Are we too late to save the planet from cataclysmic climate change? Maybe.
Given the increasing numbers of electric vehicles on the road, rapidly
declining cost of renewable energy, and fresh discussion about our warming
planet, one would think that humanity was on track to change how it produces
and consumes energy. Even climate naysayers have essentially been discredited
and excluded from debates on the future of the planet. Despite these profound
changes, we are dangerously close to missing key targets in the battle to get
global warming under control.
اضافة اعلان
According to new findings, we have likely missed the
primary target of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. The goal of the
Paris Agreement, which is the world’s most ambitious piece of climate change
legislation, is to limit global warming to below 1.5 degrees Celsius compared
to pre-industrial levels. While technically possible, scientists suspect that
we will not manage to achieve this target. The results could be catastrophic.
Last month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC), a UN -led panel of scientists and scholars, released
its final report and the findings were harrowing.
Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary general,
announced the panel’s findings by saying that “we are on a pathway to global
warming of more than double the 1.5-degree Celsius limit”.
The IPCC was crucial to the creation of the 1.5
warming target and convincing the world of its necessity. If we fail to reach
this target, the IPCC conclusively demonstrated, the consequences in terms of
drought, rising ocean levels, and other climate catastrophes will be dire.
The creation of the 1.5 warming target enabled the
rise of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing, diversification
of corporate assets, and a spike in interest in renewables. It has not all been
rosy though. One could write several pieces about the failure of international
cooperation on climate change. The US, under president Donald Trump, famously
withdrew its support of the Paris Agreement, which would have spelled the end
of the agreement before it really began. The last UN Climate Change Conference
(COP 26) was also weighed down with geopolitical infighting regarding the best
paths forward to achieve tangible climate targets. Recent spikes in the price
of oil and the energy implications of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine conclusively
demonstrate the international community’s reliance on fossil fuels. Sales of
Teslas might be through the roof, but most people still rely on fossil
fuel-guzzling internal combustion engines. In other words, we still have not
hit peak oil.
… the global conversation around climate change has never been so vibrant and far reaching. Our collective consciousness about climate change has been switched on unlike at any other point in human history. People across societies and classes are aware of the consequences of inaction.
With the scientific community ringing the warning
bell on warming targets, we have to ask some difficult questions. Like what
does missing the Paris Agreement’s warming target mean for continued climate
initiatives?
Despite the failings of international cooperation,
there are opportunities to be found in the dire news about the 1.5 degree
warming target. For one thing, the global conversation around climate change
has never been so vibrant and far reaching. Our collective consciousness about
climate change has been switched on unlike at any other point in human history.
People across societies and classes are aware of the consequences of inaction.
This is important given what needs to change.
Meeting warming targets will require unheard of investments in new energy
technologies. This also means that existing energy infrastructure dependent on
coal, oil, and natural gas would need to be taken offline before their
scheduled decommission dates.
From an economic standpoint such an action would be
counterintuitive. Given the cost involved, the only way that such actions would
be carried out is with ample political cooperation and the institutional
capacity of countries. The only way to truly affect change is through the power
and cooperation of nations, not individuals.
This unavoidable reality is counter to the marketing
from renewable energy companies and electric vehicle manufacturers that are
selling a vision of the future in which individual decisions can transform
climate change. It is wonderful that people are buying electric cars and
outfitting their homes with solar panels, but these actions alone will do
nothing to alter the actual direction of the climate.
Whether we like it or not, only nations can make
(and pay for) the historic changes that will meaningfully alter our climate
prospects. Certain nations have much more sway over the direction of the fight.
If China, for example, were to introduce new residential development guides
that required renewable energy infrastructure, that would have a profound
effect on the amount of carbon the world releases into the atmosphere. Such a
serious government step would dwarf individual efforts.
Given the state of the international community
today, this should give us pause but at least the path forward is clear. The
Paris Agreement was bound to fail but the renewed conversation it spurred could
be transformed into an agreement that works. This is what we need to focus on
going into the next COP meetings in Egypt and the UAE.
The writer is the senior editor of Exponential View, a
weekly newsletter about technology and its impact on society. He was formerly
the editor-in-chief of emerge85, a lab exploring change in emerging markets and
its global impact.
Read more Opinion and Analysis
Jordan News
.jpg)
.jpg)
