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Beyond carbon budgets

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The remaining carbon budget consistent with limiting warming to 1.5 °C allows 20 more years of current emissions according to one study, but is already exhausted according to another. Both are defensible. We need to move on from a unique carbon budget, and face the nuances.

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Fig. 1: Temperature and cumulative emissions pathways.
Fig. 2: Model differences.

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Peters, G.P. Beyond carbon budgets. Nature Geosci 11, 378–380 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-018-0142-4

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