{"id":10234,"date":"2022-01-18T14:09:39","date_gmt":"2022-01-18T14:09:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/?p=10234"},"modified":"2022-01-18T14:09:39","modified_gmt":"2022-01-18T14:09:39","slug":"carbon-dioxide-emissions-need-to-slow-by-20-to-reach-1-5c-target-uk-met-office-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/news\/climate-measurement\/carbon-dioxide-emissions-need-to-slow-by-20-to-reach-1-5c-target-uk-met-office-finds.html","title":{"rendered":"Carbon dioxide emissions need to slow by 20% to reach 1.5\u00b0C target, UK Met Office finds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to the UK Met Office\u2019s global carbon dioxide forecast for 2022, the rate that carbon dioxide is being added to the atmosphere needs to slow by around 20% over the next five-year period if global warming is to be limited to 1.5\u00b0C.<\/p>\n<p>In 1958 \u2013 when the first measurements were taken at Hawaii\u2019s Mauna Loa observatory \u2013 the rate of annual rise of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was less than one part per million (ppm). The atmospheric concentration of CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> was then about 316ppm. The rate of rise has accelerated over 60 years and the rise over the last 10 years has been nearly 2.5ppm per year, with the atmospheric concentration reaching 416ppm on average last year.<\/p>\n<p>The Met Office forecast suggests that relative to 2021, the rise in the atmospheric concentration of CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> in 2022 will be 2.14 \u00b10.52ppm. In the scenario used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to study global warming limited to 1.5\u00b0C long term, the projected rise slows to an average of 2ppm per year over the next five years, almost 20% lower than the recent average annual rise. In that scenario, the rise then continues to slow rapidly and then comes to a halt in the early 2040s. Carbon-dioxide levels then decline over the rest of the century in that scenario. The human emissions driving this fall rapidly, reaching net zero mid-century and becoming negative after that.<\/p>\n<p>Although the long-term rise in CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> concentrations comes from human-induced activities, nature also influences the rate of rise because of variations in the strength of so-called natural carbon sinks \u2013 features like vegetation and oceans. These variations are driven by climate variability and show a strong correlation with the El Ni\u00f1o \u2013 La Ni\u00f1a cycles in the tropical Pacific. CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> measurements at Mauna Loa are taken by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, USA, and also independently by the USA\u2019s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The future scenario limiting warming to 1.5\u00b0C long term is the SSP1.1-9 scenario.<\/p>\n<p>Prof. Richard Betts, who leads the Met Office team behind the CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> forecast, said, \u201cThe last two years have seen successive La Ni\u00f1a events where we see a natural and temporary cooling of the tropical Pacific. During a La Ni\u00f1a event, we see relative cooler global temperature and a strengthening of carbon sinks, which can draw down more CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span>. However, in an El Ni\u00f1o year, such as 2016, we see hotter and drier conditions leading to reduced carbon uptake. Nevertheless, the long-term change is driven by human emissions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Betts added, \u201cOur 2022 forecast suggests that nature will temporarily be doing our \u2018heavy lifting\u2019 this year as ecosystems \u2013 such as tropical forests \u2013 are expected to draw down a higher proportion of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than usual. However, if the world is to meet ambitious targets within the Paris Agreement, the long-term buildup of CO<span style=\"font-size: 50%; vertical-align: sub;\">2 <\/span> in the atmosphere needs to slow rapidly and come to a halt before mid-century. This would need an immediate slowing in the rate that human-induced carbon-dioxide emissions are added to the atmosphere, leading rapidly to a complete stop. A temporary boost from nature is obviously welcome but we won\u2019t get this free dividend in most years.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to the UK Met Office\u2019s global carbon dioxide forecast for 2022, the rate that carbon dioxide is being added to the atmosphere needs to slow by around 20% over<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":10235,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[290],"tags":[],"acf":[],"author_meta":{"display_name":"Elizabeth Baker","author_link":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/author\/elizabethbaker"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/Met-office-global-carbon-dioxide-forecast-2022-e1642514722337-300x143.png","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["<a href=\"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/news\/climate-measurement\" class=\"advgb-post-tax-term\">Climate Measurement<\/a>"],"unlinked":["<span class=\"advgb-post-tax-term\">Climate Measurement<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":"0","relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 3 years ago","modified":"Updated 3 years ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on January 18, 2022","modified":"Updated on January 18, 2022"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on January 18, 2022 2:09 pm","modified":"Updated on January 18, 2022 2:09 pm"},"featured_img_caption":"To limit warming to 1.5\u00b0C, the carbon dioxide rise must slow rapidly and stop before 2050","series_order":"","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/Met-office-global-carbon-dioxide-forecast-2022-e1642514722337.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10234"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10234"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10234\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meteorologicaltechnologyinternational.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}