Renewable energy can power the world, says landmark IPCC study

UN's climate change science body says renewables supply, particularly solar power, can meet global demand

By Fiona Harvey, www.guardian.co.uk
9 May 2011

Renewable energy could account for almost 80% of the world's energy supply within four decades - but only if governments pursue the policies needed to promote green power, according to a landmark report published on Monday.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the body of the world's leading climate scientists convened by the United Nations, said that if the full range of renewable technologies were deployed, the world could keep greenhouse gas concentrations to less than 450 parts per million, the level scientists have predicted will be the limit of safety beyond which climate change becomes catastrophic and irreversible.

Investing in renewables to the extent needed would cost only about 1% of global GDP annually, said Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the IPCC.

Renewable energy is already growing fast – of the 300 gigawatts of new electricity generation capacity added globally between 2008 and 2009, about 140GW came from renewable sources, such as wind and solar power, according to the report.

The investment that will be needed to meet the greenhouse gas emissions targets demanded by scientists is likely to amount to about $5trn in the next decade, rising to $7trn from 2021 to 2030. …

Renewable energy can power the world, says landmark IPCC study

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Climate change likely to be more devastating than experts predicted, warns top IPCC scientist

(Stanford University) Without decisive action, global warming is likely to accelerate at a much faster pace and cause more environmental damage than predicted, says Stanford scientist Chris Field, a leading member of the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Field warns that higher temperatures could ignite tropical forests and melt the Arctic tundra, releasing billions of tons of greenhouse gas that could raise temperatures even more -- a vicious cycle that could spiral out of control.

Climate change likely to be more devastating than experts predicted, warns top IPCC scientist

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Scientists plan emergency summit on climate change

David Adam, environment correspondent

Scientists are to hold an emergency summit to warn the world's politicians they are being too timid in their response to global warming.

Climate experts from across the world will gather in Copenhagen next month to agree a stark message to policy makers, which they hope will break the political deadlock on efforts to curb rising temperatures. The meeting follows "disturbing" studies that suggest global warming could strike harder and faster than expected.

It comes ahead of a year of high-level political discussions on climate change, which climax with international negotiations in Copenhagen in December, where officials will try to hammer out a successor to the Kyoto protocol.

Katherine Richardson, a marine biologist at the University of Copenhagen, who is organising next month's event, said: "This is not a regular scientific conference. This is a deliberate attempt to influence policy."

The meeting will publish an update to the 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Richardson said the IPCC report was "wishy-washy" on issues such as sea level rise. "The IPCC talks of a 40cm sea rise this century. Well, if the consensus now is a rise of a metre or more then they need to know that."

A number of studies published since the IPCC report was prepared show that carbon emissions are rising faster than expected and that existing greenhouse gas targets may not be enough to prevent catastrophic temperature rise. Climate experts, including Jim Hansen, of Nasa, have warned about so-called "tipping points" that could lead to runaway warming and rapid sea level rise.

Scientists plan emergency summit on climate change

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