COP29, the UN Climate Change Conference, was held in Baku, Azerbaijan between 11 and 22 November. It took place under the shadow of significant temperature rises across the globe. It also took place in the wake of the US electing Donald Trump, a president who, among other things, is also a climate change denier and unlikely to accept any global consensus at COP29.

Global warming, even for the countries in the freezing North, is no longer in the realm of scientific debate. It’s no longer a bunch of climate scientists sounding warnings about the impact of global warming in our lives. The results are clearly visible, with all temperature records broken not only in north India this summer but also in Europe.

With many regions across the world having already seen a rise of 1.5ºC this year, the target of limiting global temperature rise to 1.5ºC has failed. We don’t actually say we have breached the 1.5ºC mark because of a technicality: as per the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), temperature rise is computed over a 20-year average. However, to wait 20 years to admit that we crossed the 1.5ºC mark in 2024 is not very helpful.

Just to put this in perspective, the world knew a temperature rise of this magnitude about 125,000 years ago, when homo sapiens was crossing over from Africa into Eurasia. In other words, we are tipping over into completely uncharted territory.

High summer temperatures have a huge impact on agriculture, as well as the livelihoods of those forced to work in fields, factories and other occupations involving continuous exposure to heat.

What’s striking is that over the past few years, rising temperatures have been accompanied by extreme weather events. Higher than usual winter temperatures lead to the melting of permafrost in the polar regions, releasing huge amounts of methane and flipping ocean currents with completely unknown consequences.

The Global North, meaning the US, Canada and Europe, has always believed that global warming is a problem specific to Africa, Asia and Latin........

© National Herald