This is a hopium article. We are still accelerating past 1.5℃. By many metrics, we have already exceeded it. The only reason why we haven’t officially exceeded

This is a hopium article. We are still accelerating past 1.5℃. By many metrics, we have already exceeded it. The only reason why we haven’t officially exceeded it, is because some benchmarks are as much as twenty contiguous years at or above 1.5℃ worldwide before we have “reached” the 1.5℃ threshold. And that’s an absolutely delusional metric, created purely for political convenience. There is no other way to sugarcoat that, no way to spin it as anything other than deeply delusional. We are still solidly on the “business as usual” path that brings us to a minimum of 4℃ world by 2100. And 6+℃ by 2100 is still within the range of plausibility. I don’t care what governments say, I only care about ppm including methane. Warming trails CO2 by about two decades. The climate we are experiencing now - with its western droughts and northern wildfires and snow crab population crashes - represents the atmospheric carbon of about 2003-2005. That’s Windows XP era atmospheric carbon. Atmospheric carbon is much, much worse now. And the climate we will have in 15-20, from today’s atmospheric carbon, will be commensurately worse. I would be very surprised if we don’t have our first series of world-wide famines, which will deeply impact even first-world countries, by some time in the 2030s. I would be shocked if we aren’t seeing severe drops in the planetary population through starvation and resource conflicts, by the 2050s. And by severe, I’m talking a 20-40% global drop within a decade or two. Plus, our global economy is absolutely fragile. Just look at the shortages and economic chaos that occurred when a teeny-tiny, near-insignificant pandemic with a piddly 3-5% fatality rate (12-20% without modern medical care) swept through humanity. Almost nothing is made entirely within 1,000km of where it is consumed. Even a simple can of peaches requires the coordinated efforts of a dozen production, processing, manufacturing, and packing facilities in about as many countries scattered across the planet. Once the chaotic weather of climate change causes food shortages and people start starving, all that is going to fall to pieces as they prioritize surviving the near term future ahead of international trade. 99% of what even North Americans and Europeans need to survive will vanish from shelves. And since humanity is now (at minimum!!) 4-5× times past the planet’s carrying capacity, humanity is going to crash in an absolutely epic manner.