• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
Celebrating our 1,000th edition. The climate news you need
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  FEATURED
BREAKING: U.S. Senate Passes Historic $369B Climate Package August 7, 2022
Researchers Point To ‘Dangerously Unexplored’ Risk of Global Climate Catastrophe August 2, 2022
Koch Network Pressures Manchin, Sinema as Advocates Praise ‘Game Changing’ Climate Deal August 2, 2022
Coastal GasLink Cost Skyrockets 70% to $11.2B August 2, 2022
Ottawa Releases Regulatory ‘Frame’ for Net-Zero Grid by 2035 August 2, 2022
Next
Prev

Countries Are ‘Way Off Track’ from Meeting Climate Targets, Latest UN Assessment Warns

March 10, 2020
Reading time: 3 minutes

Dawn Ellner/flickr

Dawn Ellner/flickr

25
SHARES
 

Ocean and surface temperatures last year were the highest on record, average global temperature was 1.1°C above pre-industrial levels, the Earth lost more ice than it gained for a 32nd year in a row, and sea levels hit an all-time high, prompting United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to declare humanity “way off track” from getting climate change under control in his foreword to the World Meteorological Organization’s latest annual climate assessment.

“Climate change is the defining challenge of our time. We are currently way off track to meeting either the 1.5°C or 2.0°C targets that the Paris Agreement calls for,” Guterres wrote. “Time is fast running out for us to avert the worst impacts of climate disruption and protect our societies.”

Which means “we need more ambition on [emission cuts], adaptation, and finance in time for the climate conference, COP 26, in Glasgow, UK, in November. That is the only way to ensure a safer, more prosperous and sustainable future for all people on a healthy planet.”

Scientists “said the threat was greater than that from the coronavirus, and world leaders must not be diverted away from climate action,” The Guardian reports.

While 2016 still stands as the warmest year on record, WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said that mark may soon be eclipsed in light of continually-rising greenhouse gas levels.

“A recent decadal forecast indicates that a new annual global temperature record is likely in the next five years. It is a matter of time,” he said. “Last year, emissions dropped in developed countries, despite the growing economy,” showing that “you can detach economic growth from emission growth. The bad news is that, in the rest of the world, emissions grew last year. So if we want to solve this problem, we have to have all the countries onboard.”

Taalas added that countries still aren’t keeping their promises under the 2015 Paris deal. “There’s clearly a need for higher ambition levels if we’re serious about climate mitigation.”

The report contains an around-the-world inventory of climate impacts in 2019, including an extended heat wave in Europe that produced 20,000 emergency hospital admissions and 1,462 premature deaths in France alone, and was made five times more likely by climate change. The Guardian points to heat waves in India and Japan, heat and devastating bushfires in Australia, cyclones in Mozambique and south Asia, hurricanes in the Caribbean and North America, flooding in Iran, the Philippines, and Ethiopia, and heavy rains that produced US$20 billion in losses in the United States alone.

“Unpredictable climate and extreme weather was a factor in 26 of the 33 nations that were hit by food crises in 2019, and was the main driver in 12 of the countries,” the paper adds. “The WMO said unusually heavy precipitation in late 2019 was also a factor in the severe desert locust outbreak in the Horn of Africa, which is the worst in decades and expected to spread further by June 2020 in a severe threat to food security.”

“After a decade of steady decline, hunger is on the rise again—over 820 million suffered from hunger in 2018, the latest global data available,” the report stated.

“This annual litany of climate change impacts and inadequate global responses makes for a gut-wrenching read,” University of Edinburgh climate scientist David Reay told The Guardian. “Writ large is the ‘threat multiplier’ effect that is climate change on the biggest challenges faced by humanity and the world’s ecosystems in the 21st century.”

“The report is a catalogue of weather in 2019 made more extreme by climate change, and the human misery that went with it,” added Imperial College of London meteorologist and climatologist Sir Brian Hoskins. “It points to a threat that is greater to our species than any known virus—we must not be diverted from the urgency of tackling it by reducing our greenhouse gas emissions to zero as soon as possible.”



in Africa, Asia, Australia, Drought, Famine & Wildfires, Food Security, Heat & Temperature, Ice Loss & Sea Level Rise, India, International Agencies & Studies, Small Island States, UK & Europe, United States

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

openthegovernment.org
United States

BREAKING: U.S. Senate Passes Historic $369B Climate Package

August 8, 2022
50
Early stages of construction on the Flamanville 3 nuclear reactor in France
Nuclear

Failing French Nuclear Plants Drive Up Electricity Costs as Heat Waves Cut Production

August 8, 2022
11
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/
Health & Safety

Canadians Share Stories of Fear, Vulnerability from 2021 Heat Dome

August 7, 2022
6

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

/MaxPixels

‘Substantial Damage’, No Injuries as Freight Train Hits Wind Turbine Blade

May 25, 2022
5.5k
openthegovernment.org

BREAKING: U.S. Senate Passes Historic $369B Climate Package

August 8, 2022
50
Noah Berger/flickr

Researchers Point To ‘Dangerously Unexplored’ Risk of Global Climate Catastrophe

August 2, 2022
569
François GOGLINS/wikimedia commons

Corrosion Problem Shutters Half of France’s Nuclear Reactors

August 2, 2022
1.2k
flickr

‘Big Wake-Up Call’ as Energy Crisis Makes Fossil Hydrogen a Bad Investment

July 20, 2022
997
/MaxPixels

‘Substantial Damage’, No Injuries as Freight Train Hit Wind Turbine Blade

December 22, 2021
653

Recent Posts

jasonwoodhead23/flickr

Fossils Dismiss Federal Emissions Cap as ‘Aggressive’, ‘Unrealistic’

August 8, 2022
4
Early stages of construction on the Flamanville 3 nuclear reactor in France

Failing French Nuclear Plants Drive Up Electricity Costs as Heat Waves Cut Production

August 8, 2022
11
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

Canadians Share Stories of Fear, Vulnerability from 2021 Heat Dome

August 7, 2022
6
Joseph Brent/Flickr

Green Hydrogen Will Cost Less than Fossil-Fuelled ‘Blue’, Shell CEO Admits

August 7, 2022
10
David Wilson/wikimedia commons

U.S. State Treasurers Use Public Office to Thwart Climate Action, Investigation Finds

August 7, 2022
6
Brian Jeffery Beggerly/Wikimedia Commons

China’s Latest Renewables Plan Could Bridge Global 1.5°C Gap, Expert Says

August 7, 2022
9
Next Post
NASA/JPL-Caltech

Tropical Forests Lose One-Third of Carbon Storage Ability, Could Soon Become Carbon Source

The Energy Mix

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Navigate Site

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Follow Us

No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}