We're Debating Climate Predictions While Rome Burn
We’re Debating Climate Predictions While Rome Burns
Either three or five degrees of warming would be catastrophic—and in both cases, we already know what we have to do.
By KATE ARONOFF at the New Republic
https://newrepublic.com/amp/article/156503/were-debating-climate-predictions-rome-burns?__twitter_impression=true
February 10, 2020
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Are we on track for a catastrophe or a meltdown? This somewhat gnat-straining debate has emerged around new modeling, some of which suggests that a much-dreaded “worst case scenario” of five degrees Celsius (nine degrees Fahrenheit) of warming by 2100 is less likely than previously thought, and some of which suggests exactly the opposite.
A recent commentary in the journal Nature argues that prior predictions of that worst-case scenario, known as RCP8.5, might be too extreme: A more likely worst case, should countries’ current milquetoast attempts to curb emissions continue, would be warming of around three degrees Celsius by 2100 rather than five, but that could eventually reach four or five degrees sometime in the next century. The piece sparked some heated exchangeson #ClimateTwitter, particularly given that other climate models are running hotter than expected, showing that the world could get warmer, sooner. For policymakers and just about anyone interested in averting catastrophe, however, the debate is tragically academic, as it doesn’t change much about the task ahead: to bring down emissions as quickly as possible.
The Nature commentary’s authors, Glen Peters and Zeke Hausfather, think it’s worth reexamining the more dire predictions. “Overstating the likelihood of extreme climate impacts can make mitigation seem harder than it actually is. This could lead to defeatism, because the problem is perceived as being out of control and unsolvable.” An exaggerated sense of urgency based on apocalyptic predictions, they add, could result in “poor planning.”
But Peters and Hausfather are also quick to point out that they aren’t suggesting that people relax or be optimistic about what a three-degree-warmed world would look like. “We cannot settle for 3°C,” they write, calling even this lower option “a catastrophic outcome.” Such warming would bring mass displacement, dire threats to global food supplies, and a dramatic uptick in deadly disasters. For Caribbean and small island states, average droughts would stretch on for 21 months; in Northern Africa, they could last for five years. “The need to limit warming to 1.5°C, as made clear in the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]’s 2018 special report, does not depend on having a 5°C counterpoint.”
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