Key findings
√ Human-induced climate change continues to cause dangerous and widespread disruption in nature. It is affecting the lives of billions of people around the world. This is despite efforts to reduce the risks. People and ecosystems least able to cope are being hardest hit.
√ Approximately 3.3 to 3.6 billion people live in areas that are highly vulnerable to climate change
√ Even if the target of 1.5°C set by Paris Agreement on Climate Change is reached, there will still be serious and irreversible consequences around the world.
√ Governments can do more to act. However, if global warming rises to 1.5°C, there will be limits to the ability to adapt.
√ Disadvantaged and impoverished populations are already the hardest hit by the effects of climate change. This is likely to continue.
√ A billion more people will be at risk from coastal specific climate hazards in the next few decades.
√ If high emissions continue, natural disasters will cause 250,000 unnecessary deaths a year.
√ If temperatures rise to between 1.7 and 1.8°C above the 1850s level, half the human population could be exposed to life-threatening climatic risk.
√ If warming reaches 4°C, half of all plants and animals assessed will be threatened with extinction.
√ The likelihood is that southern and eastern Australia will experience more droughts and extreme fire events. Eastern capitals of Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne may see 600 heat-waves caused deaths a year between 2031 and 2080, and the number of days with temperatures over 35°C may increase up to 350 percent by 2090.
Our atmosphere today is on steroids, doped by fossil fuels. This is already leading to stronger, longer and more frequent extreme weather events.
Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization.
Today’s IPCC report is an atlas of human suffering and a damning indictment of failed climate leadership…This abdication of leadership is criminal. The world’s biggest polluters are guilty of arson of our only home… Nearly half of humanity is living in the danger zone – now. Many ecosystems are at the point of no return – now. As climate impacts worsen – and they will – scaling up investments will be essential for survival… Delay means death.
You cannot claim to be green while your plans and projects undermine the 2050 net-zero target and ignore the major emissions cuts that must occur this decade. People see through this smokescreen.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres
In our articles of 30 August and 6 September 2021, we discussed the contents of the report titled “Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis” issued on 7 August 2021 and prepared by the Working Group I of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC is an intergovernmental body of the United Nations, created to provide policymakers with regular scientific assessments on climate change, its risks, and adaptation and mitigation options. The key findings contained in that the report were:
√ Human activity is the main cause of the warming the atmosphere, ocean and land;
√ Greenhouse gas concentrations have continued to increase in the atmosphere;
√ Many weather and climate systems in every region across the globe are adversely affected and have become intensified, including heat waves, heavy precipitation, droughts and tropical cyclones;
√ Global surface temperature will continue to rise until at least the mid-century;
√ Global warming of 1.5°C and 2°C will be exceeded during the 21st century unless deep reductions in carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gas emissions occur in the coming decades;
√ Many changes in the climate system become larger with increased global warming. These include increases in the frequency and intensity of: (i) hot extremes, marine heatwaves, and heavy precipitation; (ii) agricultural and ecological droughts in some regions; (iii) intense tropical cyclones; and (iv) reductions in Arctic sea ice, snow cover and permafrost;
√ Heating of the climate system has caused global sea level rise through ice loss on land and thermal expansion from ocean warming;
√ Continued global warming is projected to further intensify the global water cycle, including its variability, global monsoon precipitation and the severity of wet and dry events;
√ With increasing CO2 emissions, the ocean and land carbon sinks are projected to be less effective at slowing the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere; and
Many changes due to past and future greenhouse gas emissions are irreversible for centuries to millennia, especially changes in the ocean, ice sheets and global sea level.
Six months later, on 27 February 2022, the IPCC issued its latest report titled “Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability”. It was prepared by Working Group II comprising 270 experts from 67 countries, and benefitted from comments from over 62,000 experts as well as governments.
In today’s article, we provide highlights of the report.
Observed and projected impacts and risks
Human-induced climate change continues to cause widespread adverse impacts, losses and damage to nature and people. These impacts, which have become more frequent and intense, include heat-related deaths, warm-water coral bleaching and mortality, and increased drought-related tree mortality. Some of these impacts are irreversible as natural and human systems are pushed beyond their ability to adapt. Across sectors and regions, the most vulnerable people and systems are disproportionately affected. Approximately 3.3 to 3.6 billion people live in areas that are highly vulnerable to climate change.
Adverse impacts from tropical cyclones have increased due to sea level rise and increase in heavy precipitation as well as ocean acidification. Substantial damage in terrestrial, freshwater and coastal and open ocean marine ecosystems have been observed. Approximately half of the species assessed globally have shifted either towards the earth’s poles or to higher elevations on land. Hundreds of losses of species have been caused by increases in the magnitude of heat extremes. Other impacts are approaching irreversibility, such as those relating to hydrological changes from retreating glaciers, and the changes in some mountain and Arctic ecosystems driven by permafrost thaw.
Global warming reaching 1.5°C in the near-term (2021-2040) will cause unavoidable increases in multiple climate hazards and present multiple risks to ecosystems and humans. Limiting global warming to close to 1.5°C would substantially reduce projected losses and damage in human systems and ecosystems but cannot eliminate them all. In the long-term (2041-2100) and depending on the level of global warming, climate change will lead to numerous risks to natural and human systems. For 127 identified key risks, assessed mid- and long-term impacts are likely to be several times higher than currently observed.
Climate change impacts and risks are becoming increasingly complex and more difficult to manage. Multiple climate hazards will occur simultaneously, and multiple climatic and non-climatic risks will interact, resulting in compounding overall risk as well as those across sectors and regions. Some responses to climate change result in new impacts and risks.
If global warming exceeds 1.5°C in the coming decades or later, then many human and natural systems will face additional severe risks, compared to remaining below 1.5°C. Depending on their magnitude and duration, some impacts will cause release of additional greenhouse gases, some of which will be irreversible, even if global warming is reduced.
Adaptation measures and enabling conditions
Although there is evidence of some progress in adaptation planning and implementation, such progress has been unevenly distributed across sectors and regions. It is also fragmented and focuses more on planning rather than implementation. Many initiatives give priority to immediate and near-term climate risk reduction that reduces the opportunity for transformational adaptation.
The largest adaptation gaps exist among lower income population groups. At the current rate, the gaps will continue to grow. As adaptation options often have long implementation times, long-term planning and accelerated implementation, particularly in the next decade, it is important to close the adaptation gaps.
Enabling conditions are key for implementing, accelerating and sustaining adaptation in human systems and ecosystems. These include political commitment and follow-through; institutional frameworks; policies and instruments with clear goals and priorities; enhanced knowledge on impacts and solutions; mobilization of and access to adequate financial resources; monitoring and evaluation; and inclusive governance processes.
Climate resilience development
Considering the observed impacts, projected risks, levels and trends in vulnerability, and adaptation limits, there is an urgent need for a worldwide climate resilient development action. The balance between adaptation and mitigation will vary depending on national, regional and local circumstances (including availability of resources, vulnerability, culture and values, and past development choices); and the ways in which development trajectories are shaped by equity, and social and climate justice. If the response is comprehensive, effective and innovative, it can harness synergies and reduce trade-offs between adaptation and mitigation to advance sustainable development.
If effective and equitable adaptation and mitigation are embedded in the development plan, they can reduce vulnerability, conserve and restore ecosystems, and enable climate resilient development. This is especially challenging in localities with persistent development gaps and limited resources. Trade-offs and competing priorities exist between mitigation, adaptation, and development. Integrated and inclusive system-oriented solutions based on equity and social and climate justice, reduce risks and enable climate resilient development.
Climate impacts and risks exacerbate vulnerability and social and economic inequities, and consequently increase persistent and acute development challenges. This is especially so in developing regions and sub-regions with exposed areas such as coasts, small islands, deserts, mountains and polar regions. They will in turn undermine efforts to achieve sustainable development, particularly for vulnerable and marginalized communities.
Climate resilient development is enabled when governments, civil society and the private sector make inclusive development choices that prioritise risk reduction, equity and justice, and when decision-making processes, finance and actions are integrated across governance levels, sectors and timeframes. It is facilitated by international cooperation and by governments at all levels working with communities, civil society, educational bodies, scientific and other institutions, media, investors and businesses; and by developing partnerships with traditionally marginalised groups, including women, youth, indigenous peoples, local communities and ethnic minorities. These partnerships are most effective when supported by enabling political leadership, institutions, resources, including finance, as well as climate services, information and decision support tools.
Interactions between changing urban form, exposure and vulnerability can create climate change-induced risks and losses for cities and settlements. The global trend of urbanisation offers a critical opportunity in the near-term to advance climate resilient development. Integrated, inclusive planning and investment in everyday decision-making about urban infrastructure, including social, ecological and grey/physical infrastructures, can significantly increase the adaptive capacity of urban and rural settlements. Equitable outcomes contribute to multiple benefits for health and well-being and ecosystem services, including for indigenous peoples, marginalised and vulnerable communities. Climate resilient development in urban areas also supports adaptive capacity in more rural places through maintaining peri-urban supply chains of goods and services and financial flows. Coastal cities and settlements play an especially important role in advancing climate resilient development.
Safeguarding biodiversity and ecosystems is fundamental to climate resilient development in light of the threats climate change poses to them. Recent analyses suggest that maintaining the resilience of biodiversity and ecosystem services at a global scale depends on effective and equitable conservation of approximately 30 to 50 percent of the earth’s land, freshwater and ocean areas.
Climate change has already disrupted human and natural systems. Past and current development trends have not advanced global climate resilient development. Societal choices and actions implemented in the next decade will determine the extent to which medium- and long-term pathways will deliver higher or lower climate resilient development. Climate resilient development prospects are increasingly limited if current greenhouse gas emissions do not rapidly decline, especially if 1.5°C global warming is exceeded in the near-term. These prospects are constrained by past development, emissions and climate change. However, they are enabled by inclusive governance, adequate and appropriate human and technological resources, information, capacities and finance.
