A new study released on Monday by scientists from the Stockholm Resilience Center, the University of Copenhagen, Australian National University and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research warned that we’re reaching “hothouse” conditions on Earth which would threaten the very “habitability of the planet for human beings.” This hothouse climate would push average global temperatures 7-9 °F higher than pre-industrial temperatures and would tip a threshold causing a series of events such as sea levels 30 to 200 feet higher than today, widespread river flooding, an increase the risk of damage from coastal storms, and eliminate coral reefs (and all of the benefits they provide for societies) by the end of this century or earlier. It’s unclear how soon we will reach a hothouse climate, while the current global commitment through the Paris Climate Agreement is to limit global average temperatures to  2 °C below pre-industrial levels even this limit may force us to reach a tipping point. 

“These tipping elements can potentially act like a row of dominoes. Once one is pushed over, it pushes Earth toward another,” said Johan Rockström, co-author of the report. This report was also released amid record-breaking heatwaves in Europe, Asia, and the US this summer as well as massive wildfires in Greece, Sweden and across the Western United States–signals that our planet’s climate is very palpably changing.

Why This Matters: Although our planet has cycled in and out of ice ages every 100,000 years or so for the past 1 million years, as Live Science explained, we left the last ice age around 12,000 years ago and are currently in an interglacial cycle called the Holocene epoch. In this cycle, Earth has natural systems that help keep it cool, even during the warmer interglacial periods. But because of human impact (mostly our addiction to fossil fuels) a growing number of scientists argue that the current geological age should be called the Anthropocene (from anthropogenic, which means originating with human activity). Temperatures are almost as hot as the maximum historical temperature during an interglacial cycle, Rockström noted. 

Go Deeper: Yes this is unnerving and the kind of story that makes people tune out of the climate conversation but you CAN do something, the study’s authors emphasize that this is NOT our destiny. First and foremost, vote! Vote for candidates from the superintendent of your local school board to your member of Congress to the President who not only acknowledge climate change but vow to take action on limiting our emissions. After that, read Eric Holthaus’ take, he said it best:

“The bottom line is, we have no choice but to press on through this fear. This is our actual planet we’re talking about, the only place in the entire universe capable of supporting life as we know it. The next decade will almost surely decide our fate. That should empower us. It means every act has meaning; we have the chance to save the world as we know it every single day. In this scenario we now find ourselves in, radical, disruptive climate action is the only course of action that makes sense.”