The climate faces 'the end game': "More than 2,000 million people will suffer extreme heat in 2070"

The study is titled

(The end of the weather game, in Spanish).

It is signed by a dozen scientists from around the world - under the auspices of the University of Cambridge - warning about the need to "explore the catastrophic scenarios" of the global increase in temperatures.

It has just been published by the scientific journal

(PNAS) and has caused a considerable stir in the midst of extreme heat summer.

"There is every reason to believe that climate change can be catastrophic, even at the most moderate levels of warming," warns

, scientific director of the report and a research fellow at the Center for the Study of Existential Hazards in Cambridge.

"The paths to disaster are not limited to the direct impact of high temperatures, but can have effects such as wars, famines, financial crises or new diseases."

Kemp and his colleagues argue that the debate so far has focused on the impact of 1.5 to 2 degrees warmer than the pre-industrial era (the limit set in the Paris Agreement), when the actual projection with the current trend is for an increase between 2.4 and 3 degrees by the end of the century.

"The worst possible scenario would mean that more than 2,000 million people (25% of the world's population) would be exposed to extreme heat in 2070, with

," says Kemp, who warns of serious risks to human health and food security, as well as political and social consequences.

The authors emphasize that the average annual temperature of the Earth around 13 degrees was what allowed the stabilization of the climate in the period known as Holocene, which gave rise to the development of the first agricultural societies and civilizations.

In 2021, the average temperature of the land and ocean surface reached 14.7 degrees, according to NASA.

The past eight years have been the hottest since records began in 1880.

The report published in PNAS recalls how one would have to go back to the Pleistocene, 2.6 million years ago, to find temperatures similar to those projected for the end of the century.

, concludes the team led by Kemp, who has urged the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ( IPCC) to dedicate its next report to assessing the "catastrophic impact" of high temperatures to raise public awareness.

"The more we know about how the planet works, the more reason to worry," says

, director of the Potsdam Institute and co-author of the study.

“Our planet functions as a sophisticated and fragile organism.

We have to do the calculations of the disaster precisely to avoid the worst scenario.

The epidemiologist

, specialized in the impact of temperatures on health, has also collaborated in the study.

Ella ebi encourages more interdisciplinary collaborations "to understand how climate change can trigger mortality levels."

The study warns of the risk of

for millions of humans, due to the effect that rising temperatures may have on agricultural production and the global food supply.

Shrinking habitats caused by prolonged droughts can also severely affect wildlife and the spread of disease.

Finally, the report warns of the risk of “interactive threats”: from the increase in North/South inequality to political instability, through misinformation that continues to fuel climate change denialism in large sectors of the population.

The publication of the

has coincided with the publication of the book that aims to heat up the debate even more:

, by geophysicist and climatologist at University College London (UCL) Bill McGuire.

A boy born in 2020 is going to face a much more hostile world than the one his grandparents knew.

"A child born in 2020 is going to face a much more hostile world than the one their grandparents knew," warns McGuire, a member of the Natural Hazard Working Group in the United Kingdom.

The also volcanologist is convinced that we have already passed the "point of no return" and that we only have to adapt to the hotter world that we have contributed to creating.

"At the COP26 in Glasgow, it was agreed to maintain the ceiling of the maximum increase of 1.5 degrees, but to stay there we would have to reduce emissions by 45% in 2030," the volcanologist tells

.

"In the real world, that's not going to happen.

With the current trend, emissions will increase by 14% around that time.

The 1.5 degree cap will be knocked down within a decade."

McGuire warns that those who state in public that "we are still on time" are much more alarmist behind closed doors and in scientific forums.

His book, in some way, aspires to be

: "If people believe that the time has come to block highways and refineries, it is their right to do it.

Everything we do on an individual level - from moving by bicycle and public transport, giving up the plane, eating less meat or switching to renewable energy - can certainly help.

But the most important thing is to vote smartly and pressure governments to take action on the climate emergency."

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