Coriolis Seminar - Inconvenient Truth 2.0 The Earth is getting increasingly hot, and the world is not ready for it

One can recall the highly acclaimed 2006 documentary on climate change by Al Gore: An Inconvenient Truth. Two decades later, emissions and temperatures continue to rise. The world will soon race by the 1.5C goal of the 2015 Paris Agreement, and indications are that by the end of this century it will be 2.5-3C warmer than the historical average. The impacts of such heating are everywhere; already serious; often catastrophic; and impacting the most vulnerable first. Our leaders are not talking seriously about this “Inconvenient Truth”. The priority remains to reduce emissions and to remove excess atmospheric carbon. In the meantime, however, the world is getting hotter and hotter. Has the time come to consider the unthinkable: to directly cool the planet making use of emerging techniques that can alter the climate, while the world completes the transition away from fossil fuels? There is lack of knowledge about the potential risks and benefits of these techniques. Moreover, the lack of governance is a risk by itself. The talk will explore these issues, focussing on key techniques and the governance challenges, and suggest ways forward.