UN Says Global Warming Will Exceed Limit and Maps Route Back Below Danger Zone

The United Nations has acknowledged that the world is about to cross the 1.5-degree Celsius warming limit established under the Paris climate accord. A new report from the UN Environment Programme says humanity must now plan for a temporary overshoot and find a way to bring global temperatures back below the threshold.

The report attributes the warming to the continued burning of coal, oil and gas. It says the world is already about 1.4 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, measured over a 20-year average rather than by a single year's temperature. After years of insisting that the 1.5-degree window remained open, UN officials now say the threshold will be crossed "in the next few years."

The proposed route back involves ending fossil fuel use and developing methods to remove industrial carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The report does not present that path as a quick fix. It says the world would still face decades of increased weather-related disasters, rising seas, extinctions and melting ice and glaciers after temperatures exceed the limit.

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Humanity is speeding past the limit to avoid climate catastrophe.

The report's most optimistic scenario sees warming peak at 1.8 degrees Celsius around the middle of the century if governments pursue ambitious climate policies. Under current policies, however, temperatures could rise 2.6 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2100.

"Humanity is speeding past the limit to avoid climate catastrophe," UN Secretary-General António Guterres said. Richard Betts, a report co-author and climate scientist at the University of Exeter, called the findings "a reality check" and said the world would have to live with a warmer climate while still taking action to limit further warming.

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It's a reality check. We have to live with this warmer world, but there's still a lot we can do to limit warming.