Temporarily passing Paris climate targets could ‘significantly’ raise tipping point risk: Study

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Hurricane Ian approaches the west coast of Florida, NASA Johnson (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

“To effectively prevent all tipping risks, the global mean temperature increase would need to be limited to no more than 1°C—we are currently already at about 1.2°C,” noted one scientist.

By Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams

Surpassing the global temperature targets of the Paris climate agreement, even temporarily, could dramatically increase the risk of the world experiencing dangerous “tipping points,” according to research published Friday.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) defines tipping points as “critical thresholds in a system that, when exceeded, can lead to a significant change in the state of the system, often with an understanding that the change is irreversible.”

Published in the journal Nature Climate Change, the new study focuses on the potential shutdown of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), the Amazon rainforest shifting to savannah, and the collapse of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets.

Under the 2015 Paris deal, governments agreed to work toward keeping global temperature rise this century below 2°C, ultimately aiming for limiting it to 1.5°C. However, scientists continue to warn the countries’ pledges and actions to cut planet-heating emissions are far from bold enough to reach those goals, and critics blasted the COP27 summit in Egypt last month as “another terrible failure” given that the conference’s final agreement did not call for rapidly phasing out all fossil fuels.

“To effectively prevent all tipping risks, the global mean temperature increase would need to be limited to no more than 1°C—we are currently already at about 1.2°C,” noted study co-author Jonathan Donges, co-lead of the FutureLab on Earth Resilience in the Anthropocene at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK). “The latest IPCC report is showing that we’re most likely on a path to temporarily overshoot the 1.5°C temperature threshold.”

The researchers examined various scenarios with peak temperatures from 2°C to 4°C. As lead author and PIK scientist Nico Wunderling explained, they found that “the risk for some tipping events could increase very substantially under certain global warming overshoot scenarios.”

“Even if we would manage to limit global warming to 1.5°C after an overshoot of more than 2°C, this would not be enough as the risk of triggering one or more global tipping points would still be more than 50%,” Wunderling said. “With more warming in the long-term, the risks increase dramatically.”

“We found that the risk for the emergence of at least one tipping event increases with rising peak temperatures—already at a peak temperature of 3°C, more than one-third of all simulations showed a tipping event even when overshoot durations were limited strongly,” he added. “At 4°C peak temperature, this risk extends to more than half of all simulations.”

According to the study, “Our model analysis reveals that temporary overshoots can increase tipping risks by up to 72% compared with non-overshoot scenarios, even when the long-term equilibrium temperature stabilizes within the Paris range.”

Study co-author Ricarda Winkelmann, co-lead of the FutureLab on Earth Resilience in the Anthropocene at PIK, pointed out that “especially the Greenland and the West Antarctic ice sheet are at risk of tipping even for small overshoots, underlining that they are among the most vulnerable tipping elements.”

“While it would take a long time for the ice loss to fully unfold, the temperature levels at which such changes are triggered could already be reached soon,” she said. “Our action in the coming years can thus decide the future trajectory of the ice sheets for centuries or even millennia to come.”

While these scientists found that the Amazon and AMOC have higher critical temperature thresholds, various studies have highlighted the dangers of either system reaching its tipping point.

An analysis of the Amazon released in September by scientists and Indigenous leaders in South America stated that “the tipping point is not a future scenario but rather a stage already present in some areas of the region,” meaning portions of the crucial rainforest may never recover—which could have “profound” consequences on a global scale.

A study on the AMOC from last year, also published in Nature Climate Change, warned that the collapse of the system of currents that carries warm water from the tropics to the North Atlantic “would have severe impacts on the global climate system,” from disrupting rains that billions of people need for food and increasing storms to further threatening the Amazon and ice sheets.

Donges stressed that “even though a temporary temperature overshoot would definitely be better than reaching a peak temperature and remaining there, some of the overshoot impacts may lead to irreversible damages in a high climate risk zone and this is why low-temperature overshoots are key here.”

Pointing to estimates that current policies could lead to an average global temperature of up to 3.6°C by 2100, Donges declared that “this is not enough.”

As Winkelmann put it: “Every tenth of a degree counts. We must do what we can to limit global warming as quickly as possible.”

2022 climate-conscious gift guide

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Gift boxes. Photo by Tofros.

A selection of gift ideas to show love for your people and your planet

By Daisy Simmons, Yale Climate Connections

‘Tis the season for conundrums — at least for the climate-conscious who find themselves torn between reducing carbon emissions and holiday gift-giving. So take heart: It IS possible to indulge in your generous nature while keeping a lighter carbon footprint.

Read on for three categories of climate-conscious gifts.

For those equally climate-virtuous

Some people on your list may be just as climate-conscious as you. As such they may be happiest with a present that’s climate-conscious and that combats emissions — whether through direct action or educating more people about the problem, and the solutions.

  • The World Economic Forum has a few tips that might appeal to your recipients, such as planting a tree or buying a piece of coral in their name.

  • Or consider a Climeworks gift certificate for direct-air carbon capture. The group says a $30 gift, for example, will remove and store 25 kg CO2 in your recipient’s name.

  • Looking for an emissions-reducing gift for the whole household? Yale Climate Connections regular contributor Dana Nuccitelli suggests taking advantage of the tax credits and rebates available in the Inflation Reduction Act. “Now’s the time to upgrade your gas water heater or stove to a cleaner heat pump or induction version,” he says. “What better gift for your family than cleaner indoor air, plus lower monthly energy bills?”

  • Want something a little more budget-friendly that also helps improve your home efficiency? Make a draft dodger snake — Bob Vila has some simple and cool DIY ideas here.

  • Your fellow climate-oriented friends and family may also appreciate catching up on their related reading. For these folks, check out Michael Svoboda’s YCC review of 12 new titles for climate activists and academics.

  • For those who prefer to learn through cinema, find out if the Wild and Scenic Film Festival On Tour is heading to your neck of the woods.

  • For more emissions-busting gift tips, check out our 2021 gift guide for tips on Buy Nothing communities, climate action vouchers, and renewable energy credits.

Memorably material-free: Experiences and homemade treats

Material-free gifts like tickets to games or shows, babysitting vouchers, and memberships mean good times — and generally low to no planet-warming emissions compared with the impacts of producing and transporting material goods.

Here are a few for your giving inspiration:

  • Got a kayaking enthusiast on your list? Turn to a local outfit for guided kayaking, snowshoeing, and other fun treks. Or head to Airbnb to scout for unique locally hosted experiences, from beginner surfing lessons in Santa Cruz to mountain e-bike touring in Asheville, North Carolina.

  • Check out classes based on your recipients’ interests, like in-person cooking classes at a local co-op or kitchen store, a knitting class, or perhaps a belly-dancing class.

    Quality online options are seemingly endless now, too, thanks to Masterclass (think intentional eating with author Michael Pollan or conservation with Jane Goodall) and Udemy (explore a range of courses on climate change plus hundreds of lessons in gardening, among many others.)

  • For your 21-plus set, book a tour to a carbon-neutral provider convenient to them. For example at the New Belgium brewery in Fort Collins, Colorado, your gift recipient can learn all about Fat Tire, America’s first certified carbon-neutral beer.

  • Look into local museum and performing art center memberships for the culture-oriented people on your list. Or consider a subscription you know they’ll love, like New York Times Cooking ($5/month).

  • Give the priceless gift of time in nature in the form of an America the Beautiful National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass — an annual pass that gets one vehicle into any national park or forest ($80). Many states also offer annual state park passes: California, Florida, Maryland, and more.

  • Got something you’re really good at? Offer up services for friends and family, like a bike repair, massage, oil change, or even tax prep.

There’s also still time to make something that wins over loved ones’ hearts … and appetites. You might whip up a batch of seasonal salted pecan caramel popcorn or glögg using organic ingredients and a reusable container.

Or, really please your crowd and take a cue from YCC contributor Karin Kirk’s holiday playbook. She gifts bread kits — “Put the dry ingredients for a no-knead bread in a silicone or plant-based/non-plastic bag, and send it off with instructions for mixing, rising, and baking. Instant treat.”

Her other holiday hit? “Boozey treats,” she says. “We’ve put our garden to proper use making plum gin and raspberry vodka. And honestly, it’s hard to go wrong with this theme!”

Material goods you can feel good about gifting

While other categories of gifts may be even more climate-friendly, a growing number of retailers are ramping up their own carbon neutrality efforts. Many shops are brimming with sustainable gift options, from solar gadgets to recycled jackets and shoes.

First, a few rules of thumb to help make any shopping expedition a little climate-friendlier:

  • Consider who you’re buying FOR. Retail returns in 2021 accounted for 16.6 percent of total U.S. sales, according to the National Retail Federation. And with an “estimated 10 percent of all returns ending in a landfill, the environmental impact is not trivial,” per McKinsey analysis.

    Avert returns with a gut check before making any purchase. Is your prospective gift something they need or want? And is there actually room for it in their home? Also consider asking about and honoring people’s wish lists.

  • Consider who you’re buying FROM. Some retailers are climate-friendlier than others — find out who they are and favor them in your shopping choices. Small, local businesses may be a good place to start. Also look for retailers with reputable, relevant certifications, like Climate Neutral, Corporation B, EWG-Verified, or 1% for the Planet.

  • Consider what materials are used. Look for renewable/reused/recycled materials wherever possible and avoid plastic gifts — unless they’re made with recycled or ocean-bound plastic. According to Beyond Plastics research, the U.S. plastics industry contributes roughly 232 million tons of CO2e gas emissions per year — equivalent to the average emissions from 116 coal-fired power plants. Plus, just under 9% of plastic in the U.S. is actually recycled, according to Environmental Protection Agency data.

Enough with the don’ts, let’s get to the do’s. Here are a few low-impact physical gifts for the recipient archetypes on your list:

The clean energy buffs

The foodies

  • Inspire their love of plant-based fare with a vegetable-centric cookbook. Food & Wine’s list has 16 contenders, from easy weeknight wins to James Beard-winning chef creations.

  • Help them store their delectables with pretty beeswax food wraps, and then clean up the mess with biodegradable, reusable Swedish cloths.

  • Food writers from a range of publications swear by the reBoard cutting board, made from recycled kitchen scraps.

  • Score intrigue points with a novel — and climate-friendly ingredient — like kelp. Atlantic Sea Greens offers foodie fare like cranberry kelp cubes perfect for making smoothies, or try the Ginger Sesame Sea-Veggie Burger.

The musically minded

  • Look for instruments with Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification. Martin and DeMars are examples of companies prioritizing FSC-compliant renewable wood in their guitars.

  • The House of Marley offers headphones and earbuds made with FSC-certified wood and recyclable aluminum — in addition to supporting global reforestation via One Tree Planted, and ocean conservation via the Surfrider Foundation.

The gardeners

  • Gather an assortment of pollinator-friendly and heirloom seeds appropriate for your recipient’s zone and make a theme basket. Potential add-ins include biodegradable CowPots (Karin’s go-to) and a sturdy and sustainable hand tool.

  • Splurge on a Haws watering can (also Karin-approved), handmade in England by a socially and environmentally responsible company that’s been around for 100+ years. These are hard to find in the U.S., but this Canadian retailer sells them and is Black-owned, certified B-Corp and donates 1% of profits to environmental projects.

  • Another splurge? Borrow Dana’s plan for his mom (spoiler alert, Dana’s mom!) and gift a bird feeder with a camera powered by solar panels.

The ones who appreciate your keen fashion sense

  • If you’re shopping for jewelry, opt for baubles made with recycled gold and silver, responsibly mined stones, and conflict-free diamonds. Treehugger has more tips here.

  • For toiletries, head to Henry Rose Fragrance, billed as the first fine fragrance line to be both EWG Verified and Cradle to Cradle Certified; Good Time’s low-waste shampoo, conditioner and body soaps; and/or Carbon-Neutral-certified Leaf’s plastic-free razors.

  • Need socks? A few climate-conscious contenders out there include Bare Kind’s Rainforest Trust bamboo socks made at a third-generation family-run factory and The Giving Socks, where every pair you buy supports tree restoration in Africa.

  • For outerwear, check out Patagonia’s “recrafted” line of garments made from old clothes. Climate-neutral, B-certified TenTree also offers a wide range of stylish jackets and coats.

  • Shoes offer a world of climate-conscious opportunity, from Thousand Fell’s fully recyclable sneakers and Cariuma’s National Geographic Gecko canvas shoes made with organic cotton, sustainably sourced rubber, cork and recycled plastics to Rothy’s ballet flats, knit from single-use plastics and available in 21 colors.

For the kids—and kids at heart

  • From stackables to push cars, little ones love the sustainable wooden toys from PlanToys.

  • For school-age kids, try plantable pencils they can use now, plant later.

  • Your young Lorax lover will love the “I speak for the trees” hoodie at tentree.

  • The rainforest-guardian doll, aka “Lottie,” is made with recycled cardboard, soy ink, and bio-degradable string — and a portion of your goes to the Rainforest Trust.

  • Check out Eco-bricks for budding engineers. Any of these FSC-certified wood building sets is ready to please, but the Wanderlust collection’s architectural builds may especially delight kids who live in featured cities like Chicago.

  • Help older kids learn about climate change — and action — with video games that bring climate issues front and center, like one of these.

Check the climate-conscious off your gift list

By thinking outside the gift box and exploring new ways to bring climate consciousness to gift-giving, you can unlock the next level of holiday spirit: to act generously and responsibly.

Red List calls out ‘perfect storm of unsustainable human activity decimating marine life’

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Turtle at Sea. Photo by Jeremy Bishop

“As the world looks to the ongoing U.N. Biodiversity Conference to set the course for nature recovery, we simply cannot afford to fail,” said the head of the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

By Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams

During the United Nations biodiversity summit in Montreal, an international conversation group on Friday highlighted how humanity is dangerously failing marine life with illegal and unsustainable fishing, pollution from agricultural and industrial runoff, and activities that drive up global temperatures.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species now features 150,388 species, 42,108 of which face possible extinction. Of the 17,903 marine animals and plants on the list, more than 1,550 are at risk.

“Today’s IUCN Red List update reveals a perfect storm of unsustainable human activity decimating marine life around the globe. As the world looks to the ongoing U.N. Biodiversity Conference to set the course for nature recovery, we simply cannot afford to fail,” Bruno Oberle, the group’s director general, warned Friday. “We urgently need to address the linked climate and biodiversity crises, with profound changes to our economic systems, or we risk losing the crucial benefits the oceans provide us with.”

The primary aim of the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)—which is hosted by China but kicked off earlier in Canada this week due to Covid-19 restrictions—is the development of post-2020 global biodiversity framework (GBF).

A top priority for many parties to the treaty—along with the United States, which has failed to ratify the CBD over the past three decades but is still participating in the summit—is to protect 30% of lands and waters by 2030. However, as activists and Indigenous leaders from around the world have noted, there are serious human rights concerns regarding implementation of the 30×30 goal.

COP15 comes after the fifth round of discussions about establishing a U.N. treaty for the high seas, or the two-thirds of oceans outside territorial waters. Those August talks failed to produce an agreement—which, as Laura Meller of Greenpeace’s Protect the Oceans campaign warned at the time, “jeopardizes the livelihoods and food security of billions of people around the world.”

“While progress has been made, particularly on ocean sanctuaries, members of the High Ambition Coalition and countries like the USA have moved too slowly to find compromises, despite their commitments,” Meller continued. “Time has run out. Further delay means ocean destruction. We are sad and disappointed. While countries continue to talk, the oceans and all those who rely on them will suffer.”

Similarly, urgent warnings came with the update Friday. Ashleigh McGovern, vice president of the Center for Oceans at Conservation International, said that “with this devastating IUCN Red List update on the status of marine species, it is clear that business as usual is no longer an option.”

“Human activity has had devastating effects on marine ecosystems and biodiversity, but it can also be harnessed to drive action as a matter of survival, equity, and climate justice,” she added. “If we are to secure a new future for the world’s oceans and the essential biodiversity they harbor, we must act now.”

Jon Paul Rodríguez, chair of the IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC), pointed out that “most of the Earth’s biosphere, 99% of all livable space on our planet, is underwater.”

“Humanity acts as if oceans were inexhaustible, capable of sustaining infinite harvest of algae, animals, and plants for food and other products, able to transform vast quantities of sewage and other pollutants that we pour in coastal areas, and absorb the CO2 generated by land-use change and burning fossil fuel,” he said. “This Red List update brings to light new evidence of the multiple interacting threats to declining life in the sea.”

According to the IUCN Red List, 20 of the 54 abalone species—some of the world’s most expensive seafood—are threatened with extinction.

“Abalones reflect humanity’s disastrous guardianship of our oceans in microcosm: overfishing, pollution, disease, habitat loss, algal blooms, warming, and acidification, to name but a few threats. They really are the canary in the coal mine,” said Howard Peters, a member of the IUCN SSC Mollusc Specialist Group and research associate at the U.K.’s University of York who led the abalone assessment.

“The most immediate action people can take is to eat only farmed or sustainably sourced abalones. Enforcing fishery quotas and anti-poaching measures is also critical,” Peters noted. “However, we need to halt the changes to ocean chemistry and temperature to preserve marine life including abalone species over the long term.”

The update also raised the alarm about dugongs, particularly in East Africa and New Caledonia. Populations of the large herbivorous marine mammals are threatened by fishing gear, oil and gas exploration and production, chemical pollution, and the destruction of seagrasses they rely on for food.

“Strengthening community-led fisheries governance and expanding work opportunities beyond fishing are key in East Africa, where marine ecosystems are fundamental to people’s food security and livelihoods,” said Evan Trotzuk, who led the region’s assessment.

Another focus of the list is the pillar coral in the Caribbean, given that its population has shrunk by more than 80% across most of its range over the past three decades.

Noting that it is just one of 26 corals now listed as critically endangered in the Atlantic Ocean, Arizona State University associate professor Beth Polidoro, Red List coordinator for the IUCN SSC Coral Specialist Group, said that “these alarming results emphasize the urgency of global cooperation and action to address climate change impacts on ocean ecosystems.”

Amanda Vincent, chair of the IUCN SSC Marine Conservation Committee, declared that “the awful status of these species should shock us and engage us for urgent action.”

“These magical marine species are treasured wildlife, from the wonderful abalone to the charismatic dugong and the glorious pillar coral, and we should safeguard them accordingly,” she added. “It is vital that we manage fisheries properly, constrain climate change, and reverse habitat degradation.”

Nodding to the conference, Jane Smart, director of IUCN’s Science and Data Center, said the update reinforces her group’s “urgent call for a post-2020 global biodiversity framework that will be ambitious enough to cease destruction of our life support system and catalyze the necessary action and change to secure life on this planet.”