Climate negotiators meeting in Dubai last month pledged to chart a course for stabilizing the climate system using good science. But many scientists say these promises are at best ill-defined and at worst a travesty of good science — vague and full of loopholes.
The U.N. climate conference in Dubai agreed on an action plan for two key objectives: to keep the world on track to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees C (2.7 degrees F), and to stay below this threshold by achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Negotiators pledged that both objectives would be pursued “in keeping with the science.”
But neither of the objectives have agreed definitions that would allow a judgment on whether they have been achieved. Two studies published during the Dubai event exposed the problem and revealed wide gaps opening over both…
Read the full article originally published at e360.yale.edu.