Experts warn of ‘relentless, continuing’ climate change
COVID-19 and extreme weather struck a double blow on millions of people in 2020, a United Nations report on the state of the climate has warned.
Despite the pandemic driving an economic slowdown that caused a dip in greenhouse gas emissions, experts said the report showed “relentless, continuing climate change” and more extreme storms, floods and droughts.
The impacts of a changing climate were compounded by the pandemic’s hit to the economy and lockdown restrictions, hampering evacuation and recovery efforts from storms and worsening food insecurity, the report said.
As the report was released, UN secretary general Antonio Guterres warned climate impacts were “already too costly” for people and planet, and called on countries to act immediately.
Countries must commit to cut their emissions to net zero by 2050, and
submit plans in the next few months that will collectively cut global emissions by 45% by 2030 to help limit temperature rises, he urged.
He called for an end to fossil fuel subsidies, a phase-out of coal power plants, and for rich countries to deliver on their pledge of 100bn $US a year for developing nations to cope with climate impacts and develop cleanly.
The warnings come as global leaders prepare to take part in a summit this week convened by US President
Joe Biden to galvanise efforts by major economies to combat climate change ahead of key UN Cop26 talks hosted by the UK in November.
At the weekend China and the US announced they had reached an agreement to co-operate with each other and with other countries to tackle the climate crisis, raising hopes of action by them and other countries to slash pollution.
Countries have committed under the Paris climate agreement to halt global temperature rises to well below 20C above pre-industrial levels, and try to curb them at 1.50C to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, but plans so far do not get close to what is needed to meet those goals.
The new report from the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) highlights the urgency of the need for action, as even the economic slowdown caused by the pandemic – grounding planes, halting traffic and shutting offices, factories and public buildings – has not halted the drivers or impacts of climate change. It warned: Concentrations of major greenhouse gases in the atmosphere continued to increase in 2019 and 2020;
temperatures were 1.20C above pre-industrial levels in 2020, which was one of the three warmest years on record. The past six years since 2015 have been the hottest on record and 2011-20 was the warmest decade ever recorded;
oceans absorb excess heat, and 2019 saw the highest ocean heat content on record, with the trend likely continuing in 2020. More than four-fifths of the seas experienced at least one marine heatwave last year;
Arctic sea ice shrank to its second-lowest summer minimum on record, there were record high temperatures in the Arctic circle in Siberia, and the Greenland ice sheet continues to melt;
many parts of the world saw heavy rain and extensive flooding, locust outbreaks, severe or longterm drought, heatwaves, wildfires, agricultural losses and hurricanes and typhoons; and
more than 50m people were doubly hit by climate-related disasters and by the Covid-19 pandemic.