Preparing for Copenhagen...

As a preparation to the UN Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen in December the International  Alliance of Research Universities organised an international scientific  congress on climate change, Climate Change: Global Risks, Challenges and Decisions, in Copenhagen March 10-12, which produced a Synthesis Report as an update of the IPCC AR4 with the following key messages:

• Recent observations show that greenhouse gas emissions and many  aspects of the climate are changing near the upper boundary of the IPCC  range of projections. 
• Many key climate indicators are already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which contemporary  society and economy have developed and thrived.
• These indicators  include global mean surface temperature, sea-level rise, global ocean  temperature, Arctic sea ice extent, ocean acidification, and extreme  climatic events. With unabated emissions, many trends in climate will  likely accelerate, leading to an increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible  climatic shifts.  
• Temperature rises above 2 degrees Celsius  will be difficult for contemporary societies to cope with, and are likely  to cause major societal and environmental disruptions through the rest  of the century and beyond.    
  
• Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global  and regional action is required to avoid “dangerous climate change”  regardless of how it is defined. Weaker targets for 2020 increase the  risk of serious impacts, including the crossing of tipping points, and  make the task of meeting 2050 targets more difficult and costly.
• Setting  a credible long-term price for carbon and the adoption of policies that  promote energy efficiency and low-carbon technologies are central to  effective mitigation. 
• Climate change is having, and will have, strongly differential effects on  people within and between countries and regions, on this generation  and future generations, and on human societies and the natural world.  
• Tackling climate change should be seen as integral to the  broader goals of enhancing socioeconomic development and equity  throughout the world.   
• Society already has many tools and approaches – economic,  technological, behavioural, and managerial – to deal effectively with the  climate change challenge. If these tools are not vigorously and widely  implemented, adaptation to the unavoidable climate change and the societal transformation required to decarbonise economies will not be  achieved. 
• A wide range of benefits will flow from a concerted effort to  achieve effective and rapid adaptation and mitigation. These include  job growth in the sustainable energy sector; reductions in the health,  social, economic and environmental costs of climate change; and the repair of ecosystems and revitalisation of ecosystem services.  
• If the societal transformation required to meet the climate change  challenge is to be achieved, then a number of significant constraints  must be overcome and critical opportunities seized. These include reducing inertia in social and economic systems; building on a growing  public desire for governments to act on climate change; reducing  activities that increase greenhouse gas emissions and reduce resilience  (e.g. subsidies); and enabling the shifts from ineffective governance  and weak institutions to innovative leadership in government, the private sector and civil society. 
• Linking climate change with broader sustainable consumption and production concerns, human rights issues  and democratic values is crucial for shifting societies towards more  sustainable development pathways.
  

Here the 2 degree limit is formulated, which will dominate the Copenhagen meeting, as well as the need to reduce inertia in social and economic systems and the idea of linking climate change to human rights issues and democratic values. The background consists of vague but suggestive catastrophy scenarios:

• many  aspects of the climate are changing near the upper boundary of the IPCC  range of projections  
• many key climate indicators are already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability  
  
• major societal and environmental disruptions through the rest  of the century and beyond
• crossing of tipping points. 

The Synthesis Report is clearly politicised with science subordinate to the higher goals to decarbonise economies  and create  job growth in the sustainable energy sector.