How will the 2023 IPCC Synthesis report reshape the business environment?

How will the 2023 IPCC Synthesis report reshape the business environment? 

The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) publication represents a turning point. The 2023 Synthesis Report, released in March this year, gives a comprehensive overview of climate science and its response to climate change by bringing together findings from its six previous IPCC reports. 

 Described as an up-to-date assessment of the climate crisis, it doesn’t just present the latest findings on temperature change, sea level rise, land use change, CO2 emissions, but acts as a beacon to guide and inform policymakers preparing for the COP28 negotiations in UAE later this year. 

But what does this mean for businesses? 

Given the amount of greenhouse gases humanity is continuing to put into the atmosphere, reducing our CO2 output won’t heal our planet overnight. We also need to adopt more permanent solutions that remove CO2 from our atmosphere – both naturally and using technologies, such as capturing CO2 directly from the air. 

We need to invest in nature-based approaches like large-scale reforestation, which in turn needs a significant change of ethos, where damage to nature is no longer tolerated. Not only that, but we must stop investing in the wrong things. At the end of 2021, nearly 200 coal-fired power stations were under construction in Asia alone. To remain within the temperature commitments that 196 countries agreed to under the Paris Agreement, we must plateau emissions by 2025 and then reduce dramatically to reach net zero by 2050. 

We need to move from ambition to action. The IPCC Synthesis report highlights some pathways to avoid intensifying climate risks, but wider system transformation is necessary for real change. Developing workable decarbonisation strategies has gone from being a high-level idea to business-in-practice. 

There is an urgent need for adaptive improvements to the urban environment and supporting infrastructure we all depend upon. The need to prepare for the regular occurrence of what were once rare climate shocks, is galvanising action in government offices worldwide. The private sector also has an opportunity here, to partner with governments to accelerate solutions to counteract the expediential growth of flooding. 

Climate change creates a domino effect felt through every aspect of our society and economy. Reading the IPCC’s Synthesis Report from a business’ standpoint, it is striking how comprehensive its implications are for supply chain issues, transport costs, the importance of avoiding nature damage, conservation of resources, and a whole list of related operational and commercial risk factors.  

Read the full article and find out more about what the IPCC suggest businesses and organisations need to do next: https://bit.ly/43FRkmO