Address Our Ecological Collapse
"We are living through an ever more undeniable climate crisis. Without urgent action, the coming decades will bring an increasingly inhospitable new normal."
― Extinction Rebellion
Facts
- The planet's average surface temperature has risen about 2.05 degrees Fahrenheit (1.14 degrees Celsius) since the late 19th century, a change driven largely by increased carbon dioxide and other human-made emissions into the atmosphere
- Most of the warming occurred in the past 40 years, with the six warmest years on record taking place since 2014
- By the end of this century, what have been once-in-20-year extreme heat days (one-day events) are projected to occur every two or three years over most of the U.S.
- Droughts in the Southwest and Central Plains of the United States in the second half of the 21st century could be drier and longer than anything humans have seen in those regions in the last 1,000 years, according to a NASA study
- Global mean sea level has risen about 8–9 inches (21–24 centimeters) since 1880, with about a third of that coming in just the last two and a half decades. In the United States, almost 40 percent of the population lives in relatively high population-density coastal areas, where sea level plays a role in flooding, shoreline erosion, and hazards from storms
- Research suggests that there has been an increase in intense hurricane activity over the past 40 years
- Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the acidity of surface ocean waters has increased by about 30%
- The Arctic Ocean is expected to become essentially ice free in summer before mid-century
- That we are already on the path of a sixth major extinction is now scientifically undeniable
- In 2020 alone, fossil fuel companies contributed around $50 million to politicians in the United States
Organizations Addressing Climate Devastation
- Indigenous Environmental Network (International)
- Extinction Rebellion (International)
- EarthJustice (International)
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EarthRights (International)
- Climate Justice Alliance (United States)
- Fridays For Future (International)
- Union of Concerned Scientists (United States)
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Center for Health, Environment and Justice (United States)
- Rainforest Action Network (United States)
- Stop Ecocide (International)
- Sunrise (United States)
- Click here to view all U.S. Climate Network members
- Click here for a list of leading organizations involved in climate change research, policy making, and education
- Click here to view LGBTQ+ Environmental Organizations
Polls
- Two-Thirds of Americans Think Government Should Do More on Climate (Pew Research Center, 2020)
- How Americans see climate change and the environment in 7 charts (Pew Research Center, 2020)
- Yale Climate Opinion Maps 2020 (Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 2020)
Academic Papers & Reports
- Reports from the The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
- Reports from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
- Report by independent think-tank Breakthrough | "Existential climate-related security risk: A scenario approach" (2019)
- Jennie King, Lukasz Janulewicz, Francesca Arcostanzo | Deny, Deceive, Delay: Documenting and Responding to Climate Disinformation at COP26 and Beyond
- GISS Surface Temperature Analysis ver. 4 (GISTEMP v4) is an estimate of global surface temperature change
- Bradshaw CJA, Ehrlich PR, Beattie A, Ceballos G, Crist E, Diamond J, Dirzo R, Ehrlich AH, Harte J, Harte ME, Pyke G, Raven PH, Ripple WJ, Saltré F, Turnbull C, Wackernagel M and Blumstein DT (2021) Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future. Front. Conserv. Sci.
- Mora, C., Dousset, B., Caldwell, I. et al. Global risk of deadly heat. Nature Clim Change 7, 501–506 (2017)
- Tong, D., Zhang, Q., Zheng, Y. et al. Committed emissions from existing energy infrastructure jeopardize 1.5 °C climate target. Nature 572, 373–377 (2019).
- Vogel, M. M., Zscheischler, J.,Wartenburger, R., Dee, D., & Seneviratne, S. I. (2019). Concurrent 2018 hot extremes across Northern Hemisphere due to human-induced climate change. Earth's Future, 7,692–703. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019
- Rogelj, J., D. Shindell, K. Jiang, S. Fifita, P. Forster, V. Ginzburg, C. Handa, H. Kheshgi, S. Kobayashi, E. Kriegler, L. Mundaca, R. Séférian, and M.V. Vilariño, 2018: Mitigation Pathways Compatible with 1.5°C in the Context of Sustainable Development. In: Global Warming of 1.5°C. An IPCC Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty [Masson-Delmotte, V., P. Zhai, H.-O. Pörtner, D. Roberts, J. Skea, P.R. Shukla, A. Pirani, W. Moufouma-Okia, C. Péan, R. Pidcock, S. Connors, J.B.R. Matthews, Y. Chen, X. Zhou, M.I. Gomis, E. Lonnoy, T. Maycock, M. Tignor, and T. Waterfield (eds.)]. In Press.
"Limiting warming to 1.5°C implies reaching net zero CO2 emissions globally around 2050 and concurrent deep reductions in emissions of non-CO2 forcers, particularly methane (high confidence). Such mitigation pathways are characterized by energy-demand reductions, decarbonization of electricity and other fuels, electrification of energy end use, deep reductions in agricultural emissions, and some form of CDR with carbon storage on land or sequestration in geological reservoirs."
- IPCC Special Report on the impacts of global warming (2018)
Articles
- Paul Kedrosky | Shifting Baseline Syndrome
- Robin McKie | The Guardian |"‘Soon the world will be unrecognisable’: is it still possible to prevent total climate meltdown?" (July, 2022)
- Damian Carrington and Matthew Taylor | The Guardian | "Revealed: the ‘carbon bombs’ set to trigger catastrophic climate breakdown" (May, 2022)
- Phoebe Weston | The Guardian | "Top scientists warn of 'ghastly future of mass extinction' and climate disruption" (January, 2021)
- Lee Camp | Scheerpost | "Ads All Tell Us To Kill Our Future. Worth Discussing?" (December, 2020)
- Paul Waters-Smith | Current Affairs | "Any Politician Unwilling to Act on Climate Is an Enemy of Humanity" (September, 2020)
- Chris Hedges | Scheerpost | "The Price of Resistance" (September, 2020)
- Big Think | "Article from 1912 warns the world about climate change" (2018)
"While there have been more recent calls for the scientific community in particular to be more vocal about their warnings to humanity (Ripple et al., 2017; Cavicchioli et al., 2019; Gardner and Wordley, 2019), these have been insufficiently foreboding to match the scale of the crisis. Given the existence of a human “optimism bias” that triggers some to underestimate the severity of a crisis and ignore expert warnings, a good communication strategy must ideally undercut this bias without inducing disproportionate feelings of fear and despair (Pyke, 2017; Van Bavel et al., 2020)."
- Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future (January, 2021)
Videos
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