How is this possible? I thought we all died from ‘climate change’ years ago? Or was that the end of Net Neutrality? Or Trump starting WWIII?
Environmental review of 2022: another mile on the ‘highway to climate hell’
Two events in 2022 symbolised the climate breakdown that humanity is careering towards and the real, though fast-fading, hope that the world can still be steered away from calamity.
The first was the apocalyptic floods that submerged a third of Pakistan, the world’s fifth most populous country, affecting 33 million people. Scientists found that the climate crisis had made the deluge up to 50% more intense.
The second was the re-election of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva as the president of Brazil. Experts had said the fate of the Amazon rested on the vote. Another term of the rampant destruction seen under Jair Bolsonaro could have pushed the world’s biggest rainforest past its tipping point, with global consequences.
Overall, however, the climate crisis is bleaker than it has ever been. In October, a slew of reports laid bare how close the planet had neared to irreversible climate breakdown, with one UN study stating there was “no credible pathway in place to 1.5C”, the internationally agreed limit for global heating, and that progress on cutting carbon emissions was “woefully inadequate”.
Well, if all the climate cultists would practice what they preach there’d be no problem, right?
Scientists had revealed in September that five “disastrous” tipping points may already have been passed due to the 1.1C of global heating to date. These included the collapse of Greenland’s ice cap, eventually producing a huge sea level rise and the collapse of a key current in the north Atlantic, disrupting rain upon which billions of people depend for food.
Who gets blamed when the Greenland ice cap doesn’t collapse? Who’s held responsible for the scaremongering?
The climate equation remains simple: carbon emissions must halve by 2030 to have an even chance of keeping to the 1.5C limit. But in 2022 emissions will have risen to a record level. “We are on a highway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator,” said the UN secretary general, António Guterres.
Read: Your Fault: 2022 Was Another Mile On The Way To Climate Hell »