Country By Country Analysis Of Years Left Until Science-demanded Zero Greenhouse Gas Emissions

international | environment | other press Tuesday June 14, 2011 16:41 by Dr Gideon Polya

Gideon Polya analyses yhe growth GHG emissions and what needs to be fone to reduce the emissions to prevent a 2 degree C temperature rise.

An analysis of every country in the World reveals that for a high probability of avoiding a catastrophic 2 degree C temperature rise (EU policy), at current rates of greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution the World on average must achieve zero emissions in less than 20 years, Australia must cease GHG pollution within 5 years, and Bangladesh's low per capita pollution means that at current rates it has 139 years to use up its “fair share” allocation of atmospheric pollution. .

The authoritative Australian Climate Commission, advised by an expert Scientific Advisory panel composed of 9 leading Australian climate scientists, recently released a report entitled “The Critical Decade. Climate science, risks and responses”. The report stated (p53) that “The budget approach [to tackling climate change] directly links the projected rise in temperature to the aggregated global emissions in Gt [Gigatonnes or billions of tonnes] CO2 [carbon dioxide] or Gt C [carbon] for a specified period, usually 2000 to 2050 or 2100. For example, humanity can emit not more than 1 trillion [1,000 billion] tonnes of CO2 between 2000 and 2050 to have a probability of about 75% of limiting temperature rise to 2 degrees C [Centigrade] [noting that this is EU policy].”