As winter storms rage, summers reach global temperature highs, plants and animals die; the time to act on climate change is ticking away. According to the Climate Clock, we have less than four-and-a-half years left to turn back the clock on the climate crisis and create a world that can support the next generation.
In the summer of 2023, we began to truly understand what was coming as wildfires, smoke clouds, and air quality concerns became a daily worry. Climate scientists determined that temperatures can only rise by 1.5°C above what they were during pre-industrial times, as outlined in the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015. If they rise above that threshold, weather will come in extremes: heat waves, droughts, floods, and more. Sergey Paltsev, deputy director of MIT’s Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, said, “There is nothing magical about the 1.5 number, other than that is an agreed aspirational target. Keeping at 1.4 is better than 1.5, and 1.3 is better than 1.4, and so on.” Although the threshold will not completely eliminate the impacts of climate change, rather, it is an aspiration of a “defense line” against the irreversible impacts of climate change.
The carbon budget, an eight-year timeline that gives us a two-thirds chance of staying under the 1.5°C threshold at current greenhouse gas emissions, is an important consideration when battling climate change. If we limit our greenhouse gas emissions by switching to renewable energy and electric vehicles, among other measures—or “lifelines” as coined by the Climate Clock—we can stretch the budget and even remain below the threshold. By switching to renewable energy sources, we could eliminate up to three-quarters of greenhouse gas emissions over time. Renewable energy reduces the use of fossil fuels, like petroleum, coal, and natural gas, by using wind, solar, and heat energy that are unlimited. By extending the carbon budget, we can not only remain below the threshold, but reduce energy prices for consumers as well: renewable energy costs are up to 56% cheaper than fossil fuels.
While these issues seem far-off for many, some communities are suffering every day because of climate change and its impacts on the world that supports us. On the island of Fiji, residents have lost their homes while they watched them sink below sea level, leaving them with a permanent and profound loss that cannot be rectified without change. Sailosi’s village of Vunidogoloa, resting on the remote shores of what was once one of Fiji’s biggest islands, has become one of the first communities that have been subjected to a forced government-planned relocation due to climate change and its pending devastation to their former home. On the other side of the world in New Orleans, Louisiana, residents are facing similar challenges as their city is at risk of sinking below sea level, and temperatures have reached as high as 105°F during their hottest recorded summer in 2024.
The impacts of climate change are no longer a distant problem of tomorrow, but a consequential issue of today, as scientists fight to keep emissions low and weather consistent. The future of tomorrow depends on everyone’s decisions today and over the next four years and 94 days.
