Lennart Bengtsson: Off target
Friday 21st April 2023 | Professor Lennart Bengtsson
There is nothing wrong with setting targets. However, it is important to first ensure that the objectives are reasonable and, above all, that they are feasible. Formulating irrelevant goals – or goals that cannot be achieved for scientific, technical or economic reasons – does not benefit anyone, especially the citizens of the country or the population of the world. It does not help at all, no matter how cleverly the slogans are formulated.
Perhaps the most unfortunate example is the so-called 1.5°C target, which has no scientific basis but is merely a political ploy. I say this for the following reasons:
There is no direct or simple link between greenhouse gas emissions and the Earth’s temperature. The IPCC has shown this clearly in all its six reports. The main reason is that we do not know climate sensitivity (the relationship between carbon dioxide and temperature) well enough. A doubling of greenhouse gas concentrations might raise the global temperature by anything between 2°C and 5°C at climate equilibrium, which means that even if we can accurately determine emissions, the resulting temperature increase cannot be determined any better than by a factor of 2-3. The only meaningful thing that can be done is to agree on an emission target, as was the case with the Kyoto agreement.
The world’s non-Western population is suffering from a lack of energy, and in many parts of the world a major shortage. Since the early 1970s, energy has come from fossil fuels (over 80%) and biomass (around 10%). This is still the case. These energy sources produce carbon dioxide when burned. No one has seriously thought through how these sourced can realistically be replaced, and especially not how long it will take to do so, or if it is even possible. Sweden is a shining exception here, thanks to the sensible efforts of previous generations of engineers and politicians and not the efforts of today.
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