Government Action: All that’s missing as new report confirms climate crisis

Governments have been handed a firm mandate to act decisively on the climate crisis by a new report released today by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), according to 850 NGOs organized in the Climate Action Network. 

 

The first installment of the IPCC’s fifth assessment report – which has been signed off by almost 200 nations after its summary was negotiated line by line in Stockholm this week – said it was more certain than ever before that human activities were responsible for climate change. 

 

And for the first time, the IPCC gives a global budget for the total amount of carbon pollution that cannot be exceeded if we are to meet the international goal of preventing devastating levels of global warming that will occur beyond 2C. 

 

That figure is 1 trillion tonnes. But Wael Hmaidan, director of Climate Action Network International, warned that we’ve already burnt through half of this, and at the current rate, we will have exhausted the entire budget within 30 years.

 

With climate impacts continuing to mount in the real world, Hmaidan said reducing carbon pollution levels quickly and dramatically was vital to stay within that threshold.

 

“The report confirms that the planet is heating up, sea level rise is accelerating, the rate of Arctic sea ice retreat has doubled, the melting of glaciers and ice sheets is happening faster, and the oceans are acidifying,” Hmaidan said.  

 

One of the most significant steps forward in the IPCC’s first assessment report in five years is the amount of new information about how climate change will impact regions around the world.  

 

“This report shows that the science on climate change is clear. The debate about who is responsible is over. People rightly demand that governments tackle the climate risk posed to our communities and economies,” Hmaidan said.

 

Governments should use the report as the backbone of a climate plan to dramatically reduce emissions, and flick the switch to renewable energy, thereby securing a safer, fairer and happier future for the world.

 

Representatives of the world’s governments will be in Warsaw in November for the major climate negotiations of the year. They should ensure this report is in their luggage and informs their negotiating positions. 

 

The report will be integral to countries who have been asked by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon to bring “strong pledges” to a summit on climate action next September – ahead of the 2015 conference in France which is tasked with agreeing a global climate action plan. 

 

Contacts:

Climate Action Network (CAN) is a global network of over 850 NGOs working to promote government and individual action to limit human-induced climate change to ecologically sustainable levels.