The Climate Consent Foundation believes the key to averting dangerous climate change is global consent on the guiding principles of a fair and science-based rationale for sharing a limited 'carbon budget' between all nations.

 

Climate Change is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. It affects all nations and effective action to reduce its risks depends on urgent and unprecedented international cooperation. The 5th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change includes a report (published 31/3/14) which examines how the risks of climate change can be assessed and managed. It confirms that ‘human interference with the climate system is occurring, and that climate change poses risks for human and natural systems’ through food security, water supply, flooding, drought and higher temperature.

It predicts these will have a negative impact on global public health, with poorer people most vulnerable, but says ‘risks are reduced substantially’ under the the lowest temperature projections (RCP2.6 - low emissions) compared to the highest temperature projections (RCP8.5 - high emissions). In other words, we must make urgent cuts in fossil fuel use if we are to preserve the benign climatic conditions that enabled human society to develop over the last 10,000 years.

The first report (30/09/13) for the IPCC Fifth Assessment examined the science of climate change. It concluded that the unprecedented rise in atmospheric CO2 from a pre-industrial maximum of 280 parts per million (a level which had not been exceeded for at least 800,000 years) to the current 398ppm was due to the 545 billion metric tons (GtC) of carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere by human activity since 1750.

IPCC scientists therefore proposed limits for total global carbon emissions with different odds of keeping temperature within 2˙C of the 1880 average: 900 GtC for 33%; 820 GtC for 50% and 790 GtC for a 66% chance. Depending on the degree of risk which today’s political leaders are willing to bequeath their descendants, total future emissions from human activity cannot exceed 255-335 GtC. However, with global fossil fuel emissions rising fast, we are on track to exceed the lowest of these limits within 20 years. If this trend continues, the IPCC predicts average global temperature could rise 4.8˙C above 1880 levels by the end of this century, and by 12-15˙C in Arctic regions. The human, environmental, economic and political consequences of such rapid climate change (around the same difference in temperature between the last ice age and the present day) will be incalculable and irreversible.

The key priority - which twenty years of UN climate talks have failed to address due to conflicting short term national interests - is to agree on simple, science-based and ethical principles for sharing the international burden of cutting carbon emissions fairly - and fast.

Climate Consent was formed to help the public and policy makers in all countries focus on these principles as the foundations of an effective UN climate deal that involves all nations and enables the world to make a safe transition to a successful and just low-carbon global economy.

We believe that Contraction & Convergence (C&C) a science-based and transparently fair framework for sharing the international burden of cutting global carbon emissions should provide the core principles of the UN climate deal to be signed in 2015. Developed by a musician called Aubrey Meyer, C&C harmonises market forces with the right of each person to an equal share of a healthy atmosphere. It creates powerful financial incentives for all nations to avoid fossil fuels and is increasingly backed by scientists, economists, business leaders, health professionals and religious leaders, C&C has been described as the single most important idea since the Renaissance, yet has received little media attention and remains virtually unknown to the public.

 

We have made a video summary about C&C.

CLICK TO VIEW

 

 

OUR STRATEGY:
To build consent on the principles required for an effective global climate deal by producing accurate, clear and appealing web-based videos and multi-media material. This will explore the science and implications of climate change and show why Contraction & Convergence should set the agenda at the UN climate talks and provide the basis for effective and fair international action to cut fossil fuel emissions. Our material will be made freely available through our website in different languages so it can reach a wide general audience, from students to adults. Our output will also create an invaluable and reliable resource for policy makers in all countries who see the need for a rational, fair and flexible formula for cutting global carbon emissions.

This website is an initial step, but we hope it will help to raise interest in our work. If you share our concerns and ideals, we would be immensely grateful for your support. Please click the 'donate' tab for more information.