Multispeed Mitigation to Manage Midcentury Overheating Above 1.5°C

Rick Duke

Principal, Gigaton Strategies, LLC and Former U.S. State Department Deputy Special Envoy for Climate

Abstract
We have made crucial progress mitigating climate change. The 2015 Paris Agreement and 2016 Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol ratcheted down long-term warming projections from over 4°C to under 3°C. But with the United States now actively opposing climate action and China putting forward a disappointing 2035 emission reduction target, it is clear we will overshoot the canonical 1.5°C threshold. Nonetheless, a multispeed mitigation strategy can minimize midcentury overheating and return to 1.5°C by 2100. First, slow mitigation (energy transition, fertilizer management, and carbon dioxide removal) can deliver roughly 1°C of cooling by 2100–but these strategies will only marginally impact midcentury peak temperatures. Complementary fast mitigation (cutting methane and other short-lived climate pollutants, rapidly ending deforestation) can limit midcentury peak temperatures to well below 2°C while also contributing roughly 0.5°C of 2100 cooling.  

Bio
Currently, Rick Duke advises on climate policy through Gigaton Strategies and affiliations with the Andlinger Center at Princeton and the Center for Global Sustainability at the University of Maryland.

During the Biden Administration, Rick Duke served as Deputy to Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry. He drove strategy for U.S.-China climate negotiations, culminating in the Sunnylands Statement that committed China to address non-CO₂ climate superpollutants in its next emissions target. He also helped define and leverage the 2030 and 2035 targets for the United States, launched the Global Methane Pledge, propelled a $10B renewables investment in Egypt, and drove work to end tropical deforestation through carbon markets and land restoration.

He also served as Special Assistant to President Obama, including setting the strategy that secured 5-year extensions to renewable energy tax credits, supporting the 2014 leader-level joint announcement of first-ever emission reduction targets with China, and leading White House efforts to secure the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol to phase down HFCs. During the first term, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary at the DOE.

Previously, he launched the Center for Market Innovation at NRDC. At McKinsey, his projects included managing development of the firm’s first global greenhouse gas abatement curve. He holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University, where he focused on the economics of public investment in clean energy.

This event is co-sponsored by the Center for Policy Research in Energy and the Environment.