The world is closer than thought to a “point of no return” after which runaway global heating cannot be stopped, scientists have said.
Continued global heating could trigger climate tipping points, leading to a cascade of further tipping points and feedback loops, they said. This would lock the world into a new and hellish “hothouse Earth” climate far worse than the 2-3C temperature rise the world is on track to reach. The climate would also be very different to the benign conditions of the past 11,000 years, during which the whole of human civilisation developed.
The public and politicians were largely unaware of the risk of passing the point of no return, the researchers said. The group said they were issuing their warning because while rapid and immediate cuts to fossil fuel burning were challenging, reversing course was likely to be impossible once on the path to a hothouse Earth, even if emissions were eventually slashed.
The assessment, which was published in the journal One Earth, synthesised recent scientific findings on climate feedback loops and 16 tipping elements. The tipping elements include the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, mountain glaciers, polar sea ice, sub-Arctic forests and permafrost, the Amazon rainforest and the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (Amoc), a system of ocean currents that strongly influences the global climate.
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“Don’t look up! Don’t look up! Don’t look up!”
Meanwhile heads of European industry are gathering in Belgium this week to discuss the lowering of European climate goals, as it impacts their bottom line 🤦
The Buy European question is only one part of a sprawling summit agenda taking place at Alden Biesen in Limburg, an estate founded in the 13th century by Teutonic knights. Leaders will also discuss deregulation, fragmented capital markets that constrain green and digital investment, as well as barriers in the European single market that hamper trade.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/feb/12/eu-leaders-clash-buy-european-belgium-summit
Shame the 100s that rule the world don’t give a fuck.
A “hothouse Earth” scenario can be prevented in two ways:
- reduction of emissions and increasing carbon uptake
- waiting for things to hit the fan, and then reducing the amount of sunlight arriving on Earth
Choice 1 is obviously a dozen times more preferable. Choice 2 will be almost inevitable if making choice 1 fails, and could bring about unforeseen risks.
Snowpiercer timeline here we come then.
I haven’t read one of these “past the point of no return” articles in at least a month. The end is nigh and we were the makers of our own destruction all along, gets pulled out every so often, throughout history. The thing is, when it finally happens, it’ll be true.
When what finally happens? We’re a frog in a pot, there is no point where things suddenly get a thousand times worse, it happens gradually. Until the frog finally jumps out, except we can’t.
