Time is Running Out
Scientists estimate that limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C would reduce the odds of initiating the most dangerous and irreversible effects of climate change.
Time is Running Out
Scientists estimate that limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C would reduce the odds of initiating the most dangerous and irreversible effects of climate change.
The Climate Emergency
The climate emergency is here! And it is happening more quickly than most scientists anticipated a few years ago. The adverse effects of climate change are much more severe than expected. There is evidence that extreme weather frequency is linked to the intensity of climate change. In 2020, one of the hottest years on record, we experienced:
- Major wildfire activity in California, Australia and in the Amazon
- A Siberian summer with record temperatures exceeding 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit within the Arctic circle
- A record low for October Arctic sea ice reach of 2.04 million square miles
- An Atlantic hurricane season resulting in more than $46b of damage, and
- Floods in South East Asia displacing more than 12 million people.
Scientists now believe that catastrophic climate change could render a significant portion of the Earth uninhabitable as a consequence of continued high emissions, self-reinforcing climate feedback loops and looming tipping points. We must reduce emissions and increase removals of greenhouse gases in order to restore the melting Arctic and end the deadly cycle of damage that the current climate is delivering.

As a result of global warming, we see ever more destructive atlantic hurricane seasons. In 2020 resulting in more than $46b of economic damage.

1.5 degrees Celsius
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change – recommends that the world should attempt to limit global warming to 1.5°C compared with pre-industrial levels to reduce the challenging impacts on ecosystems, human health and well-being.
“The good news is that a 1.5-degree pathway is technically achievable. The bad news is that the math is daunting. Such a pathway would require dramatic emissions reductions over the next ten years—starting now.”
“The good news is that a 1.5-degree pathway is technically achievable. The bad news is that the math is daunting. Such a pathway would require dramatic emissions reductions over the next ten years—starting now.”
McKinsey, 2020
Good News
We must cut the planet’s emissions by 50% by 2030 and achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 to align to a 1.5 degrees pathway. A re-invigorated Paris Agreement with the United States at its heart and where governments set more ambitious emissions goals, combined with an accelerated energy transition to renewable energy gives us the opportunity to slow the climate emergency.
Accelerating the energy transition off fossil fuels is fundamental. Re-building the global economy after covid-19 offers developed countries the opportunity to transition to 100% renewable energy faster and developing countries the chance to leapfrog over fossil fuel-driven power. Together, we can fully decarbonize our electricity systems and buildings using solar and wind power; we can help industry recover from this recession with less of a thirst for fossil fuels; and encourage people with the means to buy a vehicle, choose electric. But for the planet to get to 50% decarbonization by 2030 will take more.

Accelerating the energy transition off fossil fuels is fundamental.
“Even after accounting for ongoing reforestation efforts, deforestation today claims an area close to the size of Greece every year. Achieving a 1.5-degree pathway would mean dramatically slowing this.”
“Even after accounting for ongoing reforestation efforts, deforestation today claims an area close to the size of Greece every year. Achieving a 1.5-degree pathway would mean dramatically slowing this.”
McKinsey, 2020
Rainforests -A Critical Climate Solution
Tropical rainforests and land are a critical climate solution that our countries offer to the world, and without which our climate goals will not be possible. Combining an energy transition with our planet’s natural solutions gives us the best shot at aligning to the elusive 1.5 degrees C pathway in time. Rainforests are one of the largest and most cost-effective emission reduction opportunities for the planet. And our coalition represents billions of acres of those rainforests and carbon reductions. From Papua New Guinea to the world’s second largest rainforest in the Congo Basin to central America – our rain forests absorb and store the greenhouse gases that the world emits and stops them from entering the atmosphere to create global warming.

McKinsey & Company
McKinsey offer three scenarios to reaching our climate goals – and all require the curbing of global deforestation immediately.
“Deforestation—quite often linked to agricultural practices, but not exclusively so—is one of the largest carbon-dioxide emitters, accounting for nearly 15 percent of global CO2 emissions. Deforestation’s outsize impact stems from the fact that removing a tree both adds emissions to the atmosphere (most deforestation today involves clearing and burning) and removes that tree’s potential as a carbon sink. Even after accounting for ongoing reforestation efforts, deforestation today claims an area close to the size of Greece every year. Achieving a 1.5-degree pathway would mean dramatically slowing this. By 2030, if all fossil-fuel emissions were rapidly reduced (as in our first scenario), and all sectors of the economy pursued rapid decarbonization, deforestation would still need to fall about 75 percent. In the other two scenarios, where reduced deforestation serves to help counteract slower decarbonization elsewhere, deforestation would need to be nearly halted as early as 2030. Either outcome would require a combination of actions (including regulation, enforcement, and incentives such as opportunity-cost payments to farmers),” McKinsey, 2020