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Implications of the Paris agreement for the ocean

In the aftermath of COP21, potential post-2030 emission trajectories and their consistency with the 2 °C target are a core concern for the ocean scientific community in light of the end-century risks of impact scenarios.

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Figure 1: Contrasting risks of impact for the ocean and society in 2100 from different GHG emission pathways.

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Acknowledgements

This is a product of The Oceans 2015 Initiative, an expert group supported by the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, the Ocean Acidification International Coordination Centre of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the BNP Paribas Foundation and the Monégasque Association for Ocean Acidification.The authors also benefited from financial support from the Children's Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), German Environment Ministry, Gross Family Foundation, European Climate Foundation (ECF), Agence de l'Environnement et de la Maîtrise de l'Énergie (ADEME), Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), European Union DG CLIMA (21.0104/2014/684427/SER/CLIMA.A.4) and the French Government (ANR-10-LABX-01). A.K.M. acknowledges support from the French National Research Agency (CapAdapt Project ANR-2011-JSH1-004 01 and ANR-15-CE03-0003). R.B. is supported by the RESCCUE project funded by the French Development Agency and the French Global Environment Facility (AFD CZZ 1647 01 F and FFEM CZZ 1667 01 H). F.J. acknowledges support from the Swiss National Science Foundation.The contents of this piece are solely the opinions of the authors and do not constitute a statement of policy, decision or position on behalf of the French Government, the Pacific Community or any funding partners.The authors also thank W. Cramer and P. Barthélemy for their comments on an earlier version.

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A.K.M., J.-P.G., M.C. and R.B. designed the research. A.K.M., J.-P.G. and F.J. put Fig. 1 and Table 1 together, and A.K.M., J.-P.G., O.H.-G., F.J. and H.-O.P. analysed ocean-related data and drew up the conclusions from Fig. 1 and Table 1. M.C., H.W. and T.S. analysed INDC-related material. All authors contributed to drafting and revising the manuscript as well as to the Supplementary Information.

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Correspondence to Alexandre K. Magnan.

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Magnan, A., Colombier, M., Billé, R. et al. Implications of the Paris agreement for the ocean. Nature Clim Change 6, 732–735 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3038

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