Zero Carbon Dorset

​Both Dorset and Bournemouth, Poole & Christchurch (BCP) Councils declared a climate and ecological emergency in 2019. These declarations are based on the scientific evidence that we have around a decade to take the required action to prevent greenhouse gas emissions exceeding levels which scientists agree will lead to irreversible and catastrophic climate change. Recent reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [1] have identified that the consequences of allowing temperatures to rise by 2 degrees, rather than the 1.5 degree ambition set out in the Paris Climate Agreement, are stark; extreme weather events, rising sea levels, disruption to food supplies and potential societal instability, directly affecting 100’s of millions more people than at 1.5 degrees and indirectly threatening the whole of humanity. Continuing emissions at business-as-usual levels threatens our very existence. With emissions due to exceed the levels required to keep below a rise of 1.5 in the time detailed on the clock above, and with the limits to secure a better than 50% chance of staying within 2 degrees due to be exceeded in the time set out in the clock above, we must act now. Actions agreed at COP26 in Glasgow remain insufficient to address this issue. Aligned with this we are witnessing an ecological catastrophe where extinction rates are up to 1000 times the underlying natural rate [2] and the very ecosystem that supports human life is under threat.