Climate crisis: In the worst case, all of humanity could die out
Created: 08/02/2022 10:31 am
By: Moritz Serif
The climate crisis can make entire countries uninhabitable.
© Noah Berger/dpa/picture alliance
Authors call for more research into the worst possible consequences of global warming.
The climate crisis could turn into a catastrophe.
Washington DC – Climate change could become catastrophic and, according to experts, could lead to human extinction in the worst case.
However, so far too little is known about end-time scenarios and their probability, writes an international team in the journal
Proceedings.
In the article “Climate Endgame: Researching Catastrophic Climate Change Scenarios”, the authors advocate more prudent risk management and more research into the worst possible consequences of global warming.
The world must start preparing for end-time scenarios caused by the crisis.
Already there are climate impacts such as coral reef deaths.
“Numerous evidence that climate change could reach catastrophic proportions”
"There are numerous indications that climate change could take on catastrophic proportions," write the scientists, including the former and one current director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), Hans Joachim Schellnhuber and Johan Rockström.
"Even discounting the worst-case scenario of climate change, the world is on track to experience a temperature increase of between 2.1 and 3.9 degrees by 2100." not sufficiently studied.
"Facing a future of accelerated climate change without considering the worst-case scenarios is naïve risk management at best and fatally foolish at worst," it says.
Climate crisis: Entire countries could become uninhabitable
For climate researcher Niklas Höhne from Wageningen University, the worst-case scenario of extinction is still "relatively far away".
"But before that there are gradations," said the expert, who was not involved in the article.
"It is quite likely that whole parts of the country and countries are no longer habitable."
In their article, the researchers write about the expansion of areas with an annual average temperature of over 29 degrees Celsius.
According to the team's modeling, two billion people could live in such areas by 2070.
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"There is a serious potential for catastrophic consequences"
"By 2070, these temperatures and the social and political consequences will directly affect two nuclear powers and seven high-security laboratories housing the most dangerous pathogens," said co-author Chi Xu of China's Nanjing University knock-on effects.”
Heat and uninhabitable areas could lead to migration, social unrest and international conflict.
The scientists write that the effects on tipping points are particularly dangerous.
Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has not yet sufficiently dealt with the possible catastrophic consequences of climate change.
None of the IPCC's 14 special reports deal with extreme or catastrophic climate change.
They should be taken into account in the next report.
Worst case scenarios in the climate crisis: Höhne believes it is important to educate people
Höhne thinks it's important to educate people about worst-case scenarios.
“We need to communicate clearly what the risks are.
And on the other hand say: We still have it in our hands," said the researcher.
“We know how to do it, we have the technologies and we know the policies.
It's not even expensive, in the long run it's even cheaper to do something about climate change. "(mse / dpa)
