The IPCC has released its latest report on climate change.
In summary:
- Climate change has already impacted natural and human systems on every continent.
- Climate change is also damaging global food production, cutting our supply of fresh drinking water, and damaging our infrastructure.
- Coastal flooding could reduce global economic production by 10 percent by the end of the century.
- And the widespread damage already occurring to ecosystems on land and sea worldwide (coral reefs and arctic ecosystems are already experiencing “irreversible” changes) means we are playing Russian Roulette with our life support system.
The key priority for action: fundamental decarbonization of the world economy.
This involves divestment from fossil fuels, removal of existing tax incentives for fossil fuels, and an entirely achievable target of generating “around one-quarter of our energy mix from low-carbon sources by the year 2030.”
“Preventing global warming is the cheap option.” But you already knew that.