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The world will soon cross a dangerous climate-change threshold. That's according to a new report from the United Nations. It warns that countries will need to prepare for worsening disasters, as NPR's Lauren Sommer reports.
LAUREN SOMMER, BYLINE: Back in 2015, countries came together to tackle climate change. They agreed to try to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, which is 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, compared to pre-industrial temperatures. That threshold has big impacts, like more intense storms and hotter heat waves. But if the planet gets hotter than that, the impacts get much worse. This week, United Nations officials admitted the world is not going to limit warming to 1.5 degrees.
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INGER ANDERSEN: At this point, it's our projection that avoidance is near impossible.
SOMMER: Inger Andersen is executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme, which put out the report. She says the world will hit 1.5 degrees within a few years most likely.
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ANDERSEN: This is the legacy of our own inaction. Across the globe, extreme heat waves already proving that climate impacts will strike faster, hit harder and last longer, causing more lives and causing deeper disruptions.
SOMMER: Andersen says the damage will be particularly bad for some of the world's most vulnerable countries. Low-lying islands will face flooding from sea level rise, as well as coastal cities. More intense droughts could affect food supplies around the world. Now, the question is how long the world will stay hotter than 1.5 degrees Celsius. The U.N. says a best-case scenario is 1.8 degrees by the end of the century. That's if countries follow through on their promises to cut emissions from burning fossil fuels. But right now, even 1.8 degrees doesn't look likely because countries are way behind on those goals.
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ANDERSEN: If we were to bypass 1.8, then getting back down to 1.5 will be extremely difficult.
SOMMER: Limiting how long the planet is hotter than 1.5 degrees comes down to renewable energy, the U.N. report says. Countries need to rapidly shift away from fossil fuels and scale up solar and wind so carbon emissions fall to zero. Even then, the report finds that more is needed, like sucking emissions right out of the atmosphere. That's the only way to make up for what Andersen calls climate procrastination.
Lauren Sommer, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHRISTIAN SCOTT ATUNDE ADJUAH'S "THE RECKONING") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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