{"id":390223,"date":"2025-07-22T17:39:38","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T15:39:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=390223"},"modified":"2025-07-22T17:39:40","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T15:39:40","slug":"leeds-professors-only-3-years-left-to-avert-climate-catastrophe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=390223","title":{"rendered":"Leeds Professors: \u201cOnly 3 years left\u201d to Avert Climate Catastrophe"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From Watts Up With That?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Essay by<\/strong> Eric Worrall<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet another climate deadline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Only 3 years left \u2013 new study warns the world is running out of time to avoid the worst impacts of climate change<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Published: July 20, 2025 2.20pm AEST<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Piers Forster<\/a>\u00a0Professor of Physical Climate Change; Director of the Priestley International Centre for Climate, University of Leeds<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Debbie Rosen<\/a>\u00a0Research and Innovation Development Manager for the Priestley Centre for Climate Futures, University of Leeds<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
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    Bad climate news is everywhere.  Africa is being hit particularly hard<\/a> by climate change and extreme weather, impacting lives and livelihoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    We are living in a world that is warming at the fastest rate since records began. Yet, governments have been slow to act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    But so far, only 25 countries, covering around 20% of global emissions<\/a>, have submitted their plans, known as Nationally Determined Contributions<\/a>. In Africa, they are Somalia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. This leaves 172 still to come. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    But arguably only one of the submitted plans \u2013 the UK\u2019s \u2013 is compatible with the Paris Agreement<\/a>.

    \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Our report shows<\/a> that human-caused global warming reached 1.36\u00b0C in 2024. This boosted average global temperatures (a combination of human-induced warming and natural variability in the climate system) to 1.52\u00b0C. In other words, the world has already reached the level where it has warmed so much that it cannot avoid significant impacts from climate change. There is no doubt we are in dangerous waters.

    \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Just five of the G20<\/a> countries have submitted their 2035 plans: Canada, Brazil, Japan, the United States<\/strong> and the United Kingdom. But the G20 is responsible for around 80% of global emissions. This means that South Africa\u2019s current G20 presidency can help to ensure that the world prioritises efforts to help developing countries finance their transition to a low-carbon economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u2026Read more:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u00a0https:\/\/theconversation.com\/only-3-years-left-new-study-warns-the-world-is-running-out-of-time-to-avoid-the-worst-impacts-of-climate-change-261229<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

    The referenced \u201cour report\u201d;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Indicators of Global Climate Change 2024: annual update of key indicators of the state of the climate system and human influence<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Piers M. Forster<\/a>,Chris Smith,Tristram Walsh,William F. Lamb,Robin Lamboll,Christophe Cassou,Mathias Hauser,Zeke Hausfather,June-Yi Lee,Matthew D. Palmer,Karina von Schuckmann,Aim\u00e9e B. A. Slangen,Sophie Szopa,Blair Trewin,Jeongeun Yun,Nathan P. Gillett,Stuart Jenkins,H. Damon Matthews,Krishnan Raghavan,Aur\u00e9lien Ribes,Joeri Rogelj,Debbie Rosen,Xuebin Zhang,Myles Allen,Lara Aleluia Reis,Robbie M. Andrew,Richard A. Betts,Alex Borger,Jiddu A. Broersma,Samantha N. Burgess,Lijing Cheng,Pierre Friedlingstein,Catia M. Domingues,Marco Gambarini,Thomas Gasser,Johannes G\u00fctschow,Masayoshi Ishii,Christopher Kadow,John Kennedy,Rachel E. Killick,Paul B. Krummel,Aur\u00e9lien Lin\u00e9,Didier P. Monselesan,Colin Morice,Jens M\u00fchle,Vaishali Naik,Glen P. Peters,Anna Pirani,Julia Pongratz,Jan C. Minx,Matthew Rigby,Robert Rohde,Abhishek Savita,Sonia I. Seneviratne,Peter Thorne,Christopher Wells,Luke M. Western,Guido R. van der Werf,Susan E. Wijffels,Val\u00e9rie Masson-Delmotte,and Panmao Zhai<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Abstract<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    In a rapidly changing climate, evidence-based decision-making benefits from up-to-date and timely information. Here we compile monitoring datasets (published at https:\/\/doi.org\/10.5281\/zenodo.15639576<\/a>; Smith et al., 2025a) to produce updated estimates for key indicators of the state of the climate system: net emissions of greenhouse gases and short-lived climate forcers, greenhouse gas concentrations, radiative forcing, the Earth\u2019s energy imbalance, surface temperature changes, warming attributed to human activities, the remaining carbon budget, and estimates of global temperature extremes. This year, we additionally include indicators for sea-level rise and land precipitation change. We follow methods as closely as possible to those used in the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) Working Group One report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The indicators show that human activities are increasing the Earth\u2019s energy imbalance and driving faster sea-level rise compared to the AR6 assessment. For the 2015\u20132024 decade average, observed warming relative to 1850\u20131900 was 1.24 [1.11 to 1.35]\u2009\u00b0C, of which 1.22 [1.0 to 1.5]\u2009\u00b0C was human-induced. The 2024-observed best estimate of global surface temperature (1.52\u2009\u00b0C) is well above the best estimate of human-caused warming (1.36\u2009\u00b0C). However, the 2024 observed warming can still be regarded as a typical year, considering the human-induced warming level and the state of internal variability associated with the phase of El Ni\u00f1o and Atlantic variability. Human-induced warming has been increasing at a rate that is unprecedented in the instrumental record, reaching 0.27 [0.2\u20130.4]\u2009\u00b0C per decade over 2015\u20132024. This high rate of warming is caused by a combination of greenhouse gas emissions being at an all-time high of 53.6\u00b15.2\u2009Gt\u2009CO2<\/sub>e\u2009yr\u22121<\/sup> over the last decade (2014\u20132023), as well as reductions in the strength of aerosol cooling. Despite this, there is evidence that the rate of increase in CO2<\/sub> emissions over the last decade has slowed compared to the 2000s, and depending on societal choices, a continued series of these annual updates over the critical 2020s decade could track decreases or increases in the rate of the climatic changes presented here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     \u2013 Discussion started: 05 May 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     \u2013 Revised: 11 Jun 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     \u2013 Accepted: 13 Jun 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     \u2013 Published: 19 Jun 2025Read more: https:\/\/essd.copernicus.org\/articles\/17\/2641\/2025\/<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

    You have to delve into the study to find the 3 years reference;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The values in Table 8 are all greater than zero, implying that we have not yet emitted the amount of CO2<\/sub> that would commit us to these levels of warming. However, including the uncertainty in ZEC (as in Table S8), non-CO2\u2009<\/sub>emission and forcing uncertainty, and underrepresented Earth system feedbacks results in negative RCB estimates for limiting warming to low temperature limits with high likelihood. A negative RCB for a specific temperature limit would mean that the world is already committed to this amount of warming and that net negative emissions would therefore be required<\/strong> to return to the temperature limit after a period of overshoot. The assumption behind such a calculation is that we can treat the warming impact of positive and negative net emissions as approximately symmetric. While the claim of symmetry is likely valid for small emissions values, some model studies have shown that it holds less well for reversal of larger emissions (Canadell et al., 2021; Zickfeld et al., 2021; Vakilifard et al., 2022; Pelz et al., 2025). As such, larger exceedances of the RCB for a particular temperature target would decrease the likelihood that the temperature target could still be achieved by an equivalent amount of net negative emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Note that the 50\u2009% RCB estimate of 130\u2009Gt\u2009CO2<\/sub> would be exhausted in a little more than 3 years<\/strong> if global CO2<\/sub> emissions remain at 2024 levels (42\u2009Gt\u2009CO2<\/sub>\u2009yr\u22121<\/sup>; see Table 1). This is not expected to correspond exactly to the time that 1.5\u2009\u00b0C global warming level is reached due to uncertainty associated with committed warming from past CO2<\/sub> emissions (the ZEC) as well as ongoing warming and cooling contributions from non-CO2<\/sub> emissions. For comparison, our estimate of 2024 anthropogenic warming (1.36\u2009\u00b0C) and the recent rate of increase (0.27\u2009\u00b0C per decade) would suggest that continued emissions at current levels would cause human-induced global warming to reach 1.5\u2009\u00b0C in approximately 5 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u2026Read more: Same link as above<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

    This deadline will no doubt join all the other 3 years or 5 years or 10 years to save the world nonsense deadlines which have come and gone. Even if we wanted to there is no plausible path to meaningfully reducing emissions in such a short timeframe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    30 Year Anniversary of the UN 1989 “10 years to save the world” Climate Warning<\/a><\/blockquote>