Speaking of risks of future global warming not included in IPCC models, scientists in Alaska discovered massive carbon emissions seeping out of land permafrost, essentially emitting as much carbon in two years as US commercial sources emit per annum. This has the signature of a tipping point that self-reinforces emission of carbon into the atmosphere. After all, Alaskan temps have been really hot. And, deadly methane-laden permafrost melts in heat.
Further, speaking of high heat levels found at high latitudes, Russian scientists report massive numbers (7,000 counted but likely thousands more) of pingos as well as melting permafrost spreading all across Siberia. Perniciously, this is likely more self-reinforcing carbon emission spewing into the atmosphere, no further human influence required.
As such and horrifyingly, the discombobulated ecosystem may be in the process, heaven forbid, of overtaking human influenced carbon emissions/global warming. No more anthropogenic or human influence required to overheat the planet; it may be starting to heat up on its own volition. That's what Venus (865 degreesF) did. All of its carbon is now in its atmosphere whereas most of our carbon is still underground, under ice. What to do?
Of course, everybody talks about geo-engineering and how engineers can shoot particles like sulfate aerosols into the stratosphere to reflect solar radiation back into outer space (which may damage ozone as an unintended consequence) or maybe remove carbon from the atmosphere and sequester it or maybe put mineral dust like olivine into the ocean to combat global warming, blah, blah, blah. This will save humanity from its own vices, but oh contraire, nobody knows if geo-engineering works at scale. In fact, the National Academy of Sciences, the European Transdisciplinary Assessment of Climate Engineering, and several prominent scientists claim it is not a solution for several reasons, including "unintended consequences" that are worse than the initial fix.
It's entirely possible that humanity is in the lurch by already passing the 11th-hour and now forced to adapt to higher temps, fierce storms, severe droughts, serious crop failure, destructive weather patterns, bouts of human starvation, Biblical flooding, and restless angry masses of eco migrants roaming the countryside, or in short, the dystopian films Blade Runner (1982) and Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) combined and including pissed-off people bearing arms, open carry, in a throwback to Revolutionary American times (1775-1783). Based upon recent political/societal behavior, there are plenty of people looking forward to this.
On the other hand, what if the world comes together with a Marshall Plan effort, all hands on deck, to convert fossil fuels to renewables ASAP? What would that do? According to Kevin Anderson of Tyndall Centre for Climate Change/UK, in order to stay below the guardrail 2 degreesC, lesser-developed nations must go to zero CO2 emissions by 2050 but wealthy nations must go to zero CO2 emissions by 2035.
On the other-other hand, according to Michael Oppenheimer (Princeton), an author of the IPCC 4th assessment, the odds of staying under 2 degrees C are maybe 10%, and the last time the world was 2 degrees C warmer, sea levels were 18-30 feet higher.
But then again, according to Wally Broecker (Columbia, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory), who coined the term "Global Warming" in 1975; when he was in grad school in the 1950s fossil fuels accounted for 85% of energy sourcing. Today, it's basically the same with fossil fuels at 81%. Go figure.
Withal, nobody knows for certain what will happen, in part, because we've never been here before. All the same, abrupt climate change continues to negatively outpace expectations of scientists, leading to serious concerns that their worse case scenarios are too soft, too conservative.
What then should be done remains the most compelling question of the 21st century.
According to several top-flight scientists, like James Hansen, the Paris Agreement of 2016 signed by almost 200 nations is too flimsy and misguided to solve the problem.
"If you talk to glaciologists privately they will tell you they are very concerned we are locking in much more significant sea level rises than the ice sheet models are telling us," James Hansen-Columbia University. (Source: Oliver Milman, James Hansen, Father of Climate Change Awareness, Calls Paris Talks "A Fraud," The Guardian, Dec. 12, 2015)
Postscript: "If it turns out that global warming and ocean acidification are consequences of capitalism's carbon-based energy system, the entire world could end up dead from the external costs of capitalism," Paul Craig Roberts, American economist.
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