In a new report, a group of researchers said that between 2023 and 2025, coral reefs saw their worst bleaching on record and that reefs’ estimated temperature “tipping point” has been crossed.
Climate scientists often refer to “tipping points” as the level of warming at which irreversible damage occurs — as reefs can’t be revived and ice sheets can’t be reformed, for example.
For reefs, the report says that “even under the most optimistic emission scenarios … warm-water coral reefs are virtually certain … to tip.”
The researchers said ice sheets are also on their way to “irreversible collapse, locking in long-term multi-metre sea level rise.”
Their report also says Antarctic sea ice “may have a tipping point that could already be underway” although it describes this as “highly uncertain.”
The report comes from an organization called Global Tipping Points, which is made up of 160 researchers from 23 countries.
Read more at TheHill.com.
