Drastic action is required to avoid dramatic climate change over the next century, an annual UN report says — action that the world’s biggest polluters continue not to take.
According to the United Nations’ annual “emissions gap” report, which was released Tuesday, the globe is on track to warm by as much as 3.9 degrees Celsius (7 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels by 2100.
That’s well over the 1.5-2 degree Celsius (2.7-3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) ceiling that was set as the agreed-upon goal in the Paris climate accord.
Severe reductions are needed in carbon emissions worldwide, the report found.
In order to meet the Paris accord’s 1.5 degree Celsius goal, global emissions would have to drop 7.6% annually from 2020 to 2030, the report found, a dramatic departure from the 1.5 rise annually that’s occurred, on average, over the past decade.
“[Greenhouse gas] emissions have grown every year since the global financial crisis in 2009, with only slightly lower growth in 2015 due to big declines in coal use in both the United States of America and China,” the report observed.
To meet the 2 degree Celsius goal, emissions would have to drop 2.7% annually for the next decade, the report found.
After declining for years, U.S. emissions spiked in 2018. President Donald Trump, who’s said climate change is a “hoax” and employs climate science deniers throughout his administration, wasted no time in withdrawing from the Paris climate accord, which requires countries to wait three years after joining before backing out.
That three-year mark came earlier this month. After formally notifying the United Nations of the United States’ intent to withdraw from the agreement — there is a one-year waiting period for the withdrawal to take effect — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the Trump administration “will continue to work with our global partners to enhance resilience to the impacts of climate change and prepare for and respond to natural disasters.”
Most Americans should either put away their car keys or find ways to not look their children and grandchildren in the eye.
Greta Thunberg says what???
There is no way the world will start driving less or dramatically change its energy consumption without us being offered a better alternative. It doesn’t have to be what we’re doing now, consumers seldom foresee what they will want in the future…
“ “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”. Henry Ford
I know people some people will hate this, but historically, changes in the use of energy have come from new technologies disrupting old paradigms. I don’t see how this problem gets solved other than with a shift to some sort of clean energy or some technologies that disrupt our current use of fossil fuels. I really think that attacking consumption or expecting major changes in consumption without offering something equal or better is fruitless.
You are correct. The problem, of course, is that not only is the government not promoting those increasingly affordable technologies, the current Neanderthals are trying to take us back to the coal age. Imagine where we would be if the Kochs and all of the oil extraction industries did not control a majority of our elected reps. Imagine where we could be if we actually started thinking beyond the next election cycle.
The future is weeping.
Haven’t you heard, America lives in a Fox News/Fossil Fuel Bubble separate from the rest of the world. Nothing to worry about in this report. It only applies to Planet Earth, not America. Nothing to see. MAGA. Move along to your lifeboat.