Three degrees more - the earth doesn't care, humanity doesn't
Global warming of three degrees doesn't sound terribly exciting for newcomers to the climate issue. I've also seen pictures of the ridiculous few centimeters of sea level rise in New York Harbor. We would like to dispel this misconception.
Just this much, the last time it was three degrees higher on Earth, the sea level was around 25 meters higher. That was around three million years ago, in the Pliocene.
With half of the world's population now living closer than 25 kilometers to the nearest coastline, this sounds quite threatening, given that more than 130 cities with over a million inhabitants are located on coastlines.
The level of knowledge of the population, most of whom still believe that three degrees more means nothing other than that Berlin could keep up with the Mediterranean flair of Malaga, is poor.
The topic is uncomfortable
In our reporting, we try to strike the right balance between arousing but not shocking - because if the statements are too harsh and the images too frightening, readers are more likely to close their eyes and not engage with the topic at all.
This is often a topic of conversation in our editorial team.
When a recent study by the Austrian Academy of Sciences revealed that 39 percent of Austrians, for example, believe that we can live with three degrees of global warming, we decided to talk to you straight.
87 percent of Austrians expect little from the climate conference
What will happen?
- Large parts of the earth become deadly hot and uninhabitable
- This results in refugee flows on an unprecedented scale
- The sea level will rise by many meters
- Famines will also break out in our latitudes
- Cooling our nuclear reactors is becoming increasingly difficult
- Political conflicts will lead to wars
- All these are just the tips
- All of this is life-threatening for the Homo sapiens species
- It goes much faster than expected
Is there still hope?
Yes.
Raising awareness of the importance of phasing out fossil fuels, renaturation projects and reforestation and of our own lifestyle.
Our decisions over the next 10 years will determine the outcome of the next 100.
Not for the planet - just for us.
"3 degrees of global warming would be the end of human civilization"
