Without much more ambitious action, the physical and socioeconomic impacts of climate change will be increasingly devastating, it warns.
“Floods, droughts, heatwaves, extreme storms and wildfires are going from bad to worse, breaking records with alarming frequency. Heatwaves in Europe. Colossal floods in Pakistan. Prolonged and severe droughts in China, the Horn of Africa and the United States. There is nothing natural about the new scale of these disasters. They are the price of humanity’s fossil fuel addiction,” said“This year’s United in Science report shows climate impacts heading into uncharted territory of destruction.
Despite a strong fluctuation in global emissions over the past two and a half years, fossil CO2 emissions fell significantly in 23 countries during the pre-pandemic decade of 2010–2019. There is a 93% probability that at least one year in the next five will be warmer than the warmest year on record, 2016, and that the mean temperature for 2022–2026 will be higher than that of the last five yearsEnhanced mitigation action is needed to prevent the goals of the Paris Agreement from slipping out of reach.
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation is an important driver of the distribution of heat, salt and water in the climate system, both regionally and globally. Recent research suggests AMOC may be weaker in the current climate than at any other time in the last millennium. Globally, by the 2050s, over 1.6 billion people living in over 970 cities will be regularly exposed to 3-month average temperatures reaching at least 35 °C .
Extreme weather events cause long-lasting socioeconomic impacts especially in the most vulnerable communities, which are often also the least equipped to respond, recover and adapt.