The past years were the hottest on record. Yet we’re on track to burn more fossil fuels

‘If structural engineers said a bridge was unsafe, would you cross it?’ Photograph: Ng Han Guan/AP

Let me see if I have this right.

A vast majority of the world’s best climate scientists have told us again and again that to maintain a stable and liveable planet, we, the human race, must reduce the burning of fossil fuels – and emissions of greenhouse gases – by half by 2030. And end emissions altogether by 2050. Knowing this, what are we on track to do?