Ambitious emission reductions maintain Earth resilience, conditional on climate and carbon feedbacks and tipping points
Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: Earth resilience is a guiding principle for navigating safe futures in the Anthropocene, but operational quantification remains limited. We introduce a path-based resilience indicator estimating the probability of returning to a safe Holocene-like state by 2100 via the share of trajectories that fulfil not only temperature-but also dynamic warming rate-and tipping safety demands, rendering it effective for analyses of overshoot. It is conditioned on emission scenarios and analysed considering uncertainties in climate and carbon sensitivity and tipping dynamics. We find that a net-zero-by-2050 scenario has an estimated resilience of 34%, in contrast to <1% for current policies. To gain ∼10%pt resilience, emissions need to be cut by 35% in 2035 compared to an NDC scenario. On average, 7.3%pt are gained with every 5 years of decarbonising earlier than 2050. Therefore, early decarbonisation can hedge against the risk of tipping and strong climate and carbon feedbacks.
Institutions: University of Potsdam, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Arizona State University, Leibniz Association, Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Bolin Centre for Climate Research, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Goethe University Frankfurt
Language: English
Subfield: Economics and Econometrics
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Climate action
Open Access status: green
Awards: G4103557828, G6997788416
OpenAlex ID: W7225044870