Managing climate overshoot: A risk-based strategy for climate stabilisation

[Geoengineering News]

https://essopenarchive.org/doi/full/10.22541/essoar.15002445/v1

Authors: Graeme Taylor, Peter Wadhams, Tom Goreau, Suzanne Reed, Heri Kuswanto, Daniele Visioni, and Dennis Garrity

27 April 2026

https://doi.org/10.22541/essoar.15002445/v1

Abstract

Global warming is accelerating, yet current climate strategies centered on emissions reduction and carbon removal are unlikely to prevent rising temperatures from triggering dangerous tipping points. Although essential, these approaches operate on timescales too slow to counter near-term warming driven by Earth’s growing energy imbalance, weakening carbon sinks, and amplifying climate feedbacks. This timescale mismatch reflects systemic shortcomings in climate risk assessment that underestimate nonlinear risks and the escalating costs of delay. We argue that climate stabilisation should be approached as a risk-management challenge rather than an incremental policy process. A viable strategy must combine rapid decarbonization and expanded carbon removal with carefully governed cooling interventions capable of reducing near-term warming. Evaluating these options requires explicitly comparing the risks of intervention with the risks of inaction. Without an integrated, risk-based strategy that aligns intervention timelines with accelerating climate threats, the likelihood of irreversible Earth-system disruption will continue to grow.

Source: ESS Open Archive