1.5°C threshold likely to be breached by 2030: Experts

IPCC co-chair Hans-Otto Pörtner said only a massive mobilisation towards transformation of energy use, industry, infrastructure, society and how we deal with ecosystems will keep that limit within reach

New Delhi: The 1.5 degree C threshold for global warming, the redline as far as the climate crisis is concerned, may be breached as early as the end of the current decade, two Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s co-chairs said.

1.5 (and it is often just referred to as just that) may have still had a chance if the COP27 climate conference that recently ended agreed to emissions peaking by 2025 (put forth by the EU, UK and supported by small island nations), but the proposal found a few takers (AFP)

Hans-Otto Pörtner, IPCC co-chair said: “Co-chairs do not hold a crystal ball but clearly the chances are already high and increasing daily that we shall miss holding warming to that important limit. Only a massive mobilisation towards transformation of energy use, industry, infrastructure, society and how we deal with ecosystems will keep that limit within reach. With unabated emission, 1.5°C warming will be passed around the end of this decade and may be reached during individual years even earlier.”

Co-chair, Debra Roberts added: “The best available science assessed by the IPCC indicates that the world will most likely reach 1.5°C global warming in the period 2021-2040.”

IPCC conducts regular assessments of climate science and identifies where there is agreement in the scientific community on topics related to climate change.

Breaching the threshold -- it is the extent by which the world will warm from pre-industrial levels -- pushes the world into dangerous territory triggering several tipping points. To be sure, there was never a pragmatic chance of keeping global warming below this benchmark, the primary and most sacred goal of the Paris climate agreement of 2015 which aimed to limit global warming to well below 2, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius. But it was retained simply because abandoning it was tantamount to accepting defeat. On the basis of the latest Nationally Determined Contributions, for instance, the world is expected to warm by 2.4 to 2.7 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels by the end of this century as per United Nations Environment Programme’s Emissions Gap Report. But 1.5 degrees is important in other ways as well.

“1.5°C global warming represents the transition into a high-risk future for humankind and nature. Every effort is justified to keep global warming below that limit. However, the required political effort and societal mobilisation becomes massive, due to delays caused by barriers and short-sighted resistance, such that scepticism concerning feasibility is on the rise,” said Portner.

“The science is clear. We are not on track to limit global warming to 1.5°C,” he added.

Representatives of IPCC member governments meet one or more times a year in Plenary Sessions of the Panel. They elect a Bureau of scientists for the duration of an assessment cycle. The Co-Chairs and Vice-Chairs of each Working Group form the Bureau of every IPCC Working Group.

1.5 (and it is often just referred to as just that) may have still had a chance if the COP27 climate conference that recently ended agreed to emissions peaking by 2025 (put forth by the EU, UK and supported by small island nations), but the proposal found a few takers. This was mainly because peaking by 2025 devoid of the required climate finance, technology sharing by developed nations would stifle development in developing and poor countries, negotiators said.

There was much wrangling at COP27 with negotiators failing to find consensus pushing talks overnight around this unrealistic goal and a few other issues such as Loss and Damage, phaseout/ phasedown of fossil fuels and climate finance. Still, the Sharm El Sheikh Implementation Plan agreed to on November 20 said that the impacts of climate change will be much lower at the temperature increase of 1.5 degree C compared with 2 degree C and resolved to pursue further efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degree C.

The agreement made in the early hours of November 20 does capture the scale of what is needed to achieve this goal. It states that limiting global warming to 1.5 degree C requires rapid, deep and sustained reductions in global greenhouse gas emissions of 43% by 2030 relative to the 2019 level. In comparison, emissions, if accounted based on implementation of all latest nationally determined contributions, are estimated to be 0.3% below the 2019 level, the plan states.

With time running out and the 1.5 degree C seeming imminent now, there was a stronger push by developed countries to push for steep mitigation efforts for all countries while obscuring concepts of historical responsibility and differentiation among developed and developing countries according to negotiators.

There was further undermining of trust as developed countries continued to have a partial view on gas and oil and to continue their use as they are dependent on those fuels compared to coal which is primary for developing nations.

“Every report shows 1.5 degree C is unlikely now. It should have made the centre stage of conversation at COP27. But that did not happen,” said Sunita Narain, director general, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) at a webinar on unpacking the key outcomes from COP 27 organised by Centre for Policy Research last Wednesday.

The rich countries postured to champion the cause of 1.5 degree C at COP27 and rued that developing nations were not doing enough to keep global warming under 1.5 degree C. On November 20 at the closing plenary of COP27 after nightlong negotiations to reach compromise, EU Climate Policy Chief, Frans Timmermans made a long and emotive speech about his disappointment in pushing through stronger mitigation goals. “There were too many attempts to even rollback on Glasgow. Some are afraid to transition ahead…” he said.

To say, developing nations are not showing ambition to meet the 1.5 degree C goal is wrong on many counts, explained experts. The remaining carbon budget for a 50% likelihood to limit global warming to 1.5 degree C has reduced to 380 GtCO2 which may be exceeded in the next nine years which needs to be divided equitably because most of the carbon budget has already been consumed disproportionately by the rich countries. “At the current rate, in less than ten years the world could blow through its chances of staying within 1.5 C of global warming. More than half of this damage was done before 1990 when economies like India started to develop. Even now, India’s emissions are rising from a low base compared to other large economies, and the average Indian’s emissions are a fraction of the European or American,” Ulka Kelkar, Director of the Climate Program, World Resources Institute said on November 10.

A related argument put forward by developing countries is that based on fair share, the rich countries must achieve carbon neutrality well before 2030 to facilitate equitable distribution of the remaining carbon budget. A non-paper presented by the Egypt Presidency of COP27 spoke of the depleting carbon budget and the need for developed countries to attain net-negative emissions by 2030. These provisions were soon removed in draft decision cover texts thereafter due to push back from developed countries.