1.5°C Hotspots: Climate Hazards, Vulnerabilities, and Impacts
Open accessAbstract
Differentiating the impacts of climate change between 1.5°C and 2°C requires a regional and sector-specific perspective. Whereas for some regions and sectors the difference in climate variables might be indistinguishable from natural variability, other areas especially in the tropics and subtropics will experience significant shifts. In addition to region-specific changes in climatic conditions, vulnerability and exposure also differ substantially across the world. Even small differences in climate hazards can translate into sizeable impact differences for particularly vulnerable regions or sectors. Here, we review scientific evidence of regional differences in climate hazards at 1.5°C and 2°C and provide an assessment of selected hotspots of climate change, including small islands as well as rural, urban, and coastal areas in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, that are particularly affected by the additional 0.5°C global mean temperature increase. We interlink these with a review of the vulnerability and exposure literature related to these hotspots to provide an integrated perspective on the differences in climate impacts between 1.5°C and 2°C.
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The greater share of research in Africa documents impacts in human and managed systems may reflect the high vulnerability of particularly sub-Saharan Africa to climate impacts.
“This greater share of research in Africa documents impacts in human and managed systems may reflect the high vulnerability of particularly sub-Saharan Africa to climate impacts 38 .”
From Machine-learning-based evidence and attribution mapping of 100,000 climate impact studies (2021) · cites this paper as [38]
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References 168 · Cited by 45
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- Authors
- Schleussner, C.-F., Deryng, D., D'haen, S., Hare, W., Lissner, T., Ly, M., Nauels, A., Noblet, M., Pfleiderer, P., Pringle, P., Rokitzki, M., Saeed, F., Schaeffer, M., Serdeczny, O., & Thomas, A.
- Affiliations
- Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (DE)
- Climate Analytics (DE)
- Climate Analytics, 10961 Berlin, Germany;
- The University of Melbourne (AU)
- King Abdulaziz University (SA)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Annual Review of Environment and Resources
- Publisher
- Annual Reviews
- Published
- 2018-10-17
- Volume
- 43
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 135-163
- ISSN
- 1543-5938 (ISSN-L)
- 1545-2050
- OpenAlex
- W2895863175
- Cited by
- 45
- References
- 168
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 3
- FWCI
- 0.57
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Annual Review of Environment and Resources (publishedVersion)
- Socio-Environmental Systems Modeling (acceptedVersion)
- Publication Database PIK (Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)) (submittedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- U.S. Department of Energy
- National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center
- Office of Science
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate Change and Environmental Impact
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate variability and models
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Climate Change Policy and Economics
- Keywords
- 1.5°C target, 2 °C warming, climate change impacts, climate hazards, climate change vulnerability, climate exposure, regional variation, small island states, sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, tropical and subtropical regions, coastal areas, rural areas, urban environment, natural variation
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