UN to issue starkest warning yet on climate change
Atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and hydrofluorocarbons had already reached critical levels in 2005, ten years earlier than expected, according to climate scientist Tim Flannery, who was citing figures due to be released by the UN next month.
Speaking on Australian television on Monday (8 October), the internationally-acclaimed climate scientist and activist Tim Flannery warned that greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations already exceeded 455 parts per million (ppm) in 2005, ten years earlier than previously expected.
Flannery said that the new data will be released on 7 November as part of an upcoming report by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The 455ppm mark is considered a dangerous threshold by many scientists. At this level of atmospheric GHG concentration, global average temperature will likely increase by 2 degrees Celsius, triggering potentially catastrophic sea level rises and other climate-related disasters.
The EU has made limiting temperature rises to no more than 2°C the key objective of its integrated climate change and energy policy, agreed earlier this year (see related LinksDossier).
"What the report establishes is that the amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is already above the threshold that could potentially cause dangerous climate change", Flannery said.
The findings of the IPCC report will be discussed by world leaders during a major UN Climate Change Conference in Bali in December.
European leaders are hopeful the Bali conference will represent a major step towards a binding international CO2 reduction agreement that will replace the Kyoto Protocol, set to expire in 2012.
But during a 4 October climate change hearing in Parliament, Yvo de Boer, who heads the UN framework convention on climate change (UNFCCC), told MEPs to moderate their expectations in terms of what the Bali conference is likely to produce. "The goal at Bali is not the perfect agreement but the perfect launch", de Boer said, emphasising that the purpose of the conference is not to reach an agreement but rather to establish consensus towards an eventual agreement.
The US, Australia and Canada remain opposed to any binding international CO2 emissions reduction agreements. Meanwhile, the EU has made building a global climate change regime one of its key priorities, due in part to concerns that unilateral action by Europe was hampering the competitiveness of its industries. www.euractiv.com
