1.5°C is a very interesting figure !
It dominates the climate conversation - not only at the moment but is all set to continue to do so the whole of this century.
To keep it short: 1.5°C is where 'climate change’ meets 'world politics and order’.
As you can probably tell from our name, we, at The OnePointFive Tribe, are passionately drawn-to-action by this figure. It underlines everything that we do!
Let’s tell you why ! But before we get to 1.5°C and why it dominates the climate change conversation, we will have to build context on the simple science of climate change, and plunge a little bit more into the world political order.
Our world, for the last few centuries, has been heavily reliant on fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas) as its main source of energy. It has propelled the humankind. Burning fossil fuels releases large amounts of energy, which is then successfully harnessed to not only run machines and technologies; and also produce electricity, which is the core of the human development story.
But again, burning fossil fuels also release a large amount of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases, as part of the chemical reaction.
This prolonged dependency of the human-kind on fossil fuels over centuries has as a result led to continuous greenhouse gases emission and accumulation of the same, within the earth’s atmosphere, during the same.
<Link to CO2 Concentration Trends>
This larger concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has in-turn intensified our planet’s natural greenhouse gas effect – trapping more and more of the sun's energy within the earth’s atmosphere - that is reaching us everyday.
And subsequently, as more and more heat is being trapped within the earth’s atmosphere – we have begun to see an unprecedented rise in average global surface temperature.
<Link to Global Surface Temperature Trends>
For context consider this, every decade since the 1960s have been warmer than the decade before that – so much so that the last decade 2011-2020 has been the warmest. 2020 is the hottest year on record, effectively tying with 2016, which held the previous record, for the same.
It is as if, each year is fighting it out with previous ones, to beat the record for the WARMEST, and come out on top of it.
However, it is not only the RISE in global average surface temperature that has drawn international attention toward Climate Change, but also the SPEED at which this increase in temperature has happened.
At current global greenhouse gas emission rates, we are headed to a temperature rise of 4°C by end of this century, which will completely destabilise our climate system and bring catastrophic consequences to the human society, and the planet at large.
Simply put, the greater the emissions of greenhouse gases, the greater will be the intensity of the greenhouse gas effect, the higher will be the rise of global temperature, and more devastating are the worst consequences of Climate Change.
Clearly, it is the human intervention of manufacturing and combustion of fossil fuels that has de-stabilized an otherwise very stable in-balance earth system.
For us to reverse the ‘enhanced’ greenhouse gas effect which we have come to create in the last few centuries, we will have to remove (or suck-back-out) the carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions, that we let out into the atmosphere over the years, while ensuring that we do not add any more to the atmosphere.
Amidst what clearly looks like an uphill struggle for human society as a whole, there is something interesting that has played out in the last three decades – that has provides some sense of hope and progress.
In an effort to curb this rapidly increasing average global surface temperature and its impacts on our planet; national governments from across countries, have been coming together year-on-year to negotiate and agree on a set of common Climate Goals and Climate Action Pathways, that fits all.
This has proved difficult, to be honest! Achieving common consensus, through diplomacy across all the countries in the world – each with a different political structure and priority – is challenging.
Even for something as massive as Climate Change, that affects all of us !
However, this changed in 2015-2016, when nearly every nation on our planet (197 countries) aligned on common climate goals and pledged together for the first time.
Everyone agreed to act in a manner within national boundaries, that would limit the average global surface temperature rise to 2°C with respect to pre-industrial times; and further attempt to contain the rise in temperature within 1.5°C, by the end of the century.
This forms the origin of 1.5°C and this momumental global agreement came to be known as the 'Paris Agreement'.
As part of Climate Action Pledges, national governments are now assessing national carbon footprints, proactively taking steps to reduce them and are further encouraging/writing policies for businesses/ industries to do the same.
And it is these commitment to Climate Action that has brought greenhouse gas emissions and carbon footprint, to the centre of the global attention !
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To keep it short once again: 1.5°C is where 'climate change’ meets 'world politics and order’.
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