Overshooting 1.5C Risks 'Irreversible' Climate Impact: Study

Any breach of what climate scientists agree is the safer limit on global warming would result in "irreversible consequences" for the planet, said a major academic study published on Wednesday. From a eport: Even temporarily exceeding 1.5 degrees Celsius before bringing temperatures back down -- a scenario known as an "overshoot" -- could cause sea level rises and other disastrous repercussions that might last millenia. This "does away with the notion that overshoot delivers a similar climate outcome" to a future where more was done earlier to curb global warming, said Carl-Friedrich Schleussner, who led the study co-authored by 30 scientists. The findings, three years in the making, are urgent, as the goal of capping global temperature rises at 1.5C above pre-industrial levels is slipping out of reach.Emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases must nearly halve by 2030 if the world is to reach 1.5C -- the more ambitious target enshrined in the 2015 Paris climate accord.

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