Investments in green technology needed
The numbers are based on estimations from the International Energy Agency and the price is measured as the investments needed globally to keep temperature increases at maximum 2 °C by 2100.
The longer we wait, the more expensive it will get
The longer we wait to act, the more it will cost to transform the world economy into being climate friendly. According to the projection, by the end of 2020, the cost of getting global warming under control will hit 16 trillion and by 2030 over 20 $trillion.
It can be done
Climate change can be curbed, but it requires massive investments in green technologies and low-carbon renewable energy sources. An estimate from the World Bank finds that climate inaction could reduce global GDP by at least 5 percent annually while the price of the necessary action is set to 1 percent of global GDP annually.
Global warming is called:
The price of climate change
The world economy measured by global GDP is around $87 trillion a year meaning that a 1 % investment would be less than $900 billion.
We already use 6.5% of global GDP subsidizing fossil fuels so a 1 % investment should be very possible.
What are the costs of climate change?
Climate change will affect Earth's ecosystems and people negatively in many ways, including.
- The world food production will decrease increasing the risk of hunger and malnutrition as the world population will continue to grow.
- Water shortages will become more common (lack of freshwater is already a major problem in many places around the globe).
- Loss of biodiversity and habitat destruction including more wildfires.
- Rising sea levels will require massive investments in infrastructure.
How is it going with carbon neutrality?
Despite good intentions and an increased global focus on climate change, CO2-emissions are not going down. 2019 emissions were an all time high with 43.1 billion tons of CO2 emitted from human activities.
We cannot wait forever
It’s still possible to get climate change under control. But only for so long. So-called tipping points mean that if we wait too long, climate change will spin out of control causing run-away global warming impossible to stop.
Tipping points approaching:
- Collapse of ice sheets: The Antarctic ice sheets might reach a tipping point where it will no longer be possible to stop the melting process. In addition, the Greenland ice sheet is melting at an accelerating rate and could also reach a tipping point already at a 1.5 °C increase in temperatures.
- The Amazon rainforest: About 17 % of the Amazon rainforest has been lost. The Amazon could reach a tipping point if between 20 and 40 % of the forest is lost.
- The Arctic Permafrost: The Arctic permafrost contains double the amount of CO2 as the entire atmosphere - almost 1.6 trillion tons. The permafrost is slowly thawing releasing this CO2 - as well at the very potent greenhouse gas methane. If the process is not stopped, it will create self-reinforcing global warming on an unseen scale.
