DID YOU KNOW?

At last count more than 1650 climate change court cases had been filed internationally. Around 1300 had been filed in the US and 113 in Australia.

BEST-CASE SCENARIO

The goal of the Paris Agreement is to keep global temperature increases to well below 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, and preferably below 1.5%. This would still have an impact on how we live, but management and mitigation of the risks are more manageable.

WORST-CASE SCENARIO

In February, the United Nations published a report finding we are not yet on track to reach the goals of the Paris Agreement. It found that while the majority of countries had increased their ambitions to cut emissions, changes in total emissions would be much smaller by 2030 than what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said was needed to meet the 1.5% temperature increase goal.

THE WILD CARD

Climate scientists place high importance on climate tipping points, which can trigger further and faster irreversible change. Examples include the melting of the Greenland and west Antarctic ice sheets and the shutdown of a deep-water form of ocean circulation (known as thermohaline) in the North Atlantic.

Annette Sampson has written extensively on personal finance. She was personal finance editor with The Sydney Morning Herald, a former editor of the Herald’s Money section and a columnist for The Age.

She has written several books.