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Limit the total amount of emissions

The planet can only deal with us releasing a certain amount of greenhouse gases. This means that even if we cut Scotland's emissions by 80% by 2050, if we don't do it fast enough we would have released more greenhouse gases than the planet can deal with.

That means bad news. To avoid this we need to work out how much greenhouse gases we can produce between now and 2050 without causing too much chaos, and stick to that number.


In both the graphs above we've cut our emissions by the same amount by 2050. The coloured in areas represent the total amount of greenhouse gases released over that period.

We can see that the area coloured in on the red graph is much bigger than the green.

In the red graph we've released too much greenhouse gases. The green graph is a much better scenario. The

Friends of the Earth Scotland is an environmental charity based in Scotland
5 Rose Street, Edinburgh EH2 2PR. Tel: 0131 243 2700. Registered charity number SC003442