by Tan Copsey
Today in Paris the IPCC has released its fourth assessment report on the ‘global present state of knowledge of climate change’. The report is the most important and serious collation of scientific data on climate change ever released. New Scientist describes IPCC reports as ‘the gold standard of consensus on climate change science’. In simple terms they really, really matter, and the past they have served as significant spurs to action. The 2nd IPCC report released in 1995 is credited as having galvanised the international community to agree the 1997 Kyoto Protocol – the most significant climate agreement to date, and the only show in town.
Like a sick-green chicken little I have been shouting to (at) friends and relatively disinterested family members for the last few weeks – ‘the IPCC report is coming, its going to be bad, we’re all going to die, arrggghhhhh…’. Calmer, more scientifically informed appraisals of the report are no less frightening. The report notes that there is a minimum 90% probability that climate change is caused by human activity. Global temperatures could be as high as 6.4°C by 2100. Of some comfort is that the report concludes a 4.0 degree rise is most likely if we continue using energy at current rates – the effects of such a rise are of course completely catastrophic. Breathe deeply.
It is also worth bearing in mind that this is the result of the grandest of compromises – and as such you can’t help wondering if the IPCC are in fact understating the potential rise in temperatures. The report resulted from a long and torturous process of drafting and revision, leading to outcomes and wording a considerable majority of the 2500 scientific reviewers, 800 contributing authors, and 450 lead authors involved are happy with. Not to mention the governments of all 130 odd countries involved. The mind boggles at quite how such a compromise was achieved. Especially given the attempts of certain Governments to water down the report as much as possible –the US and China unsurprisingly the chief culprits. As one anonymous scientist emailed as recently as Wednesday – ‘this is becoming an impossible process’ (that this conclusion was only reached this Wednesday after several years of frustration is surely a testament to scientific and diplomatic fortitude).
Last night, whilst the delegates hold their evening session, the Eiffel Tower and other Paris monuments turned their lights off, an apparently grand symbolic gesture, drawing attention to the need to reduce energy use. One can’t help think the time for petty symbolism of this sort is over – given the gravity of the report 5 minutes every day for the rest of the century would not nearly be enough.
