climate Crisis Threatens Future Of Global Sport, Says Report
• Opinion: The Climate Crisis – Sport Is Both Victim And Sinner
• Climate Change Set To Disrupt Australia's Summer Sports Calendar 

(NY Times) Halting The Vast Release Of Methane Is Critical For Climate, U.N. Says

New York Times - Hiroko Tabuchi

A major United Nations report will declare that slashing emissions of methane, the main component of natural gas, is far more vital than previously thought.

A California oilfield, one of the densest in the United States. Credit...James Smith/Alamy

A landmark United Nations report is expected to declare that reducing emissions of methane, the main component of natural gas, will need to play a far more vital role in warding off the worst effects of climate change.

The global methane assessment, compiled by an international team of scientists, reflects a growing recognition that the world needs to start reining in planet-warming emissions more rapidly, and that abating methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas, will be critical in the short term.

It follows new data that showed that both carbon dioxide and methane levels in the atmosphere reached record highs last year, even as the coronavirus pandemic brought much of the global economy to a halt. The report also comes as a growing body of scientific evidence has shown that releases of methane from oil and gas production, one of the biggest sources of methane linked to human activity, may be larger than earlier estimates.

The report, a detailed summary of which was reviewed by The New York Times, singles out the fossil fuel industry as holding the greatest potential to cut its methane emissions at little or no cost. It also says that — unless there is significant deployment of unproven technologies capable of pulling greenhouse gases out of the air — expanding the use of natural gas is incompatible with keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, a goal of the international Paris Agreement.

The reason methane would be particularly valuable in the short-term fight against climate change: While methane is an extremely potent greenhouse gas, it is also relatively short-lived, lasting just a decade or so in the atmosphere before breaking down. That means cutting new methane emissions today, and starting to reduce methane concentrations in the atmosphere, could more quickly help the world meet its midcentury targets for fighting global warming.

By contrast, carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, lasts for hundreds of years in the atmosphere. So while it remains critical to keep reducing carbon emissions, which make up the bulk of our greenhouse gas emissions, it would take until the second half of the century to see the climate effects.

Over all, a concerted effort to reduce methane from the fossil fuel, waste and agricultural sectors could slash methane emissions by as much as 45 percent by 2030, helping to avoid nearly 0.3 degrees Celsius of global warming as early as the 2040s, the report says.

While cutting back on carbon dioxide emissions will remain urgent, “it’s going to be next to impossible to remove enough carbon dioxide to get any real benefits for the climate in the first half of the century,” said Drew Shindell, the study’s lead author and a professor of earth science at Duke University. “But if we can make a big enough cut in methane in the next decade, we’ll see public health benefits within the decade, and climate benefits within two decades,” he said.

The U.N. report, which is expected to be published next month by the Climate and Clean Air Coalition and the United Nations Environment Programme, signals a shift in the global discussion of climate change, which has focused on reducing carbon dioxide, the largest long-term driver of climate change.

Most climate policies — including net-zero targets set by nations, states and cities as well as businesses — have tended to focus on longer-term targets for reducing carbon dioxide emissions. But methane has begun to gain prominence in the global conversation.

At a climate summit in Washington this week, President Vladimir Putin of Russia, on top of pledging to “significantly” reduce the country’s emissions in the next three decades, called for a global reduction of methane. “The fate of our entire planet, the development prospects of each country, the well-being and quality of life of people largely depend on the success of these efforts,” Mr. Putin said.

Separately, the United States Senate is expected to vote next week to reverse President Donald J. Trump’s effort to unravel restrictions on methane emissions that had been put in place during the Obama administration.

“Methane gets less attention than its big bad brother, carbon dioxide, but in truth methane is like carbon dioxide on steroids,” Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, said on Thursday.

If the Senate does vote to reverse the policy, it could become the first official reinstatement of one of the many climate regulations that Mr. Trump weakened during his administration.

For scientists who have long focused on methane, its rising prominence in climate policy is a welcome development.

Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere warm the planet by acting like a blanket, trapping the sun’s heat. Carbon dioxide is the biggest driver of climate change, but methane is more potent in the shorter term, warming the atmosphere more than 80 times as much as the same amount of carbon dioxide does over a 20-year period.

That’s bad news, but it also means that cutting methane emissions may be one of the most effective ways to immediately slow rising global temperatures.

“You have a near immediate slowdown in the rate of warming,” said Ilissa B. Ocko, senior climate scientist at Environmental Defense Fund, whose own recent research found that going all-in on reducing methane emissions from the most polluting industries could slow the rate of global warming by 30 percent. “That’s really powerful.”

And while cutting down on carbon dioxide emissions will require sweeping changes to virtually every corner of the economy — replacing the world’s gasoline cars with electric ones, for example, and shuttering almost all of its coal-fired power plants — shrinking the world’s methane footprint might be an easier lift.

Unlike carbon dioxide or most other air pollution, methane isn’t released by burning fossil fuels, but comes from leaks and other releases from oil and gas infrastructure, among other sources. A growing body of research has shown that these oil and gas emissions are larger than previously thought, and a likely driver of the global increase of methane in the atmosphere.

“This means we need to place even more emphasis on the oil and gas sector,” said Robert Howarth, professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell University. He has argued that past assessments overestimated agricultural sources of methane, like cattle ranching, and underestimated emissions from fossil fuels, particularly oil and gas. “We need independent verification and monitoring of these emissions,” he said.

Fixing those leaks in theory should pay for themselves by saving money, because capturing the gas means companies capture more product. That potential makes plugging leaks from oil and gas infrastructure the most effective and cheapest way to slow emissions, the U.N. report says.

The world’s largest oil and gas companies pledged in 2018 to reduce the proportion of methane released from their operations by one fifth, to less than a quarter of a percentage of the gas they sell, by 2025 — a target the companies said they reached last year — with an ambition of achieving 0.2 percent.

Bjorn Otto Sverdrup, chairman of the executive committee of the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, which represents 12 of the world’s biggest oil and gas producers, said the group “shares the determination to reduce methane emissions.”

He added, “We have made progress on the ambitions set only a few years back through new measurement and technologies, and we will continue to update our ambitions as we make progress.”

Minimizing methane from landfills also plays a role, as does lowering methane emissions from livestock. But emissions-reduction technologies are less certain in those fields. Releases from livestock, in particular, are expected to make up a growing share of future methane emissions unless there are technological breakthroughs, or the world’s top meat consumers change their diets.

Over all, more than half of global methane emissions stem from human activities in three sectors: fossil fuels, landfill and other waste, and livestock and other agriculture. Methane also seeps from wetlands and other natural sources.

The U.N. report also underscores how reducing methane emissions may bring significant public health benefits. Methane is an important contributor to the formation of ozone near the earth’s surface. Ozone is known to increase the risk of hospitalizations and early deaths. It also reduces crop yields and forest growth.

Rolling back methane emissions would prevent more than 250,000 premature deaths, and more than 750,000 asthma-related hospital visits, each year from 2030 onward, the report finds. The lower emissions would also prevent more than 70 billion hours of lost labor from extreme heat and more than 25 million tons of crop losses a year.

The flip side is that, with no action, methane emissions may help push the world to the brink of catastrophic climate change. If left unchecked, methane emissions are projected to continue rising through at least 2040, the U.N. report predicts.

“We’re still going wildly in the wrong direction, but we can turn that around very, very quickly,” Dr. Shindell said. “We could all use a climate success story.”

Links

• People of Color Breathe More Hazardous Air. The Sources Are Everywhere.
• ‘Firefighters Out There in the Snow’: Wildfires Rage Early in Parched West
• In Opposing Climate and Diversity Proposals, Buffett Risks Looking Out of Step
• Epicurious Has a Beef With Beef
• The Science of Climate Change Explained: Facts, Evidence and Proof
• Carbon Dioxide Levels Are At A 3.6 Million Year High
• NASA Just Released The First Direct Evidence That Humans Are Causing Climate Change
• Land In Russia’s Arctic Blows ‘Like a Bottle Of Champagne’
• The Catastrophic Science Behind The Stunning Photos Of The Arctic Crater
• (AU) Methane Released In Gas Production Means Australia's Emissions May Be 10% Higher Than Reported
• (AU) Gas Is Not Transition Energy We Were Promised, New Research Suggests
• (AU) Chief Scientist Alan Finkel Fires Back On Gas Criticism From Colleagues
• (AU) 4 Reasons Why A Gas-Led Economic Recovery Is A Terrible, Naïve Idea
• (AU) Australia's Chief Scientist Is Wrong On Gas, Say Leading Experts
• (AU) Consumers Push Corporate Agriculture To Move Quickly On Zero Emissions, Leaving National Farmers Federation Target Behind