The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has now published in full the final part of the world's most comprehensive assessment of climate change, detailing the "unequivocal" role of humans, its impact on "every region" of the world and the actions that need to be taken to address it. solution. The summary report is the last of the IPCC's sixth assessment cycle, in which 700 scientists from 91 countries participated. The entire news cycle lasted a total of eight years. The report provides the clearest and most compelling evidence yet of how humans are responsible for the 1.1°C rise in temperature recorded since the start of the industrial era. It also shows how the consequences of this warming are already deadly and disproportionately affect the most vulnerable people in the world. The report says policies put in place by the end of 2021 – the cut-off date for the evidence in the assessment – would likely cause temperatures to exceed 1.5°C this century and reach around 3.2°C by 2100. The report says that in many parts of the world, people and ecosystems will not be able to adapt to such warming. Losses and damage will "increase with each increase" in global temperature. But the report also outlines how governments can still take action to avoid the worst consequences of climate change, with the rest of this decade crucial to deciding the impacts by the end of the century. The report states: "Decisions and actions taken this decade will have an impact now and for thousands of years." The report shows that many options for tackling climate change – from wind and solar power to tackling food waste and greening cities – are already now cost-effective, have public support and would bring co-benefits to human health and nature. At a press briefing, leading climatologist and IPCC author Professor Friederike Otto said the report highlighted "not only the urgency of the problem and its gravity, but also many reasons for hope – because we still have time to act and we have everything we need".
Carbon Brief's team of journalists have combed through every page of the full IPCC AR6 summary report to produce a digestible summary of key findings and graphs.
1. What is this message?
2. How does the Earth's climate change?
3. How do man-made emissions cause global warming?
4. How much warmer will the world be this century?
5. What are the potential consequences of different levels of warming?
6. How can warming cause sudden and irreversible change?
7. What does the report say about losses and damages?
8. Why is climate action currently "inadequate"?
9. What is needed to stop climate change?
10. How can individual sectors expand climate action?
11. What does the report say about adaptation?
12. What are the advantages of short-term climate measures?
13. Why is finance an "incentive" and a "barrier" to climate action?
14. What are the co-benefits for the Sustainable Development Goals?
15. What does the report say about equity and inclusion?