If the US had no coal power in 2016 nobody would have built it starting 2017 on the hope than Trump is in office until 2024 and doesn't wake up one day determined that actually coal is bad. Too risky. But seeing good news on the horizon might mean a plant is idled not closed, or you keep four of six plants instead of two of six. It adds up.
That said, arguments in terms of remaining "carbon budget" or "cumulative emissions budget", as the article uses here, are a useful way of framing the problem. Perhaps an unrealistic target is still a useful tool to focus policy attention.
<+> i reckon _logically_ it is still possible to limit warming to +1.5C degrees, but in terms of plausible pathways to reach that target, the pathway might look something more like "massive global human population loss due to X" rather than "solar panels" or "carbon sequestration" or "global one child policy" or "overthrow of capitalism"...
It's an immensely sad thought when you look at the consequences of 3 or 4 degrees (or more) warming. But at this point it's pretty much inevitable.
The amount of methane released from the thawing permafrost is much higher than expected as is the amount of CO2, and the amount of nitrous oxide being released is about 12 times higher than expected and nitrous oxide is almost 300 times more impactful than CO2. Oh, if you haven't heard the permafrost is thawing much, much faster than expected. There is nothing we can do to stop the thawing of the permafrost. The total amount of carbon in the atmosphere is 850 gigatons, and the permafrost is holding almost 1,500 gigatons of CO2, it's won't all get released, but even if only half gets released it would mean almost doubling the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, dwarfing what humans are releasing.
The oceans are warming rapidly and the major producer of oxygen on earth, phytoplankton which is responsible for %50-%80 of the earths oxygen have seen their population reduced by almost %40 in the last 150 years due to warming oceans. Also, phytoplankton are the basis for the marine food chain as the phytoplankton populations collapse so will the marine food chain.
1.5C is a pipe dream, I even think 4C is a pipe dream. The climate is no longer changing, the earth is changing and it's driving the change in the climate, and there is nothing humans can do at this point to even slow down the process. The wheels are going to fall off, and they are going to fall off much faster than anyone expects.
