Climate: France must prepare for warming of up to 4°C, urge elected officials and civil society

France must prepare for global warming of up to 4°C in mainland France, concluded Thursday, May 4, a body bringing together civil society and elected officials around environmental issues, a "lucid" observation in line with the government's conclusions

Climate: France must prepare for warming of up to 4°C, urge elected officials and civil society

France must prepare for global warming of up to 4°C in mainland France, concluded Thursday, May 4, a body bringing together civil society and elected officials around environmental issues, a "lucid" observation in line with the government's conclusions.

The National Council for Ecological Transition (CNTE) – which brings together representatives of local authorities, NGOs, unions, employers and parliamentarians – has adopted an opinion on this subject. It "proposes to retain, for the trajectory of adaptation to climate change, the general hypothesis of a global warming of 3°C by the end of the century, crossing 1.5°C in 2030 and 2°C in 2050 ".

"We are on a trajectory towards 3°C at the global level and therefore for metropolitan France that means 4°C", specified the environmental senator and vice-president of the specialized commission of the CNTE, Ronan Dantec, stressing that the The opinion had been adopted "unanimously". "It says a consensus today of French society in its awareness that we must face the reality of this climate change, and in a lucid way," he added, presenting this opinion to journalists.

Overseas in the front line

The warming is indeed particularly marked in mainland France compared to the global average. The situation will also vary overseas depending on the geographical location of the territories, underlined Ronan Dantec: "Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon will go beyond 4°C and other territories, with the inertia of the ocean , will be closer to 3°C, which is the global average. »

The opinion follows the recommendations of the Minister of Ecological Transition, Christophe Béchu, who has been calling for a few months to get out of "denial" and to prepare France for a possible warming of 4°C. "Not that that means we're giving up on climate ambitions. We must act as if everything depends on us, but we must adapt by measuring that everything does not depend on us, ”he judged Thursday.

France is preparing its third National Plan for Adaptation to Climate Change (PNACC). The previous version (2018-2022) was based on less pessimistic assumptions of an average temperature increase of 2°C compared to the pre-industrial era.