Global warming, an unleashing enemy shattering the ‘Temple of life’

Global warming occurs when carbon dioxide and other air pollutants collect in the temperature and absorb sunlight and solar radiation that have bounced off the earth’s surface.

Normally, this radiation would escape into space, but these pollutants, which can last for years to centuries in the atmosphere, trap the heat and cause the planet to get hotter.

It was extremely terrible, watching at home from international media giants, as deadly heat waves and torrential floods battered the planet.

Effects

The world seems hotter now than any time in recorded history, unleashing a firestorm of heatwaves, mega-droughts, and acidifying seas.

“We are shattering the temple of life, with millions of species on the edge of extinction,” says Avaaz (Voice or song in many languages).

Avaaz members live in every nation of the world and its teams are spread across 18 countries, six continents operating in 17 languages.

Within 50 years, 1.5 billion people could be forced to flee temperatures as hot as the Sahara desert, and already 20 million are forced to run every year, Avaaz campaigner, Huiting Hsu, said in a statement sighted by the Ghana News Agency (GNA).

Currently, the planet is experiencing one of the greatest upheavals of life, and it's caused by a global rise of just 1°Celsius.

One could imagine the hostile and desolate planet our children will inherit if heatwaves and uncontrolled flooding continue to hit the planet.

Hopes

There is still hope because things could be turned around, as world leaders hold two major UN summits, where momentous decisions on the climate and extinction crisis would be taken to save nature.

The United Nations (UN) Biodiversity Summit scheduled for October this year aims to end the extinction crisis with bold new protections for nature.

Then just a few weeks later, the global Climate Summit also remains the best chance to secure new commitments to avoid a climate catastrophe.

In fact, there is no certainty, but the only opportunity exists in the world’s battle to save the planet and this largely calls for intensified advocacy.

Almost all the world's biggest economies have now pledged to end carbon pollution by 2050, but the shady lobbying tactics of the fossil giants seemed to thwart such efforts.

Road to COP26

Climate experts believed COP26; the international climate summit in Glasgow would make or break for humanity’s climate future, three months away.

But, energy and environment ministers at a G20 meeting in Naples, Italy saw as a decisive step leading to COP26 in November failed to agree on key details of countries climate change commitments.

“Climate activists had hoped the G20 event would result in “a strengthening of climate targets, new commitments on climate financing, and an increase in countries committing to net zero emissions by 2050,” Reuters reported.

This shows there will be even less time to take up more challenging questions about how humanity will address the climate emergency.

Unfortunately India, the world’s third-largest emitter after China and the US, allegedly skipped a meeting in London, hosted by COP26 President Alok Sharma, which was designed to lay further groundwork for the Glasgow summit.

But with so little time to enact meaningful climate action, Sharma has described COP26 as the world’s “last chance” to avoid the 1.5 degrees Celsius target.

>b>Analysis from Equity Checks

A new analysis from the Paris Equity Check has identified energy policies by G20 members - China, India, Brazil, and Australia, all currently reliant on coal that is associated with a five-degree rise in global temperatures.

World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency 2021

BioScience, a new peer-reviewed study in the journal, published by Oxford University Press, finds that we are “nearing or have already crossed tipping points associated with critical parts of the Earth system.”

Investigating 31 “planetary vital signs” several co-authors warned of a “climate emergency”, and since the publication, more than 2,800 additional scientists have added their names to that statement.

West Africa

Countries in the West Africa region are simultaneously facing the challenges of energy poverty, energy security, and climate change mitigations.

However, the region has vast renewable energy potential that would be sufficient to cover unmet power demand and achieve universal access to electricity, while supporting the transition to a path of low-carbon growth.

WRI Data on Emissions

On Green House, Gas Emission (GHG) in West Africa Region, data from the World Resource Institute Climate Analysis Indicator Tool (WRI CAIT 2014) reveals countries contributing to the GHG.

Nigeria (50 percent) dominates total Green House Gas emissions (GHG), followed by Cameroon (20 percent) and Chad (five percent).

Cote D’Ivoire, Mali, and Ghana contribute four percent each.

Combined, these six countries emit more than 85 percent of the total GHG emissions in the region.

But, according to the data, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Guinea, Niger, and Equatorial Guinea are each responsible for three percent of the region’s total GHG emissions with Benin contributing two percent of the total.

Togo, Sierra Leone, Mauritania, and the Gambia are responsible for only one percent each, and Liberia, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, and Sao Tome and Principe each emitting less than one percent of total regional emissions.

Gabon is a net carbon sink – absorbing nine percent of the region’s total GHG emissions due to the uptake of carbon by its Land Use Change and Forestry (LUCF) sector.

Contributions on the Globe

According to the data, the West Africa region’s GHG emissions represent 2.03 percent of global emissions.

With 5.26 percent of the global population, per capita emissions of 1.08 metric tons of carbon dioxide-equivalent (tCO2e) are approximately six times below the world's average.

The exceptions are Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon where per capita emissions are almost 3.5 times and 1.5 times the world's average, respectively.

The region’s carbon intensity is almost four times the world's average, with only two countries (Cape Verde and Gabon) emitting fewer GHGs relative to GDP than the world's average.

Between 1990 and 2014, total regional GHG emissions grew 17 percent, slower than the world's average growth of 45 percent.

LUCF Activities

As of 2014, 17 out of the 21 countries in the West Africa region had positive emissions from the LUCF sector with Nigeria and Cameroon dominating the region’s sector emissions (96 percent).

LUCF activities are the leading source of GHG emissions in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Liberia, Guinea, Benin, Togo, and Sierra Leone.

In Gabon, Mauritania, Gambia, and Cape Verde, LUCF activities absorb more GHG than they emit.

Combined, these four countries absorb the equivalent of 31 percent of the region’s LUCF emissions.

Energy Sector

In the energy sector, Nigeria is the highest emitter, responsible for more than half of West Africa’s regional energy emissions (60 percent), followed by Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon, and Senegal whose combined energy emissions account for more than 85 percent of the region’s GHG emissions from energy activities.

Energy is the leading source of emissions in five countries – Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, Cape Verde, and Sao Tome and Principe.

Agriculture Sector

In the agriculture sector, Nigeria is again the West Africa region’s top emitter (28 percent) followed by Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad, the WRI CAIT, Cameroon, Guinea, Senegal, and Ghana.

Combined, these nine countries emit more than 88 percent of the region’s GHG emissions from agriculture.

Agriculture is the leading source of GHG emissions in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Mauritania, and Guinea-Bissau.

Waste Sector

The situation is however not different in the waste sector as Nigeria, Cote d'Ivoire, Gambia, Senegal, and Cameroon are the highest emitting countries and together contribute 87 percent of the region’s GHG emissions from waste.

Waste is the highest emitting sector in the Gambia.

IP Sector

In the industrial Processes (IP) sector, Cameroon contributes 75 percent of the region’s emissions, followed by Nigeria (13 percent), and Senegal (three percent).

IP however, is not the leading source of emissions in any country in the West Africa region.