We have less than ten years to stop the growth in CO₂ emissions if we want a high chance of avoiding dangerous climate change, according to new research from the Institute for Public Policy Research (ippr) published today (Wed).

The research suggests we need to go further and faster than last week’s Stern Review. It shows that without action to ensure global emissions of CO₂ peak within ten years and fall by 70 to 80 per cent by 2050, we will face an unacceptable risk of causing a rise of more than 2°C, which would result in dangerous and irreversible impacts.

Those impacts are likely to include:

• An increase in the number of people affected by water scarcity to 2 billion.
• Damage to agricultural production, not just in the developing world but also to food production in North America.
• The loss of some of the world’s most bio-diverse ecosystems including most of the coral reefs and the Amazon rainforest.
• A higher chance of abrupt and large-scale changes such as the slowing-down of the Gulf Stream and the loss of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, which together would raise sea levels by 12 metres.

The report sends a stark message to governments meeting at this week’s UN climate change negotiations in Nairobi on the need to reach a consensus on what level of action is necessary after the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012. The results from the report’s research suggest that countries like the UK will need to build a ‘zero-carbon’ economy by 2050. And that the United States, the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter, can no longer sit on the fence. ippr argues that the US should adopt a national cap on its emissions without further delay.

Simon Retallack, ippr head of Climate Change, said:

“These conclusions go further than the Stern Review which proposes a long-term goal to stabilise climate change that has a medium to high risk of exceeding a 2ºC rise in temperature. We will need larger emission reductions than envisaged. Above all, our research shows we urgently need to rethink our timetable for action. We do not have decades: we have less than ten years to stop the growth in global CO₂.

“The task will be very difficult, but this is not a counsel of despair. The technology exists to meet this challenge: we know how to achieve substantial increases in energy efficiency, generate energy without fossil fuels, and reduce emissions from the destruction of forests and soils. The challenge for governments is to adopt the policies and direct the level of resources needed to do this in time.”

High Stakes: Designing emissions pathways to reduce the risk of dangerous climate changeby Dr Paul Baer with Dr Michael Mastrandrea is available from www.ippr.org

Notes to Editors

The authors of ippr’s report, Dr Paul Baer and Dr Michael Mastrandrea, are experts in risk analysis and computer modelling, specialising in climate science and policy. ippr commissioned them to conduct new climate modelling to identify emissions pathways that have a high likelihood of keeping the rise in the world’s average surface temperature to below 2°C above pre-industrial levels.

The research concludes that to have a ‘very low to low risk’ (calculated as a 9-32% chance) of exceeding the 2°C threshold, global emissions of carbon dioxide (CO₂) would need to peak between 2010 and 2013, achieve a maximum annual rate of decline of 4-5% by 2015-2020, and fall to about 70-80% below 1990 levels by the middle of the century. This would need to be matched by similarly stringent reductions in the other greenhouse gases.

These calculations are based on scenarios in which atmospheric concentrations of CO₂, which stand at 380ppm today, peak at between 410-421ppm mid century, before falling to between 355-366ppm by 2100. This in turn is based on the understanding that CO₂ concentrations can be reduced by lowering annual emissions below the level of CO₂ that is absorbed by global carbon sinks, which currently take up approximately half of the CO₂ emitted annually by human activity.

These conclusions go further than the Stern Review, which proposes a long-term goal to stabilise greenhouse gases at between the equivalent of 450 and 550ppm CO₂.

Our modelling calculated that scenarios in which CO₂ stabilised at 450ppm had a 46-86 per cent chance of exceeding 2°C; 550ppm a 70-95 per cent chance; and 550ppm a 78-99 per cent chance.

Even more troublingly, these scenarios had an 11-24%, 18-47% and 28-71% chance respectively of exceeding a 3°C rise in global average temperature.

Simon Retallack, head of climate change at ippr, will be at the UN climate change summit in Nairobi from November 13-18, where he will be available for comment.

Contacts

Richard Darlington, ippr media manager, 020 7470 6177 / 07738 320 645 / r.darlington@ippr.org

Michael Brunskill, ippr media assistant, 020 7339 0007