ANALYSIS..

A NEW UN report has warned of the need for steep emissions cuts to keep global warming to 1.50C and avoid the worst impacts of climate change.

Keeping temperature rises to 1.50C will reduce extreme weather and rising sea levels, and limit damage to everything from the economy to the Arctic, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found.

But whether it can be done is another question.

Countries have already made national commitments to drive forward with renewable power and electric vehicles, save forests and phase out polluting coal power, as part of the Paris Agreement on climate change.

While every country in the world is currently a signatory to the Paris Agreement, President Donald Trump has announced plans to pull the US out of the deal, and there are fears that might lead to others following suit.

Another problem is that country pledges made under Paris do not get the world anywhere near cutting carbon emissions to zero by mid-century, which is what is needed to curb warming to 1.50C.

Professor Piers Forster, of the University of Leeds and a leading author of the report, said current policies put the world on course for a “super-risky 30C of warming”.

And he warned: “The report shows that limiting warming to 1.50C is barely feasible and, every year we delay, the window of feasibility halves. Nevertheless, if we were to succeed, we go on to show that benefits across society will be huge and the world will be all the richer for it.

“It’s a battle worth winning.” Changes are needed across the whole of society, with “significant upscaling” of investment in all sectors, for example some 2.4 trillion US dollars (£1.8 trillion) a year in energy up to 2035, and that will require political will.

The report points to solar, wind and electricity storage, which have become substantially more economically, politically, technically and socially feasible in recent years, showing things can change fast.

But it also acknowledges the scale of the changes has no historical precedent – humans have never done anything like this before.

Rapid cutting of carbon from the economy can be done, and a good example of that is the UK, where emissions have fallen by more than 40% since 1990.

Renewables have risen to more than 30% of the electricity generation mix from only 5% a decade ago, and are widely popular with the public, while coal is due to come off the system by 2025.

However, the Government’s climate advisers have warned success in the power sector is masking failures to make necessary cuts in emissions in areas such as transport and home heating.

Ministers now face calls to replace the current target of cutting emissions by 80% by 2050 with a zero-carbon target in line with the 1.50C goal.

But they are also under pressure to push forward with policies to deliver more cuts more quickly.

The report also flags up that people could take the initiative with changes to lifestyles – everything from what we eat and how we produce it, to how we travel, how we heat our homes and plan our cities.

One of the report’s authors, Dr Heleen de Coninck, said lifestyle changes could be wide-ranging: “It’s across all elements of life, there’s no one thing we can do like going vegan, it’s a little bit of everything.”

But she added: “There’s no reason we can’t live a comfortable and fulfilling life in a 1.50C world.”