A new piece of scientific research pinpoints when global temperatures are set to exceed the bounds of natural variability, pushing the world into a new climate normal.

The paper puts forward a slightly different perspective on future climate change to most research, which tend to focus on what impacts we’re likely to see from climate change by a given time.

The research is in Nature, a major journal, which yesterday hosted a press conference covering the findings, and it’s been written up by the newswires. So it’s perhaps not surprising it’s attracted a bit of media coverage today. But depending on which news article you read, you might end up with a different take on how dramatic the findings are.

A new normal

The research looks at when the global average temperature will consistently stay above the bounds of natural variability experienced since 1860.

Using projections from 39 climate models, the researchers find that if we continue to emit greenhouse gases at current rates, we’ll reach this point of ‘climate departure’ by 2047.

By mid-century, while the coldest years could be similar to the sort of thing we see today, the average temperature will be higher than even the hottest years of the last 150 years.

And even if greenhouse gas emissions slow to a complete stop by the end of the century, we will only delay reaching this climate shift by about 20 years, according to the paper.

Reuters does a straight write-up of the paper, describing a “shift to a new climate”. It features a quote from Dr Chris Huntingford from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, who wasn’t involved in the research, which is helpful in interpreting what the findings mean in reality. He says:

“This shows the point at which what is now an extreme year becomes the norm.”

How far, how fast?

According to the research, the point of climate departure will be different for different parts of the world. The tropics around the equator will be the first to see an unprecedented climate, the authors say:

“[O]n average, the projected timing of climate departure in marine and terrestrial biodiversity hotspots [in the tropics] will occur one decade earlier than the global average”.

We make that around 2037 for the business as usual scenario, and 2059 for the lower emissions scenario.

Coral reefs are the most vulnerable habitats, according to the research. Credit: Keoki Stender

Apocalypse now?

These findings sound dramatic, largely because they find a new and intuitive way to express global temperature rise.

The paper not only talks about the scale and speed of temperature rise, but also the impact for ecosystems and human society.

For example it says that under the high emissions scenario, roughly five billion people currently live in areas where climate will be radically different by 2050.

And drama is certainly present in the way some newspapers have covered the research. The Daily Mail headline reads, ‘Apocalypse Now: Unstoppable man-made climate change will become reality by the end of the decade’.

This statement is clarified a bit in the body of the article. Journalist James Nye says:

“[T]he first signs of change [are] expected at the end of this decade â?¦ with temperature rises beginning in or around Manokwari, Indonesia by 2020.”

Of course, temperature rises and changes to the planet have already been observed – but this is presumably referring to the kind of shift in norms the paper describes.

While the research doesn’t explicitly highlight changes as early as 2020, this probably comes from the left-hand image in the following chart, which shows the projected timing of ‘climate departure’ based on annual average temperatures:

Source: Mora et al., ( 2013)

“Unstoppable” change

In general, while the main part of the Daily Mail article does a decent job of summarising the paper’s findings, the text is peppered rather heavily with words like “apocalypse” and “doomsday”.

For example, the Mail claims: “The Earth is racing towards an apocalyptic future in which major cities such as New York and London could become uninhabitable because of irreversible man-made climate change within 45-years”

This point may have come up in the press conference, but there’s nothing this clear in the paper itself, and we’re not aware of research which comes to such straightforward conclusions.

However, the research does highlight why the speed at which changes are taking place is a concern. Lead author Professor Camilo Mora from the University of Hawaii says in the paper:

“Although most ecological and social systems have the ability to adapt to a changing climate, the magnitude of disruption in both ecosystems and societies will be strongly determined by the time frames in which the climate will reach unprecedented states.”

Urgency of mitigation

Reuters features a quote from professor Camilo Mora from an interview with NBC, in which he is clear on the point that we’re heading for unprecedented climate change in the not too distant future. He says:

“We are used to the climate that we live in. With this climate change, what is going to happen is we’re going to be moving outside this comfort zone.”

The situation is not unsalvageable, according to the research. The paper says:

“Our findings shed light on the urgency of mitigating greenhouse gas emissions if climates potentially harmful to biodiversity are to be prevented.”

It’s happening

The coverage the paper has received may illustrate a point about how such projections are covered by the media.

If the paper’s conclusions are correct – and they are broadly consistent with the IPCC’s – a shift to new climate norms is going to happen at some point before the century’s out.

Coverage which casts this as a ‘doomsday’ or ‘apocalypse’ scenario is not only pedantically inaccurate – it won’t be the literal end of the world – it perhaps diverts from the pragmatic realities of how human influence is changing the climate, and the degree of climate change which is now essentially inevitable.

Our response is likely to involve adaptation – preparing and adapting to a changing climate – and mitigation – cutting emissions to limit climate change. But a climate-changed future is not the apocalypse or doomsday – it’s just reality.