‘Major Hurdle’ Cleared As Youth Activists Advance Historic Climate Case

By Dana Drugmand, DeSmog Blog

An unprecedented climate lawsuit brought by six Portuguese youths is to be fast-tracked at Europe’s highest court, it was announced yesterday.

How the global coronavirus stimulus could put Paris Agreement on track

By Marina Andrijevic, Joeri Rogelj, Carbon Brief

In our new analysis, published as a “policy forum” paper in the journal Science, we show that an opportunity for getting on a path to a 1.5C world can be seized if just a fraction of Covid-19 fiscal stimulus is invested annually in a “climate-positive” recovery.

Big Oil and Gas Nations Sideline the Science at Katowice, Even as Emissions Rise and Warming Accelerates

By David Spratt, Climate Code Red

Just as four big oil and gas producers block the UN climate policymaking conference in Katowice, Poland from welcoming a report on the science of the 1.5 degree Celsius (°C) target which it had commissioned three years earlier in Paris, new evidence has emerged of the striking contradiction between word and deed at COP24.

Response to the IPCC 1.5°C Special Report

By Kevin Anderson, Manchester Policy Blogs

The IPCC report meticulously lays out how the serious climate impacts of 1.5°C of warming are still far less destructive than those for 2°C. Sadly, the IPCC then fails, again, to address the profound implications of reducing emissions in line with both 1.5 and 2°C. Dress it up however we may wish, climate change is ultimately a rationing issue.

The ‘Burn It All Down’ Approach: Trump Uses Dire Warming Predictions to Justify Increasing Emissions

By Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams

Despite the Trump administration's own prediction that by the end of this century, the world could warm "a disastrous" 7°F, or about 4°C, above pre-industrial levels, the president has decided not to curb greenhouse gas emissions, but instead to use the devastating findings to justify and intensify his pro-fossil fuel agenda.

What Will it Take to Avert Collapse?

By Richard Heinberg, David Fridley, Resilience.org

In our view, at some point scientists and policy makers must begin discussing the one scenario that world leaders seem to want to avoid at all costs, i.e., managed economic contraction. The irony is that this scenario could reliably cut greenhouse gas emissions and is achievable without appeal to magic (CCS or decoupling).

How to Limit Warming to 1.5°C without CCS

By Chris Nelder, Energy Transition Show

In this tenth part of our series on climate science, we explore a new paper outlining a climate scenario that would limit warming to 1.5 °C without relying on negative emission technologies.

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‘Global’ Warming Varies Greatly Depending Where you Live

By Zeke Hausfather, Carbon Brief

The warming experienced by people is typically higher than the global average warming. In a world where warming is limited to “well below” 2C about 14% of the population will still experience warming exceeding 2C.

World can Limit Global Warming to 1.5C by ‘Improving Energy Efficiency’

By Daisy Dunne, Carbon Brief

The research suggests that improving energy efficiency – chiefly by saving on everyday energy use – could play a major role in restricting warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, which is the aspirational target of the Paris Agreement.

Exceeding 1.5C of Global Warming will Hit Poorest the Hardest

By Andrew King, Luke Harrington, Carbon Brief

In our study, we examine the consequences of missing the 1.5C limit in terms of the change people experience in their local climate. We do this using the “signal-to-noise” ratio.

1.5°C of Warming is Closer than We Imagine, Just a Decade Away

By David Spratt, Climate Code Red

So how does hitting warming of 1.5°C a decade from now square with the 2015 Paris Agreement’s goal of “holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C”? In two words, it doesn’t.

Limiting Warming to 1.5C Could ‘Substantially’ Cut Risk of Ice-Free Arctic Summers

By Daisy Dunne, Carbon Brief

Meeting the Paris Agreement’s aspirational target of limiting global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels could “substantially” reduce the risk of sea ice-free summers in the Arctic, research shows. Two new studies find that, under 1.5C of warming, Arctic waters could experience ice-free summers around 2.5% of the time, or one in every 40 years.