The Economist recently published an article covering climate
change policy to mark the beginning of the Doha Climate Change Conference. According to current projections, the outlook
appears quite bleak. Although the world needed to decrease greenhouse gas emissions,
they have actually increased by 20% just in the past 10 years. This is a major cause for
concern, since the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) estimates that by 2020, greenhouse
gas emissions must be 11% lower than they are now to guarantee that temperatures
do not increase by 2 degrees Celsius. Assuming that greenhouse gas emissions
continue to increase at this same pace, by 2020 the world will emit 58 gigatonnes of carbon equivalent (GtCO2e),
significantly more than the maximum level of 44 GtCO2e required to prevent
temperatures from rising above 2 degrees Celsius. As the Economist explains, if
countries planned on making major cuts down the line, then we could potentially
avoid this catastrophic temperature increase. However, given the political
climate and current policies laid out, this appears unlikely. Even if countries
adopted the strictest, conditional pledges, countries wouldn’t even come close
to the GtCO2e goal needed to prevent temperatures from rising above
2 degrees Celsius.
About TeachingwithData.org
TeachingWithData.org is a partnership between the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) and the Social Science Data Analysis Network (SSDAN), both at the University of Michigan. The project is funded by NSF Award 0840642, George Alter (ICPSR), PI and William Frey (SSDAN), co-PI.
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