"If we don’t adapt we will suffer," Prof Urge-Vorsatz, who is director at the Centre for Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Policy, at the Central European University in Hungary, said yesterday.
She gave a keynote address in Dunedin on the second day of a University of Otago two-day conference on energy and climate change, which was organised by the Otago Energy Research Centre.
More than 70 people attended her talk on "1.5C Global Warming: Can We Still Get There?", at the Otago Museum.
The talk focused on "insights from the International Panel on Climate Change’s recently published special report ", on the challenge of restricting global warming to 1.5degC by 2050.
She said that goal could be achieved but it would require extensive, early action to be taken before 2030.
During her illustrated talk, she showed images of a tall, multistorey building in Canada, which had been built using innovative wood-based materials.
If the global warming target was to be reached, major changes would be needed, including in the developing world, where projected major expansions in existing cities would generate huge carbon emissions during the infrastructure’s manufacture and building, before a single new light or heater was turned on.
More sustainable materials should be used, and this approach was also consistent with other development goals, including improving standards of living, producing healthier buildings and reducing poverty, she said.
She said there were "pathways to 1.5C that simultaneously also help us achieve several sustainable development goals" and would "help us closer to a healthier, cleaner, more equitable and happier future". When the Otago Polytechnic’s innovative, $20 million student village complex was completed, early this year, it was the largest laminated wooden building, by volume, in the country and the tallest of its kind. Prof Urge-Vorsatz is the vice-chairwoman of Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
