The impact of 1°C of global heating is already having devastating impacts on communities and ecosystems across the globe.
The impact of 1°C of global heating is already having devastating impacts on communities and ecosystems across the globe. An international research group that included researchers from IIASA and Japan, identified biases towards some selected carbon budgets in the current scenario literature. They propose a more comprehensive approach to systematically explore the carbon budget scenario space.
The fact that unchecked climate change will likely continue to have catastrophic impacts on communities and ecosystems in the future, has brought climate action to the forefront in societal debate, whether through youth climate strikes, business initiatives or government action. It is clear that understanding the requirements for keeping heating within acceptable limits has become essential. The state of scientific knowledge in this regard was recently assessed in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C (SR1.5). Apart from providing an assessment of the amount of CO2 that can still be emitted while keeping warming to 1.5°C relative to preindustrial levels – a concept known as “remaining carbon budgets” – the SR1.5 also described pathways with long-term societal transformations that would be consistent with staying within these limits.
According to a commentary by an international research group that included researchers from IIASA and Kyoto University, Japan, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, international model comparison studies have traditionally focused on a limited set of selected budgets around 400, 1,000 and 1,600 GtCO2 over the course of the century from 2011 to 2100. These budgets were prescribed when the studies were conducted, based on the state of the knowledge about the budget from the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) published in 2014. The authors however point out that this emphasis on a limited set of carbon budgets is problematic, since carbon budget estimates are expected to be refined and updated as time passes. Any selected point estimate of the carbon budget therefore has a shelf-time and will thus continuously run the risk of being outdated.
Read more at International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis
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