Study: We're not planning for possibility of abrupt climate change

Policy-makers exhibit a strange disconnect when it comes to global warming: while they acknowledge the possibility that we could tip into abrupt climate change, they consistently fail to address what we should do if that happens (pdf).

That’s according to a new study, “Policy responses to rapid climate change,” published in the journal Global Environmental Change. Prepared by Mark Charlesworth of Keele University and Chukwumerije Okereke of the University of Oxford, the study finds that policy-makers typically address the possibility of rapid climate change with … a call for more research.

That’s a problem when it’s likely that no amount of research will ever be able to precisely identify when and where a climate tipping point might be reached.

Charlesworth and Okereke write: “The assumptions about knowledge of the Earth System appear to be (1) we need more knowledge so that we can know just how far we can push the climate (earth) system. (2) Humans can know what level
of stress we can cause to the Earth System before the climate (earth) system changes state. (3) ‘Experts’ can tell us this. (4) All tipping points will be imagined and identified. (5) Levels of stress before tipping points are reached can be identified and ‘measured’ robustly enough and soon enough to allow avoidance of tipping points in the Earth System despite significant inertia.”

Instead, the authors go on to say, policy-makers should consider the following five alternative responses:

• Decisions based on plausible future states of the climate that don’t aim for exact predictions but rather provide a “robust” response to a range of possibilities;
• Technical strategies — ranging from better lifecycle analyses of steel production and permaculture to carbon capture and geoengineering — that can reduce particular environmental stresses rather than offering a system-wide solution;
• The “precautionary principle,” which focuses on steps like reduced consumption to err on the side of caution “without the need for perfect knowledge”;
• A focus on ecological virtue and prudence rather than on economic analysis; and
• More democratised policy-making that includes more than just economists and other experts. “(W)hen experts cannot predict, then a process of decision-making that is as open as possible to knowledge and ideas from all sectors of society is most effective.”

“Natural science is and will remain absolutely essential to inform policy about rapid climate and Earth System change,” Charlesworth and Okereke conclude. “If rapid changes in the Earth System become increasingly apparent, society
will almost certainly demand more natural science research to better inform policy. However, it is not clear that natural science will ever be able to tell policy-makers what the limits of stress to the Earth System are before rapid changes take place or are inevitable because of inertia in the Earth System.”

Charlesworth adds, “Our research sets the scene for more effective climate and environmental policy as it demonstrates that the near universal promotion of consumerism by national governments promotes a specific, unsustainable and probably undemocratic vision of what a ‘good life’ should be. In a situation of unpredictable abrupt climate change, doing what we know is in the global common good makes more sense than consuming as if there were no consequences.”