“In the face of an absolutely unprecedented emergency, society has no choice but to
take dramatic action to avert a collapse of civilization. Either we will change our ways
and build an entirely new kind of global society, or they will be changed for us.” *

Synthesis Paper of 20 Past Winners of the Blue Planet Prize (Environmental Nobel)

Carbon dioxide emissions must peak within the next five years (they might have already peaked in 2013) and decline rapidly until the global economy is virtually decarbonized by 2050. The figure above comes from the work of the world renowned climate scientist, Dr. James Hansen. According to the work of Dr. Hansen, CO2 needs to be brought down from its current level of 400 ppm to 350 ppm by the end of the century through a rapid reduction in fossil fuel use and the removal of 100 GtC (i.e. 367 billion metric tons) of CO2 through improved forestry and agricultural practices. Returning to 350 ppm CO2 in this time frame will allow us to avoid multi-meter sea level rise from the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and the resulting forced migrations of perhaps hundreds of millions of people because “half the world's population lives within 60 km [37 miles] of the sea, and three-quarters of all large cities are located on the coast.”

If we assume that we will remove the prescribed CO2 from the atmosphere through improved forestry and agricultural practices, then “if emissions reduction had begun in 2005, reduction at 3.5%/year would have achieved 350 ppm at 2100. Now [2013] the requirement is at least 6%/year. Delay of emissions reductions until 2020 requires a reduction rate of 15%/year [globally] to achieve 350 ppm in 2100.”

To really understand the scale of the problem, we must realize, as Lord Nicholas Stern (one of the world’s leading economists of climate change) has documented, that that the only instance of national or regional emission reductions greater than 1 percent per year over a ten-year period occurred during the economic collapse of the former Soviet Union, when emissions declined 5.2 percent per year. 

While the scale of the problem is daunting, the situation is not hopeless. We can, with existing technology, still avoid irreversible catastrophic climate change. Indeed, as leading Princeton researchers maintain, “humanity already possesses the fundamental scientific, technical, and industrial know-how to solve the carbon and climate problem for the next half century.” We do not need a technological miracle, we do, however, need to rapidly deploy existing technology both in terms of reducing demand through energy efficiency measures and increasing supply through solar, wind, geothermal, and possibly (in the near future) fourth generation nuclear power. This rapid deployment of technology is at the heart of the mission of Reduce CO2 Now. 

* 20 Past Winners of the Blue Planet Prize, who authored the synthesis paper, include:
Dr. James Hansen (Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, 1981-2013)
Dr. Susan Solomon (Chair of the National Academy of Sciences Report on Climate Stabilization Targets, 2010)
Professor Sir Bob Watson (Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 1997-2002)
Lord (Robert) May (President of the Royal Society of London, 2000-2005)
Lord Nicholas Stern (Chief Economist and Senior Vice-President of the World Bank, 2000-2003)