(Twelve minute read.)

Once we pass a certain threshold, physics takes over.

We have had summit after summit and we still unable to except the consequences.

Why?

Because we put money before people.

Scientists have and are warning that Earth is exceeding its “safe operating space for humanity” in six of nine key measurements of its health.

Earth’s climate, biodiversity, land, freshwater, nutrient and air pollution and ‘novel’ chemicals – human-made compounds like microplastics  and nuclear waste – are all out of whack, and the planet is losing resilience.

Once a tipping point is crossed it will be irrelevant as who contributed or who did not.

The 2015 UN Paris Agreement set a target to cap the global temperature rise to 1.5°C.

However, the current reality on the ground paints a worrisome picture, with governments not able or  unwilling to comprehend the consequences.

The truth is that we live in a world that is incapable of any mean full collective action, in order to avert the coming decades of uncertainty and fragility.

The magnitude of the challenge calls for bold collective actions.

The Covid crisis and the war in Ukraine have combined to shake up the global economic and social system and increase uncertainty, bringing lower growth and triggering higher inflation.

As a result we see countries roiling back on their commitments to achieve net zero carbon admissions.

If damaging tipping cascades can occur and global climate tipping points cannot be ruled out, then this is an existential threat to civilization.

Experts don’t agree on exactly where the limits are, it’s more likely that we’re burnt toast.

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These include the collapse of Greenland’s ice cap, eventually producing a huge sea level rise, the collapse of a key current in the north Atlantic, disrupting rain upon which billions of people depend for food, and an abrupt melting of carbon-rich permafrost.

They don’t exist in isolation, they are all intermingle.

This sets Earth on course to cross multiple dangerous tipping points that will be disastrous for people across the world.

To maintain liveable conditions on Earth and enable stable societies, we must do everything possible to prevent crossing tipping points.

These boundaries “determine the fate of the planet, with the consequences impossible to predict.

No amount of economic cost–benefit analysis is going to help us.

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Perhaps its beyond our collective intelligence to drive any tangible action on key global issues.

Unfortunately we are still yonks away from any global understanding of just what is a risk.

Take the UK Environment Act that became law during the UK’s hosting of the COP26 summit in Glasgow is totally ignored when granting hundreds new offshore oil licences, or opening a coal mine in Wales.

Rishi Sunak said: We’re choosing to power up Britain from Britain so that tyrants like Putin can never again use energy as a weapon to blackmail us. And just the other day announcing sweeping U-turns that could have catastrophic effects on our climate is one thing.

Delaying the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars in the UK from 2030 to 2035, more than anything sounded like an admission of the government’s failure to implement climate policy in a way that brings people with them while showing the benefits of a more sustainable future.

You dont need to be Climate Scientist to understand that we need to change our approach to the climate problem.

Take the Oceans.

Covering more than 70% of Earth’s surface. The heat-holding capacity of the ocean is mammoth.

Every year about 134 million atomic bombs of heat is being trapped by the ocean.

The effects of ocean warming include sea level rise due to thermal expansion, coral bleaching, accelerated melting of Earth’s major ice sheets, intensified hurricanes*, and changes in ocean health and Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are losing ice. lost completely, both ice sheets contain enough water to raise sea level by 66 meters (217 feet).

How much heat is that?

Ninety percent of global warming is occurring in the ocean. with most of the added energy stored at the surface.

Scientists have calculated it is the equivalent energy of more than 25bn Hiroshima atomic bombs.

The atmosphere has held on to about 2% of the extra heat caused by global heating since 2006.

Oceans are a vital climate regulator. It is not a free service. Adding that heat has come with ocean acidification, rising sea levels and changes in the frequency of extreme weather.

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The first thing to understand is, nowhere or anyone on the planet is going to be spared the impact of climate change.

Here are a few facts.

The Antarctica is losing 151 billion tonnes of ice per year, roughly equivalent in weight to the rock that makes Mount Everest,

More than 200 million people in the world will live below the tideline by the end of this century if levels continue to rise.

Wild fires devastated roughly 30 million acres of land from 2018-2020.

83 of 252 natural World Heritage sites are at risk.

A chilling number of Earth’s other denizens, including 40 percent of all amphibians known to science (about 3,200 species) is under threat.

Each year, more than 12 million hectares of land are lost to desertification.

The Great Barrier Reef in Australia  is estimated to have lost half its corals since the 1990s as a sustained rise in ocean temperatures bleached them white and made them uninviting to its colonising organisms.

Plastic production and use is forecast to double over the next 20 years, and quadruple by the early 2050s, warns the Heinrich Böll Foundation, despite the fact that greenhouse gases, such as CO₂ and methane, are released at every stage of plastic’s lifecycle – from the extraction and refinery of oil to the manufacturing process and end-of-life disposal and incineration.

At least 155 million people, 2.3 times as many as live in the UK, were pushed into acute food insecurity in 2020 due to extreme weather.

During the past 20 years there has been a 53·7% increase in heat-related mortality in people older than 65 years.

The amount of sea ice five years old or above dropped from 30% to 2%.

Climate change is accelerating the spread of infectious diseases.

Between 1990 and 2015, the richest 1% of the world’s population were responsible for more than twice as much carbon emissions as the poorest 50% of humanity.

Electric cars may emit zero tailpipe emissions, but they still have a sizeable carbon footprint from their manufacturing process. One manufacturer’s electric SUV has to drive anywhere between 29,000 miles (47,000km) and 90,000 miles (146,000km) – depending on whether it is recharged with wind power or a ‘global energy’ mix that includes electricity generated from fossil fuels – before its greenhouse gas emissions are lower than the petrol model.

Take planting trees would require 1.6 billion hectares of new forests.

The Jet Stream.

The jet stream is a large band of strong winds between five to seven miles above the Earth’s surface, blowing from west to east. The North Atlantic jet stream are likely to have drastic weather-related consequences for societies on both sides of the Atlantic.

As it flows overhead, it causes changes in the wind and pressure at that level and affects things nearer the surface such as areas of high and low pressure, shaping the weather.

Variations in the jet stream can have severe societal implications, such as floods and droughts, due to its impacts on weather patterns and so, in terms of thinking about the future, we can now begin to use the past as a sort of a prologue.

Natural variability has thus far masked the effect of human-caused warming on mid-latitude atmospheric dynamics across annual and longer timescales.

Continued warming could cause significant deviations from the norm. Such migration could render the jet stream significantly different within a matter of decades, with huge implications on the types of weather that people might experience at a given place, with trickle-down effects affecting national economies and societies.

The jet stream accounts for between 10% and 50% of variance in annual precipitation and temperature in both regions. However, little is known about how the jet stream varied during the past, or how it might change in the future.

The jet stream could migrate outside of the range of natural variability by as early as the year 2060 under unabated greenhouse gas emissions.

Heat waves are a silent and invisible killer.

We all know what is needed – clean energy.

There is no reason that governments could not make repayable grants available to their populations, to install green energy – such as solar – wind turbines  – tidal.

Once installed and the grant re payed, the energy produced should be owned by the house hold , village, factory, our community, who would have free energy, with any surplus suppling the Grid. At a lower cost than other forms of carbon dioxide removal.

Until we listen to what the natural world has to tell us about our place in it, not the other way around, will we be able to take any mean full action.

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin

Contact; bobdillon33@gmail.com.