Science Daily November 27, 2019
According to an international team of researchers (UK, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Australia) the evidence from tipping points alone suggests that we are in a state of planetary emergency: both the risk and urgency of the situation are acute. They summarize evidence on the threat of exceeding tipping points, such as the loss of the Amazon rainforest or the West Antarctic ice sheet, identify knowledge gaps and suggest how these should be plugged. They explore the effects of such large-scale changes, how quickly they might unfold and whether we still have any control over them. According to researchers if the current national pledges to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions are implemented they are likely to result in at least 3 °C of global warming. Several cryosphere tipping points are dangerously close. Climate change and other human activities risk triggering biosphere tipping points across a range of ecosystems and scales, the clearest emergency would be if we were approaching a global cascade of tipping points that led to a new, less habitable, ‘hothouse’ climate state…read more. Open Access TECHNICAL ARTICLE
Raising the Alarm. Credit: Nature, 27, November 2019Â