@rahmstorf.bsky.social

Read it here: strategicclimaterisks.substack.com/p/the-boldes...

skywriter.blue/pages/did:pl...

There's a lot more in our report, which is published along with @ippr.org, @gsiexeter.bsky.social, and the UCL Climate Action Unit

We've also developed a toolkit. With it, you can facilitate workshops to map derailment risks and explore how to tackle them

👇
www.scri.org.uk/derailment

Derailment shows that adaptation can't be seen as separate or even contradictory to decarbonisation

Spiralling climate impacts require more adaptation

But this can be done in a way that accelerates decarbonisation, reinforcing climate action even as climate consequences spiral

We need more of a conversation about how to maintain (and deepen) our collective agency even as climate consequences spiral

Our research identified many interventions

Key: a rapid increase in societal resilience...

This can be prevented if derailment risks are tackled and reinforcement opportunities for climate action - virtuous cycles - are realised

This cannot be left to chance

We call it 'derailment' as the prevailing assumption that the world has closed off temperature pathways above ~3°C cannot be held with much confidence when considering feedback loops

Instead, the world could be 'derailed' from these pathways by vicious cycles in societies (as well as in nature)

Derailment risk is when the consequences of climate change get in the way of climate action, worsening the underlying problem - a vicious cycle

Over 20 workshops and engagement with hundreds of experts and practitioners, we identified many examples of where this risk is growing

But the Spanish example shows that the opposite can also occur

Climate impacts could create anger and confusion, which is exploited to delay climate action

Impacts could also crowd out resources that would otherwise be used for climate action

We call these vicious cycles: derailment risk

It is often hoped that, as the world overshoots 1.5C and climate consequences escalate, virtuous cycles will reinforce climate action

Worsening impacts will act as a 'wake up', spurring more action

Producing more green tech makes it cheaper, spurring demand and more production

This is happening

There are other one-way relationships, like how climate impacts affect climate action: eg, worsening drought can decrease hydropower production

But our research showed that there is far less attention on the *feedback loops* between the consequences of climate change and climate action

Often, climate action is spoken about in one-way relationships

Action is needed to reduce the adverse impacts of climate change, with decarbonisation tackling the problem at root and adaptation increasing resilience to inevitable shocks

In turn, these actions have consequences, changing society

That should now be fixed!

And that's not it for 𝗢𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗼𝗼𝘁: 𝗡𝗮𝘃𝗶𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱 𝗯𝗲𝘆𝗼𝗻𝗱 𝟭.𝟱°𝗖 - more bonus content is coming, including essays that dive deeper into the issues we explored across the series.

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