Hoping for a ‘new normal’ climate is pointless. We must learn to adapt

Azim Khan Ronnie/500px/Getty Climate change is worsening.

There’s now no chance of holding temperature rise to 1.5°C.

The future will bring worsening floods , glacial melt, megafires and lethal heat .

But can we call this the “ new normal ”? The phrase has become common in discussions about the upheavals and damage stemming from human-caused climate change.

It’s human nature to want the future to be predictable: we are creatures of routine.

If the Earth’s climate really was going to settle into a “new normal” at 1.5°C of warming, we would find the idea comforting.

Unfortunately, it’s not true.

Passing the 1.5°C threshold isn’t like stepping from one state into another.

Global emissions of greenhouse gases are slowing, but have not yet peaked – let alone begun to fall.

That means further heat, greater change and more climate uncertainty.

Many different futures are possible after 1.5°C.

As Australia’s National Climate Risk Assessment spelled out last year, our future looks very different at 2°C.

At 2.5°C, it’s something else again.

At 3°C, it’s unrecognisable.