This technical note looks at the estimates of the remaining warming that have been used in the IPCC AR5 and in recent studies, and evaluates the consequences for carbon budget estimates to limit warming to 1.5°C.
Our areas of expertise include:
- Emission reduction targets
- Carbon and emission budgets
- Mitigation costs
- Role of air pollutants
- Co-benefits
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We explore the greenhouse-gas emission reductions necessary to achieve long-term global climate goals, such as holding warming below 1.5 and 2°C warming relative to pre-industrial levels. Analysing emissions scenarios from energy-economic models and other sources with coupled carbon-cycle/climate models leads to globally “allowed” ranges of emissions for different greenhouse gases, air pollutants and sectors, as well as associated time- and pathway-dependent mitigation costs and technology portfolios.
Publications
Science based coal phase-out timeline for Japan - Implications for policymakers and investorsReports
This report evaluates whether Japan’s energy policies and long-term targets are compatible with meeting the objectives of the Paris Agreement, and what this means for policymaking and investors.
The use of blue carbon to offset and hence effectively avoid required emission reductions in other sectors such as fossil fuel combustion, industry, agriculture, international aviation and marine activities would undermine our ability to limit temperature rise to 1.5°C.
This briefing outlines why it is misleading to conflate negative emissions technologies that remove CO2 from the atmosphere with proposed geoengineering techniques, such as Solar Radiation Management (SRM).
Accepted estimates of how much carbon we can still burn by the end of this century and keep temperature rise to below 2°C range from 590 to 2390 billion tons of carbon dioxide. The high end of this estimate does not take into account warming by non-CO2 emissions and was never intended to be used to address a real-world policy question. Consequently, this study finds that the most appropriate carbon budget estimate for keeping warming to below 2°C is in the range of 590-1240 billion tons of carbon dioxide.
Contributions to Summary for Policy Makers and Chapter 6: Assessing Transformation Pathways, 2013 & 2014
Projects
The project looks into the consequences of the Paris Agreement for planned and existing coal capacity, comparing existing and planned coal capacity for a set of key countries/regions.