What’s a climate ‘Doom Loop?’ These researchers fear we’re heading into one

(Inside Climate News, 17 Feb 2023) As governments put more resources into coping with the increasingly destructive impacts of climate change, is it distracting them from reducing emissions?

Governments could soon be so overwhelmed with the consequences of climate change that they’re unable to address its root causes, creating a self-perpetuating cycle that researchers are calling a climate “doom loop.”

In a report published Wednesday by Chatham House and the Institute for Public Policy Research, two London-based think tanks, researchers warned that the climate crisis was already imposing incredible costs on nations as they deal with everything from increasingly destructive storms and wildfires to more frequent famines and human migrations. As those costs snowball, they said, it could force governments to dial back or even abandon their efforts to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, leading to larger economic burdens in the future.

“This is a doom loop,” the researchers wrote in their report. “The consequences of the crisis and the failure to address it draw focus and resources from tackling its causes, leading to higher temperatures and ecological loss, which then create more severe consequences, diverting even more attention and resources, and so on.”

External link

Inside Climate News, 17 Feb 2023: What’s a climate ‘Doom Loop?’ These researchers fear we’re heading into one