More than 14,000 scientists from 153 countries have signed their name to research that warns of the incoming climate emergency. The new paper was published on 28 July 2021 in the journal BioScience
The paper is an update on similar research conducted in 2019, which amassed signatures from more than 11,000 scientists.
In the time since that paper was initially published, the world has suffered significantly from extreme weather events caused or made worse by climate change. In 2020, an estimated $63 billion in damage and $268 billion in economic loss was caused by natural disasters. Those events, along with the declining state of health for some of the planet’s most important indicators, encouraged more than 3,000 scientists to join onto the latest iteration of warning letter.
“Given these alarming developments, we need short, frequent, and easily accessible updates on the climate emergency,” wrote the scientists.
“Now it’s up to governments, industry, and the rest of us to actually heed these warnings — or suffer through what comes next,” wrote AJ Dellinger in Mic.
→ BioScience – 28 July 2021:
World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency 2021
“In 2019, Ripple and colleagues (2020) warned of untold suffering and declared a climate emergency together with more than 11,000 scientist signatories from 153 countries. They presented graphs of planetary vital signs indicating very troubling trends, along with little progress by humanity to address climate change. On the basis of these data and scientists’ moral obligation to “clearly warn humanity of any catastrophic threat,” they called for transformative change.
Since the article’s publication, more than 2,800 additional scientists have signed that declaration of a climate emergency (see supplemental file S1 for the current signatory list); in addition, 1,990 jurisdictions in 34 countries have now formally declared or recognized a climate emergency (figure 1p).
But, at the same time, there has been an unprecedented surge in climate-related disasters since 2019, including devastating flooding in South America and Southeast Asia, record shattering heat waves and wildfires in Australia and the Western United States, an extraordinary Atlantic hurricane season, and devastating cyclones in Africa, South Asia, and the West Pacific (see supplemental file S2 for attribution information).
There is also mounting evidence that we are nearing or have already crossed tipping points associated with critical parts of the Earth system, including the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, warm-water coral reefs, and the Amazon rainforest (supplemental file S2).
Given these alarming developments, we need short, frequent, and easily accessible updates on the climate emergency.”
Time series of climate-related global human activities. In panels (a), (d), (e), (i), and (m), the most recent data point(s) are a projection or preliminary estimate (see the supplemental material); in panel (f), tree cover loss does not account for forest gain and includes loss due to any cause. With the exception of panel (p), data obtained since the publication of Ripple and colleagues (2020) are shown in red. In panel (h), hydroelectricity and nuclear energy are shown in figure S1. Sources and additional details about each variable are provided in the supplemental material. Complete time series are shown in supplemental figure S2.
Media coverage
→ AFP / The Australian – 28 July 2021:
Earth’s ‘vital signs’ worsening as humanity’s impact deepens
“Given these alarming developments, we need short, frequent, and easily accessible updates on the climate emergency,” said the study, published in the journal BioScience.
→ ABC Science – 28 July 2021:
Climate emergency not slowed by COVID-19 pandemic and planet’s ‘vital signs’ worsening, scientists say
“Scientists have declared Earth’s “vital signs” are worsening, despite a change in habits because of COVID-19. Emissions have reached an all-time high even though air traffic has declined. Australia is an outlier in both setting targets and strategies to reduce emissions.”
→ Al Jazeera – 28 July 2021:
Thousands of scientists warn climate tipping points ‘imminent’
“Researchers say ‘overexploitation of the Earth’ has seen many of its ‘vital signs’ deteriorate to record levels.”
→ Phys.org – 28 July 2021:
Earth’s ‘vital signs’ worsening as humanity’s impact deepens
“The researchers, part of a group of more than 14,000 scientists who have signed on to an initiative declaring a worldwide climate emergency, said that governments had consistently failed to address the root cause of climate change: “the overexploitation of the Earth”.”
→ Live Science – 28 July 2021:
Ignoring climate change will yield ‘untold suffering,’ panel of 14,000 scientists warns
“A few big climate policies could change everything — but we have to act fast.”
→ Mic – 29 July 2021:
14,000 scientists warn of “untold suffering” if we fail to act on climate change
“In a paper published Wednesday in the journal BioScience, more than 14,000 scientists from 153 countries signed their name to research that warns of an incoming climate emergency.”
→ Medium – 29 July 2021:
13,900 Thousand Scientists Are Warning Us of a Climate Emergency
“Our world is burning. If you need a sign, this is it.” To Eszter Brhlik
2019: 11,258 scientists’ declaration of a climate emergency