The Climate Book: The Facts and the Solutions

687 Pages·2023·54.451 MB·English

by  Greta Thunberg (ed.)

Average global temperatures have
risen approximately 1.2°C since the
pre-industrial age.[*]
In the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC)
2021 report a group of 234 top scientists from 66 countries
concluded that ‘it is unequivocal that human influence has
warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land. Widespread and
rapid changes in the atmosphere, ocean, cryosphere and
biosphere have occurred.’
Greenhouse gas emissions – which include carbon dioxide,
methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases – from human
activities have risen to concentrations in the atmosphere that
have not been seen in millions of years, since a time when
trees grew at the South Pole and the sea level rose by 20
metres.
Despite dire warnings in the 1980s
and 1990s, we have emitted more
CO since 1991 than in the rest of
2
human history.
According to the IPCC’s estimate, our remaining carbon
budget for a 67 per cent chance of limiting warming to 1.5°C
at the beginning of 2020 was 400 gigatonnes.[*] At the
current rate of emissions, we will exceed this carbon budget
before 2030.
Some countries are vastly more
historically responsible for
emissions than others; the largest
emitters released hundreds of
billions of tonnes of CO into the
2
atmosphere between 1850 and
2021.
In 2015, nearly every country in the world – 195 in total –
committed to the Paris Agreement. The goal of the Paris
Agreement is to limit global warming to well below 2°C, and
ideally below 1.5°C, compared to pre-industrial levels.
The world is not on track to meet these goals. There is a vast
gap between the promises governments have made and the
actions they have taken. Many emissions – such as those
from international transport and shipping, as well as many of
those associated with the military – go unrecorded or are
unaccounted for.
Based on current policies, the IPCC
estimates that global warming will
reach 3.2°C by 2100.

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Compilation copyright © 2022 by Greta Thunberg
Essays copyright © 2022 by the individual authors
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First published in Great Britain by Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin Random House UK, 2022.
This page constitutes an extension of this copyright page.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Names: Thunberg, Greta, 2003– compiler.
Title: The climate book : the facts and the solutions / Greta Thunberg.
Description: New York : Penguin Press, 2023. | “First published by Allen Lane, 2022”— Title page verso.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022049218 (print) | LCCN 2022049219 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593492307 (hardcover) | ISBN
9780593492314 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Climatic changes. | Climate justice.
Classification: LCC QC903 .T59 2023 (print) | LCC QC903 (ebook) | DDC 363.738/7452—dc23/eng20230113
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022049218
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022049219
Cover design: Darren Haggar
Cover image: Warming Stripes by Professor Ed Hawkins, National Centre for Atmospheric Science, University
of Reading
Designed by Jim Stoddart, adapted for ebook by Cora Wigen
pid_prh_6.0_142488116_c0_r0
PART ONE /
How Climate Works
1.1 ‘To solve this problem, we need to understand it’ / Greta Thunberg
1.2 The Deep History of Carbon Dioxide
Peter Brannen / Science journalist, contributing writer at the Atlantic and author of
The Ends of the World.
1.3 Our Evolutionary Impact
Beth Shapiro / Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at University of
California, Santa Cruz and author of Life as We Made It.
1.4 Civilization and Extinction
Elizabeth Kolbert / Staff writer for the New Yorker and the author, most recently, of
Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future.
1.5 ‘The science is as solid as it gets’ / Greta Thunberg
1.6 The Discovery of Climate Change
Michael Oppenheimer / Atmospheric scientist, Princeton University’s Professor of
Geosciences and International Affairs and long-time IPCC author.
1.7 Why Didn’t They Act?
Naomi Oreskes / Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of
Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University.
1.8 Tipping Points and Feedback Loops
Johan Rockström / Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
and Professor at Potsdam University.
1.9 ‘This is the biggest story in the world’ / Greta Thunberg
PART TWO /
How Our Planet Is Changing
2.1 ‘The weather seems to be on steroids’ / Greta Thunberg
2.2 Heat
Katharine Hayhoe / Endowed Chair and Distinguished Professor at Texas Tech
University and author of Saving Us.
2.3 Methane and Other Gases
Zeke Hausfather / Climate research lead at Stripe, research scientistat Berkeley
Earth.
2.4 Air Pollution and Aerosols
Bjørn H. Samset / Senior researcher at CICERO Centre for International Climate
Research, an IPCC lead author, and expert on the effects of non-CO emissions.
2
2.5 Clouds
Paulo Ceppi / Lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute and the
Department of Physics at Imperial College London.
2.6 Arctic Warming and the Jet Stream
Jennifer Francis / Senior scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center and
formerly Research Professor in Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers University.
2.7 Dangerous Weather
Friederike Otto / Senior lecturer in Climate Science at the Grantham Instituteat
Imperial College London and co-lead of World Weather Attribution.
2.8 ‘The snowball has been set in motion’ / Greta Thunberg
2.9 Droughts and Floods
Kate Marvel / Climate scientist at the Columbia University Center for Climate
Systems Research and the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
2.10 Ice Sheets, Shelves and Glaciers
Ricarda Winkelmann / Professor of Climate System Analysis at the Potsdam
Institute for Climate Impact Research and the University of Potsdam.
2.11 Warming Oceans and Rising Seas
Stefan Rahmstorf / Head of Earth System Analysis at the Potsdam Institute and
Professor of Physics of the Oceans at the University of Potsdam.
2.12 Acidification and Marine Ecosystems
Hans-Otto Pörtner / Climatologist, physiologist, Professor and Head of the
Department of Integrative Ecophysiology at the Alfred Wegener Institute.