A leading New Zealand climate scientist says limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius — the point at which extreme weather events will become more frequent, food and water insecurity increases, and adaptation becomes more difficult — is unrealistic.
Victoria University professor James Renwick told Q+A he has accepted the planet will surpass the key target.
"I'd love there to be some miraculous change and emissions reductions. But, really, I think we can't avoid 1.5 degrees," he said.
"We will go through it globally in the next few years, and we'll be at that level — on average — within 10 years or so, and then going on from there."
The risk the world will temporarily exceed 1.5C in warming when compared to pre-industrial levels continues to increase, according to modelling by the World Meteorological Organisation.
Between 2017 and 2021, that likelihood was 10%. As of 2023, projections now put that figure at 66% by 2027.
Renwick said the lack of action on emissions reduction since 2015, when the Paris Agreement was signed, is "really dispiriting". At that climate summit, world leaders agreed to the legally-binding 1.5C target, down from an earlier goal of 2C.
However, as of late 2022, a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found countries' climate action pledges remain insufficient to meet the target.
While Jacinda Ardern famously declared climate change as her generation's "nuclear-free moment", Renwick told Q+A that her prime ministership didn't live up to the rhetoric.
"The Government has done a lot of great things — Zero Carbon Act; agricultural emissions pricing is coming along. It'll be happening in the next year or so," he said.
"But given the urgency of the problem and the size of the problem, action could've been taken faster, and it has been disappointing to me how slow all these things have been developing. Maybe it's just the speed at which a democracy operates.
"I would love to have seen faster action, more resources put into the problem and bigger changes made. And some of the changes could have been made quite quickly — overnight, virtually."
Adding to Renwick's frustration is the feeling that people need to be told over and over again that climate action is urgent — he's contributed to three IPCC reports and won the Prime Minister's science communication prize in 2018.
"Every time we've put one of these reports out, it is more urgent and it is more compelling and there is more detail. But it is the same message and, you know, that makes me a bit sad," he said.
"It's the big problem around climate change — that you don't quite see people dropping dead in front of your eyes. But the risks keep building over time.
"By the time you do see people dropping dead, it's a bit late — things have got so bad that it's impossible to really respond properly.
"So I think the IPCC reports, the climate science community do a good job of painting that picture of what the future could be like if we don't take action, what the dangers are, but they're always down the track a bit."
He said there is a need to capitalise on climate action while the Auckland Anniversary floods and Cyclone Gabrielle are fresh in people's minds.
"The worry is that it's not flooding in Auckland today, and all of our attention spans are pretty short.
"If we don't capitalise on understanding what we need to do in response to these events, the impetus will be lost, and we'll go back to doing nothing until the next event happens and more people will get hurt."
Renwick said he detected a shift in policy focus after the events from mitigation to adaptation.
"There's got to be money spent on repairs and rebuilding infrastructure and so on… but we cannot afford to lose sight of mitigation, and mitigation means reducing emissions of greenhouse gases."
Q+A with Jack Tame is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air
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