Can we cut emissions by half?

From IPCC's predictions of emissions in the future given present trends, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg have now gone one step further. They have developed a new model that specifies the maximum volumes of carbon dioxide that humans may emit to remain below the critical threshold for climate warming of two degrees Celsius.

According to the model, admissible carbon dioxide emissions will increase from approximately seven billion tonnes of carbon in the year 2000 to a maximum value of around ten billion tonnes in 2015.

In order to achieve the long-term stabilisation of the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, the emissions will then have to be reduced by 56 percent by the year 2050 and approach zero towards the end of this century. Although, based on these calculations, global warming would remain under the two-degree threshold until 2100, further warming may be expected in the long term.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by the combustion of fossil fuels (gas, oil) has increased by around 35 percent since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. If carbon dioxide emissions and, as a result, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations continue to increase unchecked, a drastic increase in the global temperature can be expected before the end of this century. As a result of that, food production and water availability will be affected. How many more studies will we need before our governments decide to take some extreme measures called for?