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Policies that focus solely on decarbonization will not be sufficient to keep the Earth’s temperature below the “tipping point” threshold scientists have long warned could result in a runaway greenhouse warming effect, according to research published May 23 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
While carbon dioxide is the chemical most responsible for climate change, four other pollutants – methane, black carbon soot, lower-atmosphere ozone smog and hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants – contribute almost half the heat trapped to-date that cause global warming.
Reducing atmospheric levels of all of these pollutants, known as super pollutants, will be necessary to keep global temperatures from rising beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the internationally accepted guardrail beyond which the world’s climate is expected to pass irreversible tipping points.