Climate and Environmental Crisis Compendium
Climate change is a threat to human well-being and planetary health. There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all (IPCC 2023).
The burning of fossil fuels has so dramatically changed the climate that heatwaves are hitting communities with a severity and frequency never seen during the entire development of human civilisation (Carbon Brief 2024).
We are on the brink of an irreversible climate disaster. This is a global emergency beyond any doubt. Much of the very fabric of life on Earth is imperiled (Ripple et al. 2024).
The 2023 update of the Planetary Boundaries framework finds that six of the nine boundaries are transgressed, suggesting that Earth is now well outside of the safe operating space (Richardsson et al. 2023).
The 2024 Planetary Health Check report reveals that six out of nine Planetary Boundary processes have breached the safe levels and that further boundaries may be transgressed in the near future (Caesar et al. 2024).
31–67% and 51–91% of the planetary boundary breaching responsibility could be attributed to the global top 10% and top 20% of consumers, respectively, from both developed and developing countries. (Tian et al., 2024)
March 16th 2024 marked Overshoot Day in Denmark, the date when our demand on nature’s resources surpassed Earth’s capacity to regenerate them for the given year (Global Footprint Network 2024).
The 2015 Paris Agreement is a legally binding international treaty on climate change aiming to pursue efforts “[...] to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels” (United Nations 2015).
With a 83% likelihood of limiting global warming to the 1.5°C temperature limit, the remaining carbon budget is estimated to be 100 Gt CO2 relative to the start of the year 2024 (Forster et al. 2024).
Indicators of Global Climate Change 2023 show that, for the 2014–2023 decade average, observed warming was 1.19 [1.06 to 1.30]°C, of which 1.19 [1.0 to 1.4]°C was human-induced (Forster et al. 2024).
August 2024 was the joint-warmest August globally (together with August 2023), at 0.71°C above the 1991-2020 average and 1.51°C above the pre-industrial level (Copernicus 2024).
Emissions Gap Report 2023 finds that fully implementing unconditional Nationally Determined Contributions would put the world on track for limiting temperature rise to 2.9°C this century (United Nations 2023).
Emissions Gap Report 2024 finds that nations must deliver dramatically stronger ambition and action in the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions or the 1.5°C goal will be gone (United Nations 2024).
Over the coming 50 years, 1 to 3 billion people are projected to be left outside the climate conditions that have served humanity well over the past 6,000 years (Kohler et al. 2020).
Climate change has already put more than 600 million people outside the ‘human climate niche’ and by end-of-century, current policies could leave one-third of people outside the niche (Lenton et al. 2023).
Unmitigated scenarios of GHG emissions produce climates like those of the Eocene, which suggests that we are effectively rewinding the climate clock by approximately 50 My in less than two centuries (Burke et al. 2018).
The biosphere, upon which humanity as a whole depends, is being altered to an unparalleled degree across all spatial scales and biodiversity is declining faster than at any time in human history (Eduardo et al. 2019).
The 2024 edition of the Living Planet Report, which measures the average change in population sizes of more than 5,000 vertebrate species, shows a decline of 73% between 1970 and 2020 (WWF 2024).
Carbon sequestration in forests and forest soils holds paramount significance in the context of climate actions and mitigation (Jagadesh et al. 2024).
The single most important action for sustaining and increasing the forest carbon sink is to stop emissions from deforestation and degradation (Pan et al. 2024).
Ongoing, and probably increased, harvests of wood have major, although often ignored, carbon costs that should be attributed to human activity (Peng et al. 2023).
Between 2016 and 2021, the global economy has consumed 582 billion tonnes of materials—nearly as many materials as the 740 billion consumed in the entire 20th century (Circularity Gap Report 2024).
It has been proposed to assign the term 'Anthropocene' to the present, in many ways human-dominated, geological epoch, supplementing the Holocene (Crutzen, Paul J. 2002).
Humanity has become the dominant force in shaping the face of Earth to the point where global human-made ‘anthropogenic’ mass now exceeds all living biomass (Elhacham et al. 2020).
The ‘Great Acceleration’ graphs of socio-economic and Earth System trends show that the economic activity of the human enterprise continues to grow at a rapid rate (Steffen et al. 2015).
Exceeding 1.5°C global warming could trigger multiple climate tipping points, causing substantial sea level rise, dieback of biodiverse biomes, and carbon release from thawing permafrost (McKay et al. 2022).
Harmful tipping points in the natural world pose some of the gravest threats and their triggering will severely damage our planet’s life-support systems and threaten the stability of our societies (Lenton et al. 2023).
The collapse time of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is estimated between 2037-2064 (10-90% CI) with a mean of 2050 (Smolders et al. 2024).
There is ample evidence that climate change causing sea level rise, extreme weather events and loss of biodiversity – all leading to higher mortality – could become catastrophic (Kemp et al. 2022).
Rising temperatures, heavier rainfall and more frequent and intense extreme weather are projected to cause $38tn (38.000.000.000.000) of destruction each year by mid-century (Kotz et al. 2024).
A 1°C warming reduces world GDP by 12% and a 3°C temperature increase will cause precipitous declines in output, capital and consumption that exceed 50% by 2100 (Bilal, A. and Känzig, D.R. 2024).
In 2019, the super-rich 1% were responsible for 16% of global carbon emissions, which is the same as the emissions of the poorest 66% of humanity, which is 5 billion people (Khalfan et al. 2023).
The UN Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction points out that the buildings and construction sector contributes significantly to global climate change (United Nations 2024).
According to the European Environment Agency, the building sector is a key contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, representing 35% of energy-related EU emissions in 2021 (EEA 2024).
With more than 30-50% of total material use in Europe going to housing, the material requirement of buildings represents one of the greatest challenges in terms of mass of resources used (Herczeg et al. 2014).
With a total of 77 (54,36 residential and 22,39 service) square meters per capita, Denmark ranks highest by far regarding average floor area per capita in Europe (Enerdata 2024).
On average, 16% of European dwellings were not occupied in 2011 and 35% were underoccupied (Okatz et al. 2023).
The largest share of the mitigation potential of new buildings is available in developing countries while in developed countries the highest mitigation potential is within the retrofit of existing buildings (IPCC 2022).
The Global North should avoid making new buildings, where and whenever possible, and instead use existing spaces first and then renovate, adapt or extend existing buildings (Kuittinen, Matti 2023).
The UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is a plan to end poverty and hunger, protect the planet, ensure prosperous and fulfilling lives in peaceful, just and inclusive societies (United Nations 2015).
Deep transformations – including radical reduction in resource use – are needed in all countries to reverse current trends and move towards the Doughnut of social and planetary boundaries (Fanning et al. 2022).
The Dasgupta Review calls for changes in how we think, act and measure economic success to protect and enhance our prosperity and the natural world (Dasgupta et al. 2021).
The Earth Commission have quantified the safe and just Earth-system boundaries and assessed minimum access to natural resources required for human dignity and to enable escape from poverty (Gupta et al. 2024).
Strategies for development should increase the specific forms of production that are necessary to improve capabilities and meet human needs at a high standard (Hickel, J. and Sullivan, D. 2024).
The Sustainable Development Index (SDI) measures the ecological efficiency of human development, recognizing that development must be achieved within planetary boundaries (Hickel, J. 2020).
10 New Insights in Climate Science 2024/2025 (Broadgate et al. 2024).
© 2024 Nicolai Bo Andersen Arkitekt