Climate change. Global concern or neutral topic?

2022 has started strong with many active events on the climate agenda attracting global attention and expectations. Volcano eruptions, barrages, winter storms and wildfires have featured events that were on the “very intense” side in their respective scales. Impact on affected people´s daily lives was strong and disturbing as it could be expected. These are just some recent examples of the phenomena we will have to deal with and live with in the days to come, anywhere, anytime.

It appears as if the occurrence of nature related outbreaks will become the norm and not the exception. Common sense and a little honesty will make us believe that our societies are not prepared to face that scenario. Given the fact that uncertainty largely exceeds our preparedness to properly identify and act upon the related circumstances, it looks appropriate to make a serious appraisal of the existing situation to handle an undesired but possible occurrence and to reinforce the mindset about its management. Mankind is threatened to disappear by its own created acts and omissions. (1)

Global warming is what the ecophilosopher Timothy Morton calls a hyperobject, a concept that is too large to be adequately comprehended by human beings. Its scale is not just world-historical but geological, and though it is already very bad, it will only fulfill its catastrophic potential many lifetimes from now. Its effects are distributed unequally; what I experience as an ambient stressor may cause strangers to suffer or die. Global warming suggests that humans are powerful enough to destroy the world but too weak to stop it. Though we are driven toward world-changing innovation, we are inflexible, fearful of abandoning the destructive comforts we once saw as progress — our cars, our meats, our free next-day deliveries. (2)

Governments have identified the need to act, are getting together at least to discuss among themselves and to define strategies and actionable solutions. Commitments, funding and delivering will follow, with little time if any to spare.

Therefore, there is urgent need to have clear positions in the very fundamental concepts. Answers to:

· Does mankind have a clear strategy in place to deal with these issues?

· How will these incidents affect our life going forward?

· Are the right communication programs in place to effectively engage the different communities in their respective protection programs?

need to be an integral part of a bold, organized and fast moving set of solutions. Otherwise, the last question: are the different societies addressing climate change as a global concern issue or just as a neutral topic? will have an answer that will not drive humanity to the desired result.

Let´s describe a general overview of the present situation and outline a likely scenario based on commitments and analysis recently made.

There are plenty of climate themes to watch in 2022. 2021 had the United States back in the Paris agreement and launched a new plan to green America and closed with an action-packed COP26 UN climate summit that achieved both a lot and far too little. In the meanwhile, stark warnings came about future levels of warming, an onslaught of devastating extreme weather events from fires to floods, soaring carbon markets, a load of net-zero commitments from nations, regions and the private sector, and a global energy crunch.

Here is a summary list of outstanding numbers to remember last year by. (1)

· 49.6°C: the record temperature in Lytton, in British Columbia, Canada, on June. A wildfire promptly burned the village to the ground, making Lytton the tragic icon of an unprecedented heatwave that affected the entire North American Pacific Northwest. Climate modellers declared the heatwave so extraordinary that it challenged their understanding of the physics of heatwaves, and concluded that it would not have taken place without human greenhouse-gas emissions. This was only one of the extreme weather events of the year. Among others,devastating floods in northern Europe also showed that rich countries are not immune to the blunt end of climate impacts.

· 90%: the proportion of global GDP now covered by a net-zero emissions target, corresponding to 88% of emissions and 85% of global population. Net-zero targets have become all the rage. They should be both celebrated and taken with a fistful of salt. The “net” is key: countries, cities, regions and companies promise to eliminate the bulk of their emissions while leaving themselves room to offset what they cannot disappear. Strictly speaking, by the middle of the century these offsets will need to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and tuck them away somewhere for all of eternity, or near enough. There are broadly two ways of doing this: through photosynthesis (in which case the plants must be jealously protected) or technology, which leads neatly on to:

· 1,200: the estimated tonnes of carbon dioxide that have been extracted from the atmosphere by Orca, the world’s largest carbon dioxide removal plant, since it was switched on in early September. Orca was built to remove 4,000 tonnes of CO2 each year. The gas is fizzed into water and pumped into Iceland’s volcanic bedrock where it crystallizes. Climate models suggest billions of tonnes of CO2-removal will be necessary in the second half of the century to meet the Paris targets. What is less clear is who will pay.

· 4.9% (+/-0.8): the projected growth in emissions from burning fossil fuels in 2021, relative to 2020. After a 5.4% drop in 2019, caused by global lockdowns, emissions rebounded.

· €88.88: the price of putting a tonne of CO2 in the atmosphere in Europe on December 8th. This marked the first time that the elusive $100-a-tonne mark, which many believe is needed to incentivise net-zero pledges, was reached. It was a fleeting landmark. As December rolled on, prices dropped slightly.

· 611%: roughly the increase in European gas prices in 2021. This was before the Russian invasion of Ukraine launched prices even higher starting 2022. The end of the year was marked by a staggering global energy crunch, with Europe (including Britain) particularly badly hit. The leap in prices revealed that the world remains poorly prepared for a transition to an energy system that is primarily powered by renewable sources.

· 17bn-20bn: the gap, in tonnes of CO2, between the emissions reductions that are built into COP26 climate pledges for the next decade (relative to 2010 levels) and the reductions needed to give the world a good chance of avoiding more than 1.5°C of global warming. This discrepancy highlights the shortcomings of global climate negotiations. Put bluntly: the primary goal of governments headed to COP26 was to find ways of slashing emissions enough by 2030, to put the Paris goals within reach, and on that front they (mostly) failed. The Glasgow Climate Pact requires them to try again, harder, by COP27 in November 2022.

· 2.4°C: the warming above pre-industrial temperatures that is projected for 2100 if governments deliver on all the COP26 promises they made.

· 1.09°C: the global mean temperature for 2021, relative to the 1850-1900 average, based on data from January to September.

The above mentioned topics are just the starting point of a 2022 year which has had a rough start and its forecast looks even grimmer due to the impact that recent geo-political constraints will have in energy (gas in particularly) availability, pricing and everyday life for the time the war lasts.

Here is a summary list of the outstanding numbers for this year.

· 40°C: "It's amazing": Antarctica hit by an exceptional heat wave. Temperatures up to 40°C higher than normal for the season were recorded last week on the white continent. (3)

· 1.5-2.0°C: The third volume of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2022 report was just recently released. The final text, after all, goes on to inform policymaking and forms the background against which countries will negotiate on climate issues for years to come. This volume takes a detailed look at climate mitigation—that is, what the world can do in order to stop temperatures rising above certain levels, and thus stave off some of the worst consequences of climate change. It lays out multiple socio-economic paths giving the most attention to actions that will avoid more than 1.5°C or 2°C of warming above pre-industrial levels by 2100.

· 2025: The report concludes that to have a 50% chance of meeting either goal, global greenhouse-gas emissions will have to peak in the next three years, by 2025. Fossil fuels would have to be phased down at unprecedented scale and speed. Pursuing 1.5°C will require coal use to drop by 95%, oil by 60% and gas by 45% by 2050. While that may seem like a tall order—and it is—the IPCC is also careful to note that the last decade has seen a massive reduction in the cost of many technologies at the core of decarbonisation, most notably solar and wind energy.

· $25trn: If the world economy fails to decarbonise, it will not be because of the cost. The gross investment needed to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 can seem enormous: a cumulative $275trn. But over a period of decades the world would have had to replace its cars, gas boilers and power plants anyway. So the additional spending needed to go green is in fact much smaller: $25trn. Spread that over many years and compare it to global GDP and it looks significant but manageable, peaking at 1.4% between 2026 and 2035. The challenge of getting to net zero, therefore, is not primarily budgetary but structural: how do you design politically viable policies to ensure the transition actually happens? (4)

At COP26, the United Nations climate summit held in Glasgow in November 2021, world leaders spoke movingly about the dangers of climate change, and the need for everyone to pull together to avert them. They then squabbled bitterly about who should do, and pay for, more. The refusal of some countries to give up coal almost derailed the talks at the last minute. Unsurprisingly, reports from the IPCC’s plenary suggest these debates are still live.

In one sense, the IPCC’s most recent findings are a cause for optimism, reiterating the idea that Paris goals are achievable, albeit difficult, so long as the right action is taken. The question, as ever, is whether it will be. (5)

We are well into 2022 facing a plethora of issues of many types, societies living in the times of ignorant surprise and unpreparedness. You name it, health issues (COVID pandemic), military invasion (Ukraine), adaptation to a “new normal” way of life, economic disruption and supply chain disengagement; most of them unexpected and seriously affecting people´s lives, globally. These require plenty of energy, strategy and funding to be coped with, in line with its importance and relevance.

However, we still have to give a reasonable answer to the previously asked fundamental question. Threat or joke: are the different societies addressing climate change as a global concern issue or just as another neutral topic? IPCC´s recent conclusions can set up a positive mood. But a positive answer is urgently needed.

(1) The Economist. The Climate Issue, Christmas edition 2021.

(2) The New York Times. Feb. 6, 2022, The End Is Near. What’s Your Hurry? @amandahess

(3) Le Monde. Publié le 22 mars 2022 à 03h23 - Audrey Garric

(4) The Economist. The Climate Issue, Mar. 26, 2022.

(5) The Economist. The Climate Issue, Apr. 4, 2022.