Global S&T Development Trend Analysis Platform of Resources and Environment
Act while solutions exist, the IPCC urges | |
admin | |
2022-02-28 | |
发布年 | 2022 |
语种 | 英语 |
国家 | 法国 |
领域 | 地球科学 ; 资源环境 |
正文(英文) |
The 2019 fire season has been one of the worst in Australia's history, with at least 15 people killed, hundreds of homes destroyed and millions of acres burned.
Climate change has done more damage than expected, but options still exist for moving forward, explains the CNRS biologist Camille Parmesan, who helped draft the “Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability” report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group II, released this week.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a UN body with 195 Member States, is releasing its sixth round of Assessment Reports (AR6) on existing knowledge about climate change. What is new about the 2022 report by Working Group II (WG2)? What exactly does AR6-WG2 indicate about the state of the planet? Another key message is that we’re observing changes in natural systems that are greater than expected from the warming we've experienced so far. Global warming now reaches 1.09°C above pre-industrial levels,4 and we’re already seeing it drive species to extinction – which can be directly connected to climate change. Another new connection that can be established is that diseases affecting both wildlife and humans are moving into new areas. We have a lot more literature on this since the last report in 2014, and we’re observing changes that far exceed what we expected 10 or 20 years ago. We’re also seeing loss and degradation of the most sensitive species and systems around the world, especially polar and mountaintop systems but also - and this was not anticipated 10 years ago - tropical ones. Even though these are warm-adapted, they’re more susceptible to climate change than some temperate systems as the climatic tolerances of tropical species are much lower than those of many species in higher latitudes. Many forests in tropical, temperate and boreal zones are suffering mass tree mortality due to increasing drought. Again, such sensitivity wasn’t well known before we started to see these massive tree die-offs. In boreal and temperate regions, trees that don't die from drought become more vulnerable to forest pests, and the combination of increased pest outbreaks and droughts facilitates wildfires. There is now strong evidence that some of the observed increases in these fires are attributable to climate change. Individual heatwave events have become so much hotter that wildlife is beginning to suffer. Hundreds of animal species are suffering mass mortality events due to heatwaves, for example fruit bats in Australia. Because impacts now are more severe than we originally expected, it’s becoming even more urgent that strong action be taken to limit future global warming. What sort of action can be taken? Technological solutions can also be developed in the future. But restoring and protecting ecosystems is something we know how to do and can do straight away. Technological options on their own are not sufficient, and neither are nature-based ones. We’re at a stage where we really have to do everything possible to limit future global warming. Beyond getting natural ecosystems healthier, we also need to rethink our agricultural procedures to raise crops and animals in ways that emit fewer greenhouse gases. This involves drawing on agroecology, an umbrella term for different farming practices that use more diverse crop species, less fertiliser and other sustainable methods that can help us cope with climate change. This isn’t so much about codependency with nature because humans depend on nature and not the other way around, but about the connections between healthy human systems and healthy natural systems. For example, forests and farms can be managed to have more natural predators or higher crop diversity in order to buffer against extreme climate events. One crop might be affected but another might be more resistant. In other words, total food production is more resilient when we resort to agroecological techniques that involve growing different crop species close to one another within landscapes that include natural systems where predators and pollinators can help those crops fare better and contribute to lowering the amounts of artificial pesticides needed. We’re trying to provide a pathway towards “climate-resilient development”, which brings all of these ideas together into a framework for developing a human society in better harmony with nature. While there are still options on the table for moving forward, these become scarcer as global warming increases. If we think of low-lying islands, many will be submerged no matter what we do because of the long time-lapse between carbon being released into the atmosphere and sea levels rising. The only option for some of these island populations is to migrate because no other options are left. How has the IPCC evolved since your first involvement in 19975? You are a laureate of the “Make Our Planet Great Again” initiative launched in 2017 to support US scientists relocating to France after the US pulled out of the Paris Agreement. Is our planet becoming great again? Footnotes
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来源平台 | CNRS News |
文献类型 | 新闻 |
条目标识符 | http://119.78.100.173/C666/handle/2XK7JSWQ/347249 |
专题 | 地球科学 资源环境科学 |
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714 | admin. Act while solutions exist, the IPCC urges. 2022. |
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