World heading to ‘uncharted territories of destruction’

GBNEWS24DESK//

The world’s chances of avoiding the worst ravages of climate breakdown are diminishing rapidly, as we enter “uncharted territory of destruction” through our failure to cut greenhouse gas emissions and take the actions needed to stave off catastrophe, leading scientists have said.

The report, led by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), warns that the world is “going in the wrong direction” on climate change.

With greenhouse gas concentrations continuing to rise in the atmosphere and world leaders failing to adopt strategies to hold global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures, the earth is inching closer to dangerous climate tipping points, the United in Science report says.

“Heatwaves in Europe. Colossal floods in Pakistan…There is nothing natural about the new scale of these disasters,” UN secretary-general António Guterres said.

Despite a dip in emissions during coronavirus lockdowns, planet-warming emissions have since soared beyond pre-pandemic levels. Preliminary data reveal that global carbon dioxide emissions in the first half of this year were 1.2 percent higher than during the same period in 2019, the report finds.

The global average temperature has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average. And scientists expect the annual average could be anywhere between 1.1C and 1.7C warmer up to 2026 – meaning there’s a chance we could pass the 1.5C warming threshold in the next five years.

By the end of the century, without aggressive climate action, global warming is estimated to reach 2.8C.

The ocean current that moves heat from the tropics into the northern hemisphere is now at its slowest in 1,000 years – jeopardizing historic weather patterns, says the report, which includes contributions from the UN Environment Programme and UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Nearly half the world’s population is considered highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. By the 2050s, over 1.6 billion city-dwellers will regularly swelter through three-month average temperatures of at least 35C (95F).