George Monbiot, The Guardian — reprinted in Internazionale n. 1663, 30 April 2026. Versione italiana — Version française

On 15 April 2026, scientists published a study on the AMOC (Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation), the ocean circulation system that distributes heat from the tropics to the North Atlantic. The conclusion is alarming: the system is more likely to collapse than not. Professor Stefan Rahmstorf estimates the probability of a shutdown at over 50%, with a possible tipping point as early as mid-century.

The consequences for northern Europe would be severe — winter temperatures down to -48°C in Oslo, -30°C in Edinburgh, -19°C in London — and global: collapse of the Amazon rainforest, accelerated sea level rise on the US East Coast, massive release of CO₂ from the Antarctic Ocean. An irreversible change on any human timescale, whose speed would outpace our capacity to adapt.

Why is this not front-page news? Monbiot identifies a structural answer: the economic model of Nobel laureate William Nordhaus has convinced governments that warming of 3.5-4°C would be acceptable, and that even 6°C would cause only an 8.5% drop in GDP. Climate science describes those scenarios as the end of civilisation. This model, challenged by economists such as Stern and Stiglitz, has been actively promoted by the fossil fuel industry to justify inaction.

The AMOC has shut down before due to natural causes — but never during an era of large-scale human civilisation. Monbiot concludes that a narrow economic elite, controlling media and politics, is blocking the responses needed to address an existential crisis. The stakes could not be higher.

Summary of an article by George Monbiot, first published in The Guardian, reprinted in Internazionale n. 1663, 30 April 2026. Versione italiana — Version française