IPCC report on climate change

The United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has published the third part of its sixth assessment report (AR6), assessing literature on the scientific, technological, environmental, economic and social aspects of the mitigation of climate change.

The report has several key findings:

• Coal must be effectively phased out if the world is to stay within 1.5C, and currently planned new fossil fuel infrastructure would cause the world to exceed 1.5C.
• Methane emissions must be reduced by one-third.
• Growing forests and preserving soils will be necessary, but tree-planting cannot do enough to compensate for the continued emissions of fossil fuels.
• Investment in the shift to a low-carbon world is approximately six times lower than it needs to be.
• All sectors of the global economy, from energy and transport to buildings and food, must change dramatically and rapidly, and new technologies including hydrogen fuel and carbon capture and storage are needed.

Source: IPCC, 4 April 2022