This week, the scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released the third and final instalment of their Sixth Assessment Report.
It must be difficult to get the tone right for these reports. An overly positive viewpoint might lead to a false sense of security for governments, corporates and individuals. On the other hand, paint too terrifying a picture of future destruction caused by global temperature increase and people may just run away from the problems (and the report).
So the compromise seems to be that the authors point out the seriousness of the current situation, and the track we’re on, whilst still retaining some hope that it isn’t too late (not quite) for us to cut emissions and keep warming to a more manageable level.
This latest instalment was compiled by no less than 278 scientists and draws on 8,000 studies. It certainly has some positive stories to tell – for instance, the dramatic falls in the cost of renewable energy since the last report in 2014, which is good news for everyone. The cost of solar energy per unit is down 85%, wind by 55%, and lithium-ion batteries also by 85%.
But the authors also explain that time is running out if we want to achieve the 2015 Paris goal of keeping warming to less than 2C (and ideally to less than 1.5C). Emissions must peak by 2025 for any chance of achieving the targets, and there is little sign really of that happening. And this will probably be the final IPCC report on mitigating climate change before the world is effectively locked into an emissions trajectory that means the threshold will be breached.
On the positive side, some countries have achieved a real drop in emissions over the last decade, and there are convincing solutions now in many sectors that can and will drive significant reductions. However, as Sarah Burch, a climate policy researcher at the University of Waterloo in Ontario and a lead author on the report told Scientific American, “over the past 10 years, we’ve also seen the largest increase in average global greenhouse gas emissions in human history. So emissions globally are not going down; they’re going up”. In other words, we are not globally making progress towards the stated goals; we are going backwards.
At the report’s release, United Nations Secretary General António Guterres called the document “a file of shame, cataloguing the empty pledges that put us firmly on track toward an unlivable world.” Too many countries (and businesses) are just not doing enough.
The report makes interesting comments on the ability of us as individuals to take action. In theory, individuals might be able to drive 40-70% of the total reduction in emissions needed. But the authors highlight how we are locked into a range of “high-carbon pathways”. Burch explains that “when our cities are built around internal combustion engines, when our buildings are built to low-efficiency standards or to rely on fossil fuels, when you have to live very, very far from where you work or play in order to be able to afford a home or because of the way cities are zoned—that ties your hands”.
Yes, individual action is important, but we need major changes in infrastructure design, we need government action in terms of investment and tax policy, we need more finance to drive investment in new technologies and approaches. Even where technologies exist, deployment and scaling are the keys to driving real benefits.
There is also a chapter in the report that links climate change with other sustainable development goals such as conserving nature, clean air and water, and more liveable communities. I’ve been talking about these linkages for some time now, and it is clear that a wide range of issues under the sustainability (or procurement with purpose) banner are closely linked – with potential for that linkage to be either positive or negative.
All in all, it seems to me that any light at the end of the climate tunnel is only flickering very dimly and intermittently. It would be good to think this report will be a wake-up call; but unfortunately that seems unlikely.