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Published online 8 July 2008 | Nature 454, 142 (2008) | doi:10.1038/454142a
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Leaders still vague on emissions targets
G8 talks fail to advance fight against climate change.
Toyako, Japan
World leaders met this week in Toyako on the Japanese island of Hokkaido to discuss climate change — among other global problems. But progress on reducing greenhouse-gas emissions seems increasingly unlikely to emerge from the talks.
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Are we just kidding ourselves? Do we really know what to do, and if we do, how to do it? Let's take the "edict' to decrease carbon dioxide emissions by 2050 to 50% of the 1990 levels. Where do these figures come from? Is there any rationale, are there any data to show that this is either necessary or sufficient. Or are these figures just pulled out of a hat. Should we really entrust our future to eight individuals making decisions on matters they know little about? A "...a communiqué issued by G8 leaders after a working lunch..." Is this the best the global community can do to address critical issues. If so, the future looks bleak, indeed!
There are several considerations here but let's take two of them. The first is to prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference to the climate system such that ecosystems can adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure food production is not threatened and to enable sustainable economic development (paraphrased from UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and reiterated at the G8). Many have taken this amount to be approximately 2C above preindustrial and this is generally supported by the impacts literature with some systems clearly impacted (some heavily) even at 2C but some benefits accruing at 2C as well. Now, to achieve that target (one that the EU has also supported) means far greater cuts than 50% beyond current levels. The IPCC estimates (Fourth Assessment Report)that to reach a 2C-2.4C mean temperature increase would require reductions in 2050 global CO2 emissions compared to 2000 levels. However, the CO2-eq levels this leads to (445-490 ppm) only has a 50% confidence (at 450 ppm) at reaching the target with the probability skewed to even higher temperatures (depending on the sensitivity). So, cuts of more than 50% of 2000 levels will almost certainly be needed to reach this target. There was also no mention of interim goals. However, to reach these levels (again from IPCC 4AR) would require global carbon dioixde levels to peak between 2000-2015 and for global carbon dioxide levels to be back at 2000 levels between 2000-2030. There is also a great deal of information on how to possibly achieve these goals in the working group III report of the IPCC (available online at www.ipcc.ch).
Why have leaders of the scientific community deceived the public and their political leaders by claiming that there is scientific evidence that: (a.) Earth is bathed in a steady outpouring of heat from the Sun; (b.) The Sun a ball of hydrogen that is steadily heated by hydrogen fusion; (c.) Measurements made to confirm (b) failed because solar neutrinos magically melted (oscillated) away before reaching our detectors; and (d.) therefore man-made CO2 caused global warming? These are a few the questions that NAS President Ralph Cicerone and former Vice-President Al Gore need to answer. Oliver K. Manuel; Emeritus Professor and former NASA Principal Investigator for Apollo Lunar Samples; omatumr@yahoo.com; http://www.omatumr.com