The world's biggest gamble

Rockström, J., Schellnhuber, H.J., Hoskins, B., Ramanathan, V., Schlosser, P., Brasseur, G.P., Gaffney, O., Nobre, C., Meinsheusen, M., Rogelj, J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2056-9061, & Lucht, W. (2016). The world's biggest gamble. Earth's Future 4 (10) 465-470. 10.1002/2016EF000392.

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Abstract

The scale of the decarbonisation challenge to meet the Paris Agreement is underplayed in the public arena. It will require precipitous emission reductions and a new carbon sink on the scale of the ocean sink within 40 years. Even then, the world is extremely likely to overshoot. A catastrophic failure of policy, for example waiting another decade for transformative policy and full commitments to fossil-free economies, will have irreversible and deleterious repercussions for humanity's remaining time on Earth. Only a global zero carbon roadmap will put the world on a course to phase-out greenhouse gas emissions and create the essential carbon sinks for Earth-system stability, without which, world prosperity is not possible.

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