CCAG calls for unprecedented interventions to mitigate 1.5°C climate overshoot

A momentous global effort must be undertaken to address the near inevitability of a 1.5°C climate overshoot, ensuring that the planet returns below the 1.5oC ‘climate guardrail’ as rapidly as possible.

That’s according to a new report on climate overshoot released today by the coalition of internationally renowned climate experts, the Climate Crisis Advisory Group (CCAG). It argues for immediate action, advocating not only for rapid reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions but also for the mobilisation of industry and technology to facilitate the removal of carbon dioxide on a vast scale from the atmosphere.

Key findings from the report include:

• Above the critical 1.5°C threshold, the latest science warns that the world will enter a realm of unacceptable risk and uncertainty, exposing humanity to potentially irreversible harms.
• Even at the current 1.1°C decade averaged global temperature rise, many parts of the world are already experiencing the catastrophic effects of the climate crisis
• Global warming must be kept to 1.0°C to ensure safety as well as justice for the most vulnerable communities, who are already bearing the brunt of climate breakdown.    
• The possibility of returning below 1.5°C in an ‘overshoot scenario’ will quickly move out of reach if sluggish global action on GHG reductions continues.

Johan Rockström, CCAG member and Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said: “Moving past 1.5°C will invite the worst climate impacts – yet we’re rushing towards 1.5°C as early as 2035. The near inevitability of an overshoot means we cannot stick our heads in the sand about how to manage and mitigate it. Beyond this guardrail, we risk crossing irreversible tipping points with devastating consequences. Urgent, large-scale interventions are imperative now to protect humanity."

Managing and mitigating overshoot - the actions and interventions required

CCAG advises policymakers, government officials and private sector leaders to address the problems at the heart of the climate crisis through its 4R Planet Strategy, focussing on action in four key areas.

To minimise the overshoot and mitigate its impacts, all components of the 4R strategy must be leveraged:

• Reduce - rapid reduction of emissions to limit the Earth’s warming
• Remove - development, research and scaling of techniques to remove GHGs from the atmosphere
• Repair - finding solutions that could help repair parts of our damaged climate systems
• Resilience - strengthening our capacity to deal with the climate crisis.

Each strand of this strategy involves different levels of challenge and opportunity, and all four are critical to global efforts to tackle the climate crisis.

Sir David King, founder and chair of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group, commented: “We can no longer ignore the need to mitigate climate overshoot when passing the 1.5°C threshold will intensify existing challenges and potentially expose humanity to new and irreversible harms. We must deploy major climate interventions at scale and without delay, exploring all possible options in CCAG’s 4R Planet Strategy to safeguard our planet.”

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