The climate is increasingly out of control. Four more records broken
Environment — di Andrea Barolini
CO2 in the atmosphere, average global temperature, ocean acidification and rising sea levels. The Earth's climate is in ever greater danger.
The climate is increasingly out of control. Four more records broken
CO2 in the atmosphere, average global temperature, ocean acidification and rising sea levels. The Earth's climate is in ever greater danger.
- Four key climate change indicators have reached new records.
- Global warming is increasingly evident, as are its consequences.
- United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has proposed a series of urgent measures to revive the energy transition.
In the latest report by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), entitled "State of the Global Climate 2021", four alarm bells ring out. Four negative records have indeed been broken, revealing ever more clearly how global warming is affecting the balance of the Planet. These concern the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, sea level rise, average global temperature and the degree of ocean acidification.
Greenhouse gas concentrations, sea-level rise, ocean heat levels and acidification, all set new records in 2021, while some glaciers reached the point of no return, according to the latest flagship report from @WMO
Renewable energy is our 'lifeline'.
news.un.org/en/story/2022/…
Renewable energy is our 'lifeline'.
news.un.org/en/story/2022/…
A picture that United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres commented on, describing it as a "sorry litany of humanity's failure to tackle the climate crisis". He once again urged an end to "the use of fossil fuels and an acceleration of the transition to renewable energy, if we do not want to set fire to our only home".
RT @antonioguterres
WMO #StateofClimate report is a dismal litany of humanity’s failure to tackle climate disruption.
We must end fossil fuel pollution and accelerate the renewable energy transition, before we incinerate our only home.
#ClimateAction
⏩bit.ly/3wnsYAe
WMO #StateofClimate report is a dismal litany of humanity’s failure to tackle climate disruption.
We must end fossil fuel pollution and accelerate the renewable energy transition, before we incinerate our only home.
#ClimateAction
⏩bit.ly/3wnsYAe
We are 0.39 degrees Celsius away from the threshold set by the Paris Agreement
The report confirmed in particular that the last seven years, taken as a whole, have been the warmest ever recorded since temperatures began to be measured systematically. Despite the presence of the La Niña weather phenomenon, which helps cool surface water temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, in 2021 the average global temperature was 1.11 degrees above the pre-industrial period.
The 2015 Paris Agreement made clear that we must not exceed the threshold of 2 degrees by the end of the century. But it also added that we must try to stay as close as possible to 1.5 degrees. In October 2018, moreover, the Ipcc (the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) published a report explaining in plain terms what difference that half a degree will make: it will represent the difference between a crisis and a climate catastrophe.
"The climate is changing before our eyes," commented WMO Director Petteri Taalas. "The heat trapped by anthropogenic greenhouse gases will warm the Earth for a very long time. Sea level rise and ocean acidification will continue for centuries, unless systems are invented to remove CO2 from the atmosphere."
Greenhouse gas concentrations undermine the balance of the climate
Concentrations of carbon dioxide greenhouse gas indeed peaked globally in 2020, reaching 413.2 parts per million. This represents a growth of 149 per cent compared to pre-industrial levels — that is, before humans began burning fossil fuels.
The main consequence is the inability of heat from solar radiation to dissipate beyond the atmosphere. This results in a rise in average global temperature and a progressive melting of both the polar ice caps and mountain glaciers. This mass of water then flows into seas and oceans around the world, triggering a process of rising levels that reached a new record in 2021. From 2013 to 2021, the increase averaged 4.5 millimetres per year. A considerably higher figure than that recorded in the period 1993–2002: 2.1 millimetres.
Sea levels and ocean temperatures rise
At the same time, the average temperature of the oceans also rose, likewise setting a record in 2021. All of this risks triggering a dangerous vicious circle, since the seas absorb approximately 23 per cent of annual anthropogenic CO2 emissions — a process that is useful in preventing a considerable share of greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere, but which carries a dangerous side effect: ocean acidification.
The combined effect of these four phenomena, according to the WMO, "is consistent with a world in which global warming is ubiquitous". In a video message, Guterres proposed the adoption of a series of urgent measures in an attempt to restore momentum to the transition towards renewable energy and save the climate — a transition that first the pandemic, and then the war in Ukraine, with the worsening of the energy crisis, risk severely slowing down.
At launch of WMO #StateofClimate report, @antonioguterres announced 5 ways to jump-start the switch to renewable energy.
"Fossil fuels are a dead end ... Renewables are the only path to real energy security, stable power prices & sustainable employment.
⏩bit.ly/3sI0SNM
"Fossil fuels are a dead end ... Renewables are the only path to real energy security, stable power prices & sustainable employment.
⏩bit.ly/3sI0SNM
The UN Secretary-General called specifically for improvements to access to technologies and infrastructure, for tripling private and public investment in the sector, and for eliminating the subsidies that states still grant to the fossil fuel industry — subsidies worth approximately 11 million dollars per minute.