The climate question is now ubiquitous in our daily lives. The recent events in Belgium last year, and in France this year, have awakened many of us to the urgency to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, if we want to leave an inhabitable planet to the next generations.
However, many fundamental questions that underpin our actions remain difficult to answer for non-scientists: How do we know that climate change is due to humans alone? How confident can we be in long-term projections if we are already uncertain about short-term weather forecasts? Is climate science settled? What options are on the table? Can a state or an institution be sued for climate inaction? What can I do at my own level?
In a seminar we organised as part of our CMS Sustainability Month, Prof. François Massonnet, FNRS Research Associate and climate scientist at UCLouvain, shared the latest state of knowledge regarding these important questions, with a focus on the recently released sixth assessment reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), also drawing connections between law and natural sciences.
Watch the recording of the presentation below.
