“Going Beyond Dangerous Climate Change: Exploring the void between rhetoric and reality in reducing carbon emissions” – A talk by Professor Kevin Anderson on Tuesday 6th March 2012

Professor Kevin Anderson gave a very honest talk on ‘dangerous climate change’ hosted by Manchester Environmental Students Society. He highlighted the current situation in regards to climate change and the (very low) likelihood of us staying within the 2°C limit for average global warming. One key point was that we must look at cumulative emissions rather than year by year. He explained how, over a century, we have a carbon budget so the longer we take to reduce our emissions now, future cuts will have to be more rapid and therefore less achievable. He stressed the urgency to reduce our emissions now as it will make it easier to achieve the 90% reduction in emissions by 2030 which would probably restrict warming to below 2°C.

Kevin pointed out that even a change of 2°C would drastically alter our climate including the total disappearance of artic sea ice in the summer. It seems more likely that we may hit a 4°C increase with the current rate of emissions. Although this does not sound like much, it would result in widespread detrimental effects to our environment.

To conclude, Kevin spoke of the potential for mitigation of 4°C change and the need for improvements in efficiency, better regulation and behavioral change away from mass consumerism. Kevin’s talk may not have been as optimistic as other speakers on climate change, but his bare representation of the facts made it clear that we will have to make some very serious changes…very soon.

By Kate Matthews and Rachel Carr

Kevin Anderson is also speaking next Tuesday, 13th March, at “The Behavioural Challenge of Climate Change: Where we are at, and where we need to be” a free event organised by Friends of the Earth.