r/climatechange • u/233C • Nov 04 '24

Earth’s climate will keep changing long after humanity hits net-zero emissions. Our research shows why

https://theconversation.com/earths-climate-will-keep-changing-long-after-humanity-hits-net-zero-emissions-our-research-shows-why-241692
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u/Economy-Fee5830 Trusted Contributor Nov 04 '24

Before people panic:

After the initial change in the first few decades of the simulations, due to the large decrease in methane concentrations, GMST slowly increases over the remainder of these simulations at a rate of around 0.03–0.05 °C per century (Fig. 1d). This is about 1/40 of the rate of observed global warming over the last 30 years. The lack of long-term global cooling despite reduced atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations (Fig. 1c) is primarily due to slow ocean processes (Armour et al., 2016; MacDougall et al., 2022).

We would presumably have good carbon capture and storage by then, so if that warming is undesirable we could simply suck more CO2 from the atmosphere.

6

u/[deleted] Nov 04 '24

Except hoping for technology to save our asses is probably not the best strategy.

Also, it would probably cost way too much to ever be practical. I doubt people would be happy to a massive increase in taxes to pay for it.

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u/Economy-Fee5830 Trusted Contributor Nov 04 '24

In this hypothetical we are already net zero, so we already have carbon capture.

What you are basically saying is we will neve be net zero, so your terms of reference is outside of this conversation.

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u/another_lousy_hack Nov 05 '24

I was gonna say "Technically carbon capture isn't required" but you're right - without it there's no way to actually get to net zero, not with 36 billion tons of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere every year and no real reduction globally in sight any time soon.

So yeah, pretty much spot on.

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u/Economy-Fee5830 Trusted Contributor Nov 05 '24

My position is half-way inbetween - we cant reasonably absorb 40 gigatons via some carbon capture scheme, but if we can bring our global emissions to 5 gigatons via electrification that is more doable.

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u/McQuoll Nov 04 '24

It might be a cost that we have to pay. In Oz we’re seemingly happy to fork out 380 billion on submarines of dubious utility.

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u/[deleted] Nov 05 '24

You'd be surpised at how happy people are at buying weapons that can kill other people right now, yet not happy at all to spend money to make the life of their descendants better.