Peer-reviewed journal demands that US, UK, Germany pay hundreds of TRILLIONS in 'climate reparations'

Countries that reportedly produce "excessive levels" of greenhouse gas emissions could be ordered to pay trillions of dollars in "climate reparations" to low-polluting developing countries in order to ensure that the global climate target can be reached by 2050, according to Nature Sustainability.

The countries that will be ordered to pay a collection of $170 trillion, or $6 trillion annually, as means of "climate reparations," includes the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, Russia, and Germany, the journal states.



The proposed climate reparations stem from the idea of making the atmosphere equitable for all countries, as it is a shared global commonality.

Andrew Fanning, lead author and research fellow at the University of Leeds' Sustainability Research Institute, said that nations are polluting the environment with excessive amounts of fossil fuels and need to be held accountable for "destabilising the climate."

"It is a matter of climate justice that if we are asking nations to rapidly decarbonise their economies, even though they hold no responsibility for the excess emissions that are destabilising the climate, then they should be compensated for this unfair burden,” said Fanning.

By 2050, the study says that 55 countries, including the US, UK, Germany, Japan, Russia, India and most of sub-Saharan Africa, must decarbonize their economies in order to keep the global temperature below 1.5C.

According to the study, 55 nations will have to sacrifice more than 75  percent of their share of the global carbon budget.

Under the climate reparations plan, the United States will be ordered to pay $80 trillion in reparations due to its "excessive" use of fossil fuels, while the United Kingdom will have to pay $7.7 trillion, all by the year 2050.

Jason Hickel, co-author and professor at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, said that "Climate change reflects clear patterns of atmospheric colonisation."

"Responsibility for excess emissions is largely held by the wealthy classes [within nations] who have very high consumption and who wield disproportionate power over production and national policy. They are the ones who must bear the costs of compensation," Hickel explained.

The demand in compensation is meant to reflect climate justice for alleged "climate-vulnerable" nations and the threats they face due to greenhouse gas emissions, the journal reports.
 

At the United Nation's Cop27 summit in November, worldwide leaders agreed to provide funding to poor countries that will go towards offsetting "climate disasters" such as extreme weather events like melting glaciers and rising sea levels.