Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent
@mattmcgrathbbc on Twitter
24 July 2019
Do you remember the good old days when we had “12 years to save the planet”?
Now it seems, there’s a growing consensus that the next 18 months will be critical in dealing with the global heating crisis, among other environmental challenges.
Last year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that to keep the rise in global temperatures below 1.5C this century, emissions of carbon dioxide would have to be cut by 45% by 2030.
But today, observers recognise that the decisive, political steps to enable the cuts in carbon to take place will have to happen before the end of next year.
The idea that 2020 is a firm deadline was eloquently addressed by one of the world’s top climate scientists, speaking back in 2017.
The jet stream drags tropical continental air from Africa over to Europe
“The climate math is brutally clear: While the world can’t be healed within the next few years, it may be fatally wounded by negligence until 2020,” said Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founder and now director emeritus of the Potsdam Climate Institute.
The sense that the end of next year is the last chance saloon for climate change is becoming clearer all the time.
“I am firmly of the view that the next 18 months will decide our ability to keep climate change to survivable levels and to restore nature to the equilibrium we need for our survival,” said Prince Charles, speaking at a reception for Commonwealth foreign ministers recently.
So why are the next 18 months so important?
The Prince was looking ahead to a series of critical UN meetings that are due to take place between now and the end of 2020.
Ever since a global climate agreement was signed in Paris in December 2015, negotiators have been consumed with arguing about the rulebook for the pact.
But under the terms of the deal, countries have also promised to improve their carbon-cutting plans by the end of next year.
One of the understated headlines in last year’s IPCC report was that global emissions of carbon dioxide must peak by 2020 to keep the planet below 1.5C.
Current plans are nowhere near strong enough to keep temperatures below the so-called safe limit. Right now, we are heading towards 3C of heating by 2100 not 1.5.
As countries usually scope out their plans over five and 10 year timeframes, if the 45% carbon cut target by 2030 is to be met then the plans really need to be on the table by the end of 2020.
HT/Kent N
https://youtu.be/1Oq6vztcjgg “Flash, Flash, I love you, but we only have fourteen hours to save the world!”
Harold Camping would be so proud that his legacy lives on 🙂
Now Harold is Camping out beyond the stars.
Nope. Worm food, nothing more.
He went thru a worm hole.
a worm’s a-hole.
Yech! That really BUGS me!
As a loyal subject of EIIR, I suppose I owe some respect to Big Ears – oops, sorry, Prince Charles – as the heir (maybe). But in fact I don’t: he’s an idiot. In case anyone wonders, I’m not a Diana fan either.
Carolus III Rex, Urceus Ansa sicut Aures Formatae, Fidei in Caeli Mutatione Defensor
God Save the Queen
If he outlives his Mum, he will be George VII.
Our Kings Charles have not been good examples: Charlie One was dramatically shortened, by exactly a head; Charlie Two had no legitimate heir.
Long Live the Queen!
Auto
Well, As long as China and India can continue unabated, AND as long as the developing nations of the world can do likewise, peak CO2 in 2020 will never happen even by 2040.
If 450ppm Peak at 2030 were a world killer, then the workld has died numerous times over. We must all be Zombies
The problem of Charles’s heir has been solved. I pray that the queen out lives Charles. Her mother live to be 101. So, we are not without hope.
Just a thought, if the Duchess of Sussex (the former Meghan Markle) becomes queen of England, will she still be entitled to intersectional points.
Well, They DO have just 18 months to save the Monarchy (From Charles)
I suppose the end of the Monarchy could be viewed as the end of the World
Relax Charles – you look stressed. Take a few days off.
Maybe you and Prince Andrew could fly to Jeffrey Epstein’s Pedo Island – again!
In a private jet…
Chem trails?
Only if he farts while flushing.
Stressed? He’ll just use science – that homeopathy that’s he’s so keen on.
Wasn’t it his son Andrew who was a “guest” of Epstien?
Prince Andrew and Prince Charles are brothers.
Right. Is Charles making noise to distract from Andrew’s involvement with Epstein?
Flesh Gordon was far funnier, a great parody.
Did you hear about the flasher who was thinking of retiring? He decided to stick it out a little longer.
“Doctor,you told me I have a month to live and then you sent me a bill for $1,000! I can’t pay that before the end of the month!”
“Okay,you have six months to live.”
Mindless B.S. He should go talk with China, India, African and other Third World countries.
Yeah, flying on a private jet.
737 max 8
The BBC has always produced good comedies. We’ve had Morcombe & Wise, The Two Ronnies, Only Fools and Horses, One Foot In The Grave, Are You Being Served? and now this. However, I think the TV audience may be limited as no one knows all the actors and the subject is based on bullsh*t
One Foot In the Grave is particularly apposite in this instance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTgT1eENbIs
Only climate science could produce something less believable.
More cant and nonsense from the BBC. They need to
be thrust out of their ivory tower into the world of commercial, non-government supported television, so that the British people can actually send a message to these charlatans through their viewing habits and subsequent ratings and sponsorships.
non-“taxpayer” supported television, so that the British people can actually send a message to these charlatans…………………the BBC’s Charter was thrown in the rubbish shute years ago!
There, corrected that for you! Don’t forget, with politicains, they lie, they cheat, & they steal, (sorry, The Hunt for Red October was oh so accurate)! Guvments have no money, it’s the peoples’ money (for when they’re making cuts), the guvment is spending ABCXYZ gazillions on this/that/or the other cause/project/junket/white-elephant etc! especially come election time!
Ah you make the common mistake of believing, or perhaps assuming, the BBC is independent. It is most certainly not, it is and always has been the propaganda arm of the Establishment, or UK Deep State or ‘the men in grey suits’ or whatever you deem the true decision makers behind the political and governmental classes.
Nothing will salvage it, those hidden powers would not allow it.
…Not to mention the usefulness of a global media organization for the national intelligence agencies.
Wishful thinking. The genie was out of the bottle 20 or 30 years ago. Global temps are just beginning to spike.
On which planet?
Earth.
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cag/global/time-series/globe/land_ocean/48/6/1880-2019?trend=true&trend_base=10&firsttrendyear=1880&lasttrendyear=2019
How can such a graph be published without addressing error.
Fortunately “Spike” is indicative of a sudden rise followed by a sudden fall. Without the “Fall” the “Spike” is just a Plateau
Without the Super El Nino, a plateau is all the alarmists got for the 21st Century.
And after the UN IPCC AR5, it got all the climate hustlers looking for the “missing heat.”
Missing Heat???
Found it
Ghost Peppers…Yum
Isn’t it interesting that the difference between satellite data and surface data continues to diverge in the exact opposite direction as that predicted by climate science.
That would likely tell someone truly interested in understanding the truth that surface data is being affected by something completely different than CO2.
Exactly what I was thinking Richard. GAO, back in 2011, said 42% of NOAA temperature stations do no meet NOAA guidelines for siting….
https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2011/9/post-bb6f9c3f-802a-23ad-432c-dc7700b3bf61
The maps in the linked piece below seem to show quite a difference between compliant stations temperature and ALL stations (compliant and non-compliant).
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/12/17/press-release-agu15-the-quality-of-temperature-station-siting-matters-for-temperature-trends/
But when you are devoted to the climate scare narrative, this probably isn’t going to matter. Questionable or tainted temperature data is acceptable when it can be used to promote the scare. Loydo either doesn’t understand this or doesn’t care (pick one).
….and then of course there is the fact that we have been coming out of a Little Ice Age since the 19th century, haven’t we Loydo? What do you expect the Earth to do, get colder?
Don’t worry, according to the modern version of the law of big numbers, if we can average enough bad data together, we can get whatever result we want.
” GAO, back in 2011, said 42% of NOAA temperature stations do no meet NOAA guidelines for siting”
I don’t think the temperature gauges are the real problem. The real problem with the adjusted temperature record is what NOAA does with the temperature numbers once they put them into a computer and change the results to something that suits the CAGW narrative..
How about over a meaningful time frame, like this entire interglacial.
That’s too time consuming for believers of the Church of Omnipotent Greenhouse in Carbon, they’d rather use the Readers Digest Condensed Version of climate consensus.
A global average temperature is a meaningless statistic. Here’s a graphic I made showing the average anomaly for the contiguous US since 1900, using the NOAA GHCN-Monthly summaries and a 1981-2010 baseline.
Note the flatness of that trend line. Works out to 0.36°C/century.
Now you may claim that the US is only 6% of the Earth’s land surface, and this is true. But it’s also where we live, and the temperatures we are getting. And it’s practically unchanged.
As I pointed out in the “heat wave” thread, when the NOAA monthly summaries are averaged for each month of the year since 1900, every month but February has a decreasing trend. What’s happening in my back yard is a lot more significant than what’s happening “on average” across the globe.
Would have helped to put in the link:
“A global average temperature is a meaningless statistic. Here’s a graphic I made showing the average anomaly for the contiguous US since 1900, using the NOAA GHCN-Monthly summaries and a 1981-2010 baseline.”
What you meant to say was: A contiguous US average temperature is a meaningless statistic.
“But it’s also where we live…”
No its not.
“What you meant to say was: A contiguous US average temperature is a meaningless statistic.”
It’s not meaningless. The U.S. has a temperature profile (derived from an average U.S. temperature) that shows the 1930’s to be just as warm as today, and unmodified temperature charts from around the world show the very same temperature profile, so I would say that the U.S. temperature profile is representative of the global temperature profile/climate.
I can provide you charts to compare if you so desire.
Funny that. Temps are spiking on Mars, too. Damn those Mars rovers!
Once again Loydo spouting BS again.
Loydo’s still trying to pretend that the recent El Nino spike was actually CO2 and the falling temperatures since then are proof that it’s actually getting warmer.
Loydo, please go back to taking your meds. Temps are normal here, and it’s pleasantly cool at night, too. And if you’d crawl out of your Cave of Fear occasionally, you’d know that weather and climate are not synonymous.
“Temps are normal here”
Are you talking about climate or weather?
So, the planet is going to DIE, like the Prince suggested (“fatally wounded”)? Really? The ice ages couldn’t manage to kill the planet, but by golly a few degrees above today’s temps (which are below the max even for this interglacial) will kill off everything? This all sounds like extreme hyperbole to me.
If the much warmer temperatures the planet enjoyed during the Medieval, Roman and Minoan warm periods, not to mention the vast majority of the last 10K years didn’t kill us off, the extremely mild Modern Warm Period ain’t going to do it either.
It’s interesting that despite the fact that these people basically worship nature as a God, they have a very low opinion of it. “Mother Nature is weak and pathetic, and Mankind is the most powerful force that have ever existed on this planet.”
Global warming is the religion FOR the masses. It’s not for those making a good living FROM it.
Global temps are just beginning to spike.
Good thing people 12000 yrs ago when the temps started “spiking” didn’t have graphs or we’d prb’ly be extinct — everyone would’ve been thrown in volcanoes to appease the weather gods.
It really is fascinating how 3 years of falling temperatures become a temperature spike.
Prior to that 20 years with no warming.
Very pleasant July here and we just broke record cool temps the other day – https://www.nola.com/news/weather/article_1eb8cd52-aee7-11e9-8a4f-eb77ece7c972.html
Well, if an accomplished ‘scientist’ like goofy Prince Chuck is alarmed, we should all be. The sky is definitely ready to fall in on everything.
Jane Fonda is equally as qualified on this as the prince. Why don’t they ask her?
Or AOC. She seems well educated. LOL
At least on this topic, AOC got it right. Twelve years? I was just joking. Anyone who believed that is an idiot. Something to that effect.
God knows.
We passed the “tipping point” 20 years ago.
Embrace the horror.
In the UK a few years ago there was a speech by one politician that said we had 100 days to act before global warming would run away. Guess what happened to that prediction. Exactly the same as is going to happen to this.
About 18 months to US Presidential and General election in the US.
Dems are demanding climate change in DC. Their GreenSlime masters are yanking on their strings and threatening to withhold the greenback drugs they feed on if they lose again.
Charlie’s boys did not expect Trump to be still there – note how the FBI codenamed Christopher Steel’s MI6 dirty dossier “Crown Materials”. Chatham House Royal Inst. Int. Affairs RIIA, scribbled that the “special relationship” will not survive another Trump admin.
So it is the USA v. the Commonwealth, again. This time around they have EU Commissioner van der Leyen declaring a GND, and CO2 border controls, sounding like a loyal Crown subject.
“special relationship” is jerk-off. US presidents joke about it before hosting UK PMs/
What do you call a cow that masturbates? Beef Strokanoff.
Good one. Or Spamaism.
Cow? Strokanoff? And the bull jumped over the moon.
I was going to post same, but you beat me to it. Yes, the schedule is shortened because there is an important election upcoming in 18 months…
Probably the most important election in world history.
After the 2020 U.S. presidential elections we will be able to see whether reason or delusional rules the day. How many people have the Leftwing Media been able to fool into thinking voting Democrat is in their bets interests, is the question.
I think there is going to be a huge backlash against the Democrats at the polls, for the harm they have done to the U.S. by the way they have behaved since Trump got elected.
The Left will be animated to vote this time but I think the Right is going to be even more animated.
We will all know where things stand after this next election.
Yes, funny how this totally sciencey deadline just coincidentally coincides with a politital event.
Once again misinformation from the IPCC and their spruikers: “keep the rise in global temperatures below 1.5C this century.”
That 1.5C increase is from pre-industrial times, so what they are really saying is that a rise of more than 0.5C this century will be catastrophic, an immediate emergency, etc. etc.
Yet the world seems to be doing just fine.
If he were alive, we could ask George Carlin how the world is doing.
George Carlin would probably say about the world is that the only thing that’s flat is the methane gas from flatulence.
Actually, Dan, that gas is rather bubbly.
no more champagne for me!
“That 1.5C increase is from pre-industrial times, so what they are really saying is that a rise of more than 0.5C this century will be catastrophic, an immediate emergency, etc. etc.
Yet the world seems to be doing just fine.”
On top of that, the globe has actually cooled 0.5C since Feb. 2016, so the globe is moving farther away from “catastrophe” even as we write. 🙂
There is sea ice at both poles defying numerous “expert” predictions to the contrary. Commercial shipping in Canada’s Northwest Passage remains an unfulfilled promise. Trenberth’s ocean heat is still missing. The top 2000m of the global oceans have warmed a piddling 0.1C in the last 65 years since ocean water temperature has been measured on a global scale. Now the gullible are told they have 18 months to take decisive action.
Not that we can measure the ocean’s temperature to within 0.1C today, much less 65 years ago.
Off topic but
“Scientists are calling on governments to include deliberate damage to wildlife and the environment during a conflict, under international laws against war crimes.
Researchers at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) warn that war can take a “brutal toll” on nature and vulnerable communities which rely on it for their livelihoods.
They said it could drive species to extinction and poison water resources.
Professor Sarah Durant, of ZSL’s Institute of Zoology, said changing the law would “not only help safeguard threatened species, but would also support rural communities, both during and post-conflict, whose livelihoods are long-term casualties of environmental destruction”.
https://www.forces.net/news/protecting-nature-war-under-geneva-convention
… good luck with that
The previous interglacial period, the Eemian, was warmer than this one with more ice cap melting and higher sea levels yet CO2 levels were lower than today. During the Eemian, mankind did nothing to reduce CO2 levels in the atmosphere yet the Eemian gradually ended and the last ice age followed. Mankind had nothing to do with it.
Despite the hype, there is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on climate and there is plenty of scientific rationale to support the idea that the climate sensitivity of CO2 is zero. It is all a matter of science. So if mankind significantly reduced the amount of CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere, the effort would have no effect on climate. The current interglacial period will eventually end and a new ice age will follow and mankind does not have the power to stop or alter the process.
“On the contrary, proto-anthro-homo ancestors caused the climate to destabilize 5 mya and it’s been all over the shop ever since!” – UN IPCC
“The climate math is brutally clear…”
Oh? Good! Can we see it, please?
Here it is DG:
a X b = c
You plebs don’t know what b is, but we elites have magic calculators, so we know c and it’s 1.5. So shut up.
a math teacher was caught DWI.He was told never drink and derive.
The Doomsday Interval Constant (or DIC) (pronounced Dick) is a Universal Law which is more fundamental and far reaching than the Answer to the Universe.
It states that predictions of Doom must always be sufficiently ahead in time so that the prediction is largely forgotten when it fails to eventuate yet not so far ahead that it cannot be contemplated within 2 thirds of an average human lifespan. The sweet spot for the Doomsday Interval therefore is between 12 years and 30 years and remains a constant, constantly dwarfing all other constants.
“Scientists are calling on governments to include deliberate damage to wildlife and the environment during a conflict, under international laws against war crimes.
Researchers at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) warn that war can take a “brutal toll” on nature and vulnerable communities which rely on it for their livelihoods.
They said it could drive species to extinction and poison water resources.
Professor Sarah Durant, of ZSL’s Institute of Zoology, said changing the law would “not only help safeguard threatened species, but would also support rural communities, both during and post-conflict, whose livelihoods are long-term casualties of environmental destruction”.
https://www.forces.net/news/protecting-nature-war-under-geneva-convention
… good luck with that
“I’ll see your 18-month crisis and raise you a 1-month crisis.”
“ELIMINATE FOSSIL FUELS TOMORROW AND ALMOST EVERYONE IN THE DEVELOPED WORLD WOULD BE DEAD IN ABOUT A MONTH FROM STARVATION AND EXPOSURE.”
Regards, Allan
____________________________
12. Fossil fuels comprise fully 85% of global primary energy, unchanged in decades, and unlikely to change in future decades.
The remaining 15% of global primary energy is almost all hydro and nuclear.
Eliminate fossil fuels tomorrow and almost everyone in the developed world would be dead in about a month from starvation and exposure.
Despite trillions of dollars in squandered subsidies, global green energy has increased from above 1% to below 2% is recent decades.
Intermittent energy from wind and/or solar generation cannot supply the electric grid with reliable, uninterrupted power.
“Green energy” schemes are not green and produce little useful (dispatchable) energy, because they require almost 100% conventional backup from fossil fuels, nuclear or hydro when the wind does not blow and the Sun does not shine.
There is no widely-available, practical, cost-effective means of solving the fatal flaw of intermittency in grid-connected wind and solar power generation.
Hydro backup and pumped storage are only available in a few locations. Other grid-storage systems are very costly, although costs are decreasing.
To date, vital electric grids have been destabilized, electricity costs have increased greatly, and Excess Winter Deaths have increased due to grid-connected green energy schemes.
Reference: “Statistical Review of World Energy”
https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/energy-economics/statistical-review-of-world-energy.html
Reference: “Wind Report 2005” – note Figs. 6 & 7 re intermittency.
http://www.wind-watch.org/documents/wp-content/uploads/eonwindreport2005.pdf
Excerpts from
“CO2, Global Warming, Climate and Energy”
by Allan M.R. MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/06/15/co2-global-warming-climate-and-energy-2/
They are panicking. The climate scam will come apart before then.
This is just the next phase of the politics war.
Yup and they know we know they know.
Owen Jones of the UK Guardian is clearly not really worried that there is a “climate emergency”.
https://youtu.be/ZTrjCLZj27w
That makes two of us. I have trouble trying to keep myself from laughing about it too.
I wonder when the UK runs out of other peoples money?
Never! Just do as America does and borrow it from the Chinese.
Did you hear about the 2 new Chinese restaurants that opened up? Won Hung Lo & Wee Sukim Yung.
Did you hear about the new restaurant that opened up on the moon? I hear the food is great,but there’s no atmosphere.
Thank goodness they have moved up the date for Armageddon – I am 71 years old and was afraid that I was going to miss it….
you might miss it if you get raptured before then.
People have been waiting for (and predicting) that for 2000 years too.
God only knows when it will happen.It can occur at anytime.But sooner or later, it will happen.To say that it will be an awesome experience would be a big understatement.
18 months?
Coincide with the US election-cycle much?
“will have to happen before the end of next year”.
Isn’t that around the time our Donald is being re-elected?
The planet will survive. Mankind may not, but the end will not be global warming, but human insanity.
Hey, i’m a human too! Don’t pull me into this!
Though I would say that a natural disaster would be most likely to wipe us out. Politicians and well-meaning but stupid people are dangerous, but they don’t even come close to asteroids.