The surging rate of global temperatures is “truly frightening”, Eamon Ryan has said.
Yesterday, the EU’s Copernicus Programme concluded May 2024 was the warmest in recorded history.
The finding is part of a trend that the Green Party leader said points to catastrophic climate change across the world.
“Last month was the twelfth [hottest] month in a row globally - which was a record,” Minister Ryan told Newstalk Breakfast.
“There’s never been a warmer May, there’s never been a warmer April, never been a warmer March and we are in the last 12 months over 1.5°C.”
An aircraft flying through a red sky.In 2021, world leaders agreed at the COP26 in Glasgow they would endeavour to cap average global temperature rises to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
Every 0.1°C rise above 1.5°C increases the number of extreme weather events, ravages ecosystems and causes huge disruption to human society.
“The concern scientists have is that by going over that limit, you risk some tipping points where you start to get runaway climate change,” Minister Ryan said.
“In other words, maybe the ice sheets reduce in a way that allows further heat to be reflected off and that begins a feedback loop that you can’t stop.”
A zebra dead from drought in the Namib Desert, Namibia.Under its Climate Action Plan, the Irish Government is committed to halving the nation’s carbon emissions by the end of the decade and reaching net zero by 2050.
It is, Minister Ryan reiterated, the only solution that “actually stops the problem”.
“But also, we need to adapt and I went to Government yesterday and we had a framework on how we adapt,” he said.
“Some of the investments we need to make, we’ll be adapting to climate change that is coming inevitably and we can’t stop.
“One of the ways we can do it - in my mind and I was arguing this in Cabinet yesterday - is that we can do a lot of what we call nature based solutions.
“You can actually use natural systems to help protect against the consequences.”
Last year, Ireland’s carbon emissions fell by an estimated 4%.
Main image: Green Party leader Eamon Ryan. Picture by: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews
