May 14, 2021
A Guide to Climate Tipping Points: Where to Start?
Making sense of a world on edge
This article is part of a series:
- Introduction: What are tipping points?
- 1. The Arctic
- 2. The Antarctic
- 3. The Oceans
- 4. The Weather
- Reflection: Where to start?
Where to Start?
With so many critical tipping points, we are still left with the question of where to focus. All of these tipping points require action to prevent their occurrence and mitigate their effects. But by now you may be seeing patterns: some are more urgent than others, and some cascade into others like dominoes. Underlying all of them is an urgent need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. With global efforts to keep average temperatures down to 1.5 °C, models predict that the worst effects can be avoided. However, in some cases observations have been outstripping initial predictions, so we must assume that there are factors and interactions that simply can’t be anticipated.
What criteria might we use to evaluate the urgency of these tipping elements? Here are a few:
- To what extent are we already seeing the dynamics of the tipping element play out?
- How long might it take to reach a tipping point threshold under anticipated emissions trajectories, recognizing that our predictions are inherently uncertain?
- What are the impacts of the tipping element: locally, cascading to other elements, and/or further driving global warming?
- How possible is it to reverse the dynamics? How much time do we have to do so? What are the risks of our available options?
In some cases, tipping points may have already been reached, including the melting of several major ice masses and the collapse of coral reefs, which could justify some level of geoengineering intervention. One in particular, the melting of the Arctic sea ice, drives countless cascading effects. Other elements stand to accelerate global warming through further emissions, such as the dieback of the Amazon Rainforest and thawing permafrost. Some elements are reversible through local action without requiring global greenhouse gas reductions or geoengineering, including protecting the Amazon and boreal forests.
When it comes down to you, a final factor to consider is where you personally feel drawn to dedicate your energy. The world is calling upon us to take compassionate action to heal it. Coral reefs will be saved by people who love the sea. The Arctic will be saved by those who long for eternal days and nights. If each of us finds a way to make change that resonates, new tipping elements will emerge moving the earth back to a state of wholeness.
This article is part of a series:
- Introduction: What are tipping points?
- 1. The Arctic
- 2. The Antarctic
- 3. The Oceans
- 4. The Weather
- Reflection: Where to start?
