LONDON: World temperatures are likely to rise by more than 2 degrees Celsius this century, surpassing a “tipping point” that a global climate deal aims to avert, scientists said on Monday.
A study published in the journal Nature Climate Change shows a 90 percent chance that temperatures will increase this century by 2 to 4.9 degrees Celsius.
Researchers at the University of Washington found only a 5 percent chance that warming could be at or below 2 degrees Celsius – one of the targets set by the 2015 Paris climate deal on limiting emissions of greenhouse gases that warm the planet.
Missing that target would have dramatic consequences on people’s livelihoods – such as prolonged periods of drought and rising sea levels – said Adrian Raftery, the lead author of the study and a professor at the University of Washington.
The study uses statistical projections based on total world population, GDP per capita and the amount of carbon emitted for each dollar of economic activity, known as carbon intensity.
“Our analysis shows that the goal of 2 degrees is very much a best-case scenario,” said Raftery. “It is achievable, but only with major, sustained effort on all fronts over the next 80 years.”
According to the UN Environment Program, world greenhouse gas emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels, are now about 54 billion tons a year and should be cut to 42 billion by 2030 to get on track to stay below 2 Celsius.
Ramping up efforts to improve carbon efficiency are key to limit future warming, Raftery told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a phone interview.
“Countries need to change the economic incentives for producing carbon – for example by introducing a carbon tax – and encourage innovation that would improve energy efficiency,” he said.
“We should be learning more from countries that are particularly carbon-efficient, like France, which has a very low-carbon transport infrastructure.”
Earth likely to warm more than two degrees by 2100 — scientists
Earth likely to warm more than two degrees by 2100 — scientists
Russian minister visits Cuba as Trump ramps up pressure on Havana
- The Russian embassy in Havana said the minister would “hold a series of bilateral meetings” while in Cuba
HAVANA: Russia’s interior minister began a visit to ally Cuba on Tuesday, a show of solidarity after US President Donald Trump warned that the island’s longtime communist government “is ready to fall.”
Trump this month warned Havana to “make a deal,” the nature of which he did not divulge, or pay a price similar to Venezuela, whose leader Nicolas Maduro was ousted by US forces in a January 3 bombing raid that killed dozens of people.
Venezuela was a key ally of Cuba and a critical supplier of oil and money, which Trump has vowed to cut off.
“We in Russia regard this as an act of unprovoked armed aggression against Venezuela,” Russia’s Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev told Russian state TV Rossiya-1 of the US actions after landing in Cuba.
“This act cannot be justified in any way and once again proves the need to increase vigilance and consolidate all efforts to counter external factors,” he added.
The Russian embassy in Havana said the minister would “hold a series of bilateral meetings” while in Cuba.
Russia and Cuba, both under Western sanctions, have intensified their relations since 2022, with an isolated Moscow seeking new friends and trading partners since its invasion of Ukraine.
Cuba needs all the help it can get as it grapples with its worst economic crisis in decades and now added pressure from Washington.
Trump has warned that acting President Delcy Rodriguez will pay “a very big price” if she does not toe Washington’s line — specifically on access to Venezuela’s oil and loosening ties with US foes Cuba, Russia, China and Iran.
On Tuesday, Russia’s ambassador to Havana, Victor Koronelli, wrote on X that Kolokoltsev was in Cuba “to strengthen bilateral cooperation and the fight against crime.”
The US chief of mission in Cuba, Mike Hammer, meanwhile, met the head of the US Southern Command in Miami on Tuesday “to discuss the situation in Cuba and the Caribbean,” the embassy said on X.
The command is responsible for American forces operating in Central and South America that have carried out seizures of tankers transporting Venezuelan oil and strikes on alleged drug-trafficking boats.
- Soldiers killed -
Cuba has been a thorn in the side of the United States since the revolution that swept communist Fidel Castro to power in 1959.
Havana and Moscow were close communist allies during the Cold War, but that cooperation was abruptly halted in 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet bloc.
The deployment of Soviet nuclear missile sites on the island triggered the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, when Washington and Moscow came close to war.
During his first presidential term, Trump walked back a detente with Cuba launched by his predecessor Barack Obama.
Thirty-two Cuban soldiers, some of them assigned to Maduro’s security detail, were killed in the US strikes that saw the Venezuelan strongman whisked away in cuffs to stand trial in New York.
Kolokoltsev attended a memorial for the fallen men on Tuesday.
