In recent years, extreme weather events have caused increasing damage around the world. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the science group that advises international climate negotiations, has concluded that nations need to take swifter action to slash emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gasses to avoid global warming’s most devastating effects. As the temperature continues to rise at an alarming rate, the probability of more intense drought, excessive rainfall, severe storms, bigger wildfires, and other extreme weather is increasing. Experts warn that shifting climate patterns will spark mass migration, facilitate the spread of disease, and contribute to food and water shortages and other calamities.

In response, countries have signed on to several major global agreements aimed at mitigating the effects of climate change. Most prominent is the Paris Agreement, in which 196 parties agreed at the 2015 UN climate conference to limit the global average temperature increase above preindustrial levels to well below 2°C (3.6°F), and preferably under 1.5°C (2.7°F), by reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. To date, countries have made some progress under the agreement—which is entirely voluntary—but the earth’s average temperature has already risen 1.1°C (1.98°F) above preindustrial levels, according to a 2023 assessment [PDF] by the IPCC.

While recent UN climate conferences have yielded some breakthroughs, such as landmark pledges to reduce global methane emissions and compensate developing countries for the adverse effects of climate change, most experts say countries’ pledges are still not ambitious enough to avoid catastrophic, permanent harm. Although many governments have made a sizable shift toward renewable energy as they look to pare down their use of fossil fuels, experts say current commitments to reduce emissions will still likely result in a temperature rise of 2.9°C by the end of the century.

In the United States, the way forward is fiercely debated. Democrats and Republicans are largely split along partisan lines in their attitude toward the threat posed by climate change and the need to pass climate-friendly policies. Some U.S. policymakers worry that such policies will hurt the  economy and advocate instead for the expansion of the domestic fossil fuel industry to create jobs, lower energy prices, and reduce dependence on foreign energy. Others respond that climate change is causing irreversible and costly damage to ecosystems and the food and water supply, and point to the job opportunities offered by the green transition.