A recent edition of New Scientist contained a special report on the theme of how to live with climate change and how to beat it. I thought this an interesting development in how we approach climate change. Previously, climate change has been treated as something which is avoidable, if only we can act to prevent it. This series changes the base assumption. It starts from the premise that disruptive climate change will happen, and works towards the consequences of it happening. The special report certainly had my attention.
The special report consisted of seven pieces, with a number of side boxes, that set out the basic case. The first article - 'The New Normal' - establishes a number of speculations about what the climate would be like if the earth were to be appreciably warmer. For example, we can expect spring to begin earlier than it has in the past, or that nights are warming faster than days. These all act in conjunction with natural swings in weather patterns, and it is too early to discern which are due to human activity and which are due to natural variation that would have occurred in any case.
The second piece ('Can We Limit Warming To 2˚C?') and third piece ('Is Runaway Change Likely?') are essentially different sides of the same coin. The second piece outlines what it is that we will need to do in order to limit warming to 2˚C. It seems to be a tall order given that it would require unprecedented levels of international co-operation and an unprecedented commitment of resources. If we do nothing, the article forecasts temperature rises of 3˚C to 5˚C, relative to 1850-1900, by the end of the century. That then begs the question as to whether runaway climate change is likely. The third piece addresses this question, and suggests that it is probably too early to tell. There is much about the climate that we don't know, and this is one of those points at which we are pressing the boundaries of our knowledge.
We are, however, not doing nothing. The fourth piece asks 'Have We Reached Peak Emissions?' This is an interesting question. It does suggest, with an evidential base, that the carbon intensity of our economic activity has started to plateau. The developed economies are polluting less, and the emerging and developing economies are moving to green technologies without an intermediate phase of using fossil fuel technologies.
The fifth ('How To Cope In A Warmer World'), sixth ('Will We Have To Geoengineer?'), and seventh ('Can I Make A Difference?') pieces move on to address the consequences of disruptive climate change. In short, we are urged to cope with a warmer world by a more vigorous process of risk assessment, we don't really have the technology to Geoengineer at present, and we can make a difference, but very few of us choose to do so. We are quite comfortable in our existing way of doing things, and we are resistant to change our ways.
I found the special report disappointing. I was hoping for a deeper analysis than I received and I was hoping for a greater focus on the consequences of disruptive climate change. I do think that it would be an interesting exercise to consider what the consequences of, say, a 5˚C warming might be, and then to consider how we might live within that constraint. I see this as an important piece of work because, armed with these ideas, we could then assess what technologies we will need in the future but presently don't have, and then deploy investments into attaining those technologies.
We are currently stumbling along in the hope that something may turn up to ease the climate pressure, but it may turn out that is a future without us. If we don't like that possibility, then we might like to do something to change it. I'm afraid that this special report doesn't really help us in this task.
Stephen Aguilar-Millan
© The European Futures Observatory 2017
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