Climate Change Worse Than Expected, UN Report Finds

Topline

Human-driven climate change is already causing widespread devastation and the world has a “brief and rapidly closing window to secure a liveable future,” according to the latest assessment of climate science by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published Monday, that builds on the group’s landmark report conclusively linking human activity and climate change.

A local resident reacts to a large blaze during an attempt to extinguish forest fires in Greece.

AFP via Getty Images

Key Facts

The report found that the world is likely to reach 1.5C of warming within the next 20 years, even in the best-case scenario of deep emissions cuts and the effects will be more severe than previous estimates.

At current levels, climate change caused by human action has already led to widespread, dangerous and possibly irreversible damage including water shortages, extreme heat, melting ice caps and glaciers, wildfires and flooding, the IPCC panel warned.

Some 3.3 billion people—around half the global population—live in areas classed as “highly vulnerable” to climate change, the group said, and millions already face food and water shortages due to climate change.

The changing climate is already driving mass die-offs in species of corals and trees, the group warned, and up to 14% of land species will likely face a high risk of extinction by 1.5C warming.

While human society can adapt to climate change, current efforts are fragmented and uneven, especially among the world’s poorest and the authors said “ambitious, accelerated action” is needed to mitigate loss of life and environment.

Though most resources are devoted towards adaptation, the authors caution it can only “mitigate within limits,” urging concerted action alongside rapid and deep cuts to greenhouse gas emissions.

Key Background

The IPCC compiles a new “assessment report” on the state of climate change research roughly every six or seven years. The reports are considered the most up-to-date and comprehensive overviews of the field and involve hundreds of experts. This publication is the second of three installments making up the group’s sixth assessment report. The first, published ahead of the COP26 climate conference in August, examined the science of climate change. For the first time, the group said it was “unequivocal” that humans are driving climate change and said drastic action would be needed to prevent global warming above the 1.5C limit set by the Paris climate agreement, though warned many changes were likely “irreversible.”

What To Watch For

Political action. IPCC reports tend to form the basis of major climate decisions around the world. Previous reports have been tied to major policy developments like the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1990, the Kyoto Protocol in 1995 and the Paris Agreement in 2013-14, and the first installment of this report featured heavily at the COP26. As it covers the real world impact of climate change, this part of the sixth report is likely to be politically sensitive.

Crucial Quote

“An atlas of human suffering and a damning indictment of failed climate leadership.” That’s how UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres described the report. “The facts are undeniable. This abdication of leadership is criminal. The world’s biggest polluters are guilty of arson of our only home.”

Surprising Fact

As well as the many physical health impacts of climate change, the report, for the first time, mentions the impact it has on mental health, including from increasing temperature, trauma from extreme weather and climate events and the loss of livelihood and culture. Mental health challenges are “expected to increase” alongside further global warming, the group said, particularly for children, adolescents and the elderly.