ESD Ideas: Climate tipping is not instantaneous – the duration of an overshoot matters

Abstract

Climate tipping points are not committed to occur automatically upon crossing critical thresholds in global warming, as is often assumed. Instead, it is possible to temporarily overshoot a threshold without causing tipping, provided the duration of the overshoot is short. In this Idea, we demonstrate that restricting the time over 1.5 °C would considerably reduce tipping point risks.