The IPCC synthesis report

(MainsGS3: Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.)

Context:

• Highlighting the need for urgent climate action, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its Synthesis Report for the Sixth Assessment Cycle on March 20 in Interlaken, Switzerland.

About the compilation of report:

• The Synthesis Report is a compilation of the main findings of the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report, based on results from three Working Groups (WGs).
• These working groups are : WG I which evaluated the physical science basis of climate change, WG II evaluated the impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability, and WG III which evaluated the mitigation.
• The Synthesis Report also drew from Special Reports based on Global Warming of 1.5°C (October 2018), Climate Change and Land (August 2019), and the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (September 2019).

Highlights of the report:

• The report emphasised the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to human-caused climate change through “mainstream effective and equitable action” for a “liveable sustainable future for all.”
• The report highlights the urgency of drastically reducing the emission of greenhouse gasses and so limit rising global temperatures by 1.5 C from pre-industrial levels, set by the Paris Agreement.
• Despite the IPCC’s warnings in 2018, the increase in greenhouse gas emissions continued so much so that the global surface temperature has already warmed by 1.1 C over pre-industrial levels, leading to extreme and/or unpredictable weather events that are risking human health, fortunes, and ecosystems.
• Noting the impact of the rise in temperature, the report states that such events have made people much more susceptible to food insecurity, water shortages with vulnerable populations disproportionately facing the brunt of climate change. 
• The report highlighted the economic loss and damages incurred due to climate change and stressed on the need for financial resolution for a more equitable world. 

Implications for India:

• With a large vulnerable population, India needs to prioritise grants and policies that focusses on adapting to the effects of climate change.

• India’s priority should be to minimise loss and damage in terms of lives, livelihood and biodiversity, and accelerate equitable action mitigation and adaptation.
• It proposes an approach emphasising ‘climate resilient development’ which recognises that development is important, but the quality of that development, whether it locks us into low or high carbon choices or resilient development is important,
• As a developing country, India can lower its per-capita emissions through energy efficiency policies already being implemented in almost every sector, however, it can also decarbonise the energy sector by using cleaner options like solar and renewable energy.

Way ahead:

• The report suggests climate resilient development that will not only mitigate the effects of climate change but also provide wider benefits.
• Access to clean energy, improving air quality to increase employment opportunities, boosting healthcare through technology, and delivering equity are among the report’s recommended goals to help adapt to climate change.
• The report also foregrounded the role of financial investments to achieve climate goals and encouraged public funding through central banks, government and financial regulators to reduce emissions, scale up climate resilience, and protect low-income and marginalised communities.