Researchers believe that policymakers will now need annually updated data to adopt policies to combat global warming, which has worsened since the sixth report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was first published in August 2021. IPCC reports provide the world’s decision-makers with scientific data on climate change that they can use to implement their policies in this area. A group of some fifty scientists believe that updating this data every five or ten years is no longer sufficient.
They have analysed the main climate indicators and found that anthropogenic global warming has continued to increase at an unprecedented rate since the publication of Part 1 of the IPCC’s last report. While the report refers to a warming of 1.07 ˚ C for the decade 2010-2019 compared with pre-industrial averages, the latest work carried out by these scientists points to an increase of 1.14 ˚ C for the decade 2013-2022.
The researchers also point to a record amount of greenhouse gas emissions, estimated to average fifty-four billion tonnes over the decade 2012-2022. In 2020, the IPCC estimated that carbon dioxide emissions should not exceed five hundred billion tonnes to retain a 50% chance of keeping a global temperature rise below 1.5 ˚ C.
A new assessment made in 2023 shows that this margin is shrinking like a stone, and according to the latest estimates, only two hundred and fifty billion tonnes remain to be emitted. This decrease can be explained both by the sustained pace of greenhouse gas emissions and by the updated state of global warming. Valérie Masson-Delmotte, palaeoclimatologist and Director of Research at the French Atomic Energy Commission, co-chair of the IPCC’s Working Group on Part 1 of the Sixth Assessment Report, points out that this robust update shows the intensification of human-induced warming of our climate.
It is a timely wake-up call, coinciding with the 2023 global review of the Paris Agreement, to show that the pace and scale of climate action are not sufficient to limit the escalation of climate-related risks. The group of researchers, therefore, believes that an annual update of key climate change indicators is necessary in view of the rapidly changing situation.
This new periodicity will, they believe, maintain the urgency of tackling the problem of global warming, and help the various players involved to make decisions based on scientific evidence. Updates will be possible thanks to the open Internet platform created by scientists. They believe that access to up-to-date information is vitally important, that we need to be nimble in the face of climate change, and that we need to change policies and approaches to take account of the latest data on the state of the climate system.
English