Climate scientists are struggling to find the right words for very bad news

[CousinIT]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-environment/2018/10/03/climate-scientists-are-struggling-find-right-words-very-bad-news/

A much-awaited report from the U.N.'s top climate science panel will show an enormous gap between where we are and where we need to be to prevent dangerous levels of warming.

In Incheon, South Korea, this week, representatives of over 130 countries and about 50 scientists have packed into a large conference center going over every line of an all-important report: What chance does the planet have of keeping climate change to a moderate, controllable level?

When they can’t agree, they form “contact groups” outside the hall, trying to strike an agreement and move the process along. They are trying to reach consensus on what it would mean — and what it would take — to limit the warming of the planet to just 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, when 1 degree Celsius has already occurred and greenhouse gas emissions remain at record highs.

“It’s the biggest peer-review exercise there is,” said Jonathan Lynn, head of communications for the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “It involves hundreds or even thousands of people looking at it.”

The IPCC, the world’s definitive scientific body when it comes to climate change, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize a decade ago and has been given what may rank as its hardest task yet.

It must not only tell governments what we know about climate change — but how close they have brought us to the edge. And by implication, how much those governments are failing to live up to their goals for the planet, set in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

[rickford66]

1. How about "Climate Disaster" ?

[N_E_1 for Tennis]

2. A staggering transformation is inevitable either way...

By “fixing” the ecosystem or letting it go on as usual. We have to live with the consequences we made.

From the article

“It would be an enormous challenge to keep warming below a threshold” of 1.5 degrees Celsius, said Shindell, bluntly. “This would be a really enormous lift.”

So enormous, he said, that it would require a monumental shift toward decarbonization. By 2030 — barely a decade away — the world’s emissions would need to drop by about 40 percent. By the middle of the century, societies would need to have zero net emissions. What might that look like? In part, it would include things such as no more gas-powered vehicles, a phaseout of coal-fired power plants and airplanes running on biofuels, he said.

“It’s a drastic change,” he said. “These are huge, huge shifts … This would really be an unprecedented rate and magnitude of change.”

And that’s just the point — 1.5 degrees is still possible, but only if the world goes through a staggering transformation.

[pansypoo53219]

3. my cousin the PHd climate guy has said we are fucked already.

look at HGTV & more. WEEEEE.

[jimlup]

4. Unfortunately, I have to agree with your cousin

Still we have to mitigate the disaster we've already built into the climate system. As the next decades unfold the fruits of our misadventures will become more and obvious to those who don't deny science.

I fear that the population, as a collective, will remain as ignorant as they currently are. Distracted by idiots who strive to set us towards even more dangerous levels of CO2 and CH4.

[pansypoo53219]

9. we have to pray for a real pandemic & a few mega erupions.

[jeffreyi]

5. I just wish

We were not dragging the other creatures into it. However, on the "bright" side, the mosquitoes and bark beetles seem to be doing quite well already.

[JudyM]

6. Eating the other creatures is a huge part of the problem...

Both with respect to global warming, it’s second only to fossil fuels... https://climatenexus.org/climate-issues/food/animal-agricultures-impact-on-climate-change/


... and other very significant problems like deforestation and destruction of the oceans... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/oct/04/factory-farming-destructive-wasteful-cruel-says-philip-lymbery-farmageddon-author

[dalton99a]

7. The United States is the world's second-largest emitter

and Shithole is in charge

[Scurrilous]

8. K&R