We have eight years to save the Earth: UN

NEW DELHI: The world has less than a decade - eight years - to stabilise the amount of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere to prevent global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius (C) over the pre-industrial level.

This is the most severe scenario presented in the third instalment of the report of UN’s Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released on Friday. It said the world has the technology and money to limit catastrophic global warming, but that it must act now to reduce the harmful effects of greenhouse gas emissions.

This is the third report this year from IPCC dealing with the costs and benefits of various policies to address global warming. It lays down the roadmap for stemming greenhouse gas emissions, detailing a slew of anti-warming measures to avert a disastrous spurt in global temperatures. Greenhouse gas emissions have risen by 70 per cent since 1970, and will rise between 25 per cent and 90 per cent over the next 25 years under “business as usual” scenario.

The report said the world has to make significant cuts in gas emissions through the development of bio-fuels, increases in fuel efficiency, the use of renewable energy like solar power, and a host of other measures.

The document made clear that the world has capability to act in time to avoid a rise in temperatures that would wipe out species, raise ocean levels, wreak economic havoc, cause extreme and freak weather conditions, droughts in some places and flooding in others. The guide for policy makers sets the stage for a stronger international agreement to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse emissions when it expires in 2012.

Stabilisation at reasonable cost is possible, the report says. The sharpest cuts, keeping greenhouse gas concentrations to levels equivalent to between 445 and 535 parts per million of carbon dioxide, might cost anything up to 3 per cent of global GDP by 2030.

The report follows two studies by the IPCC earlier this year warning that unabated greenhouse gas emissions could drive global temperatures up as much as 6 degrees C by 2100, triggering a surge in ocean levels, destruction of vast numbers of species, economic devastation in tropical zones and mass human migrations.

Even stringent efforts outlined in the report would not save the globe from suffering. An increase in temperatures to 2 degrees C could still subject up to 2 billion people to water shortages by 2050 and threaten extinction for 20 percent to 30 percent of the world’s species, the IPCC said.