Largely considered the most urgent and impactful contemporary environmental crises by scientists and other experts, climate change is the most high-profile challenge facing the world today. For years, public figures such as Al Gore and Greta Thunberg have sounded the alarm regarding growing carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, which pundits fear could lead to a lingering increase in global temperatures for centuries to come. Georgetown University states, “Scientists predict that if the increase in greenhouse gas emissions continues unabated, temperatures will rise by as much as 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of this century.” Georgetown also noted that “the five warmest years on record have occurred in the last decade.
Unfortunately, the way forward on climate change isn’t easy to chart. In 2019, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres stated, “We need more concrete plans, more ambition from more countries and more businesses. We need all financial institutions, public and private, to choose, once and for all, the green economy.” Unfortunately, not all nations have gotten on board with this way of thinking. For instance, Carbon Brief noted that China has regularly been responsible for a tenth of all human-prompted climate change.
