Islamic Climate Experts Urge 1.5°C Limit on Warming

An influential group of Islamic leaders has urged world governments to prevent human-caused climate change forcing global average temperatures more than 2°C above the pre-industrial level.

In a radical advance on the position of most developed countries, the group says it would be better to aim for 1.5°C  ̶  the lower limit that many climate scientists say would offer a stronger chance of preventing climate change reaching dangerous levels, but to which few governments have so far agreed.

The group’s call, a long time in preparation, was issued at the end of the International Islamic Climate Change Symposium, held in the Turkish city of Istanbul, and is published as the Islamic Declaration on Global Climate Change.

It is addressed primarily to the negotiators who will meet in Paris in December at the UN Climate Change Conference, the main aim of which will be to get agreement on a robust and enforceable global treaty to cut emissions of greenhouse gases in time to stay within the 2°C safety limit.

Rapid phase-out
The authors also address people of all nations and their leaders, urging them to commit themselves to 100% renewable energy and/or a zero emissions strategy as early as possible as part of a rapid phase-out of fossil fuels.

But they go much further than that.  They write:  “We particularly call on the well-off nations and oil-producing states to . . . stay within the 2°C limit, or, preferably, within the 1.5°C limit, bearing in mind that two-thirds of the earth’s proven fossil fuel reserves remain in the ground”.

This is a clear reference to the warnings that a large part of those reserves cannot safely be exploited, and will prove to be stranded assets.

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