Campaigners are calling for specific action to stop climate change and protect the people most affected, stressing that action must happen urgently.
Students and groups such as Extinction Rebellion, Fridays for Future and Irish Doctors for the Environment gathered in Trinity's Front Square and marched down Grafton Street to the Dáil, where they staged a sit-in protest.
The demonstration coincided with the COP27 international climate conference currently being held in Egypt.
#COP27 protest in Dublin. Now sit down protest at Grafton St., then heading to the Dail. pic.twitter.com/YAL4AToNTe
— Paul Murphy 🏳️⚧️ (@paulmurphy_TD) November 11, 2022
This week, TD Brd Smith stated in the Dáil that demonstrators would be carrying clocks "to highlight the reality that we're running out of time."
At this year's COP, the main worry is whether affluent countries will act decisively to give developing countries "loss and damage" support in order to aid those who are suffering the most from the crisis despite producing some of the least greenhouse gas emissions.
The protest taking place in Dublin today is calling for financial promises from the COP for the people and regions most impacted by the climate crisis.
It urges Ireland to adopt "Doughnut Economics," a framework for functioning within ecological constraints while providing for all human rights and needs, and to pilot it throughout the country.
Campaigners urge Ireland to ratify the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, phase out fossil fuel subsidies, and join the Energy Charter Treaty.
The demonstrators also want the government to codify ecocide as a crime, educate bureaucrats about climate change, create a climate mental health council, and assist farmers and fishers in making the transition to sustainable farming and fishing.
They also advocate for the placement of "climate clocks" on iconic structures throughout all Irish cities to illustrate how much time the world has left to make changes before the climate catastrophe brings about ecological and human collapse.
The repercussions of climate change are already severely disrupting people's lives on a large scale, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Despite a 2015 pact by governments to seek to limit warming to that amount, the planet has warmed by approximately 1.1 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times and is on a trajectory to warp past 1.5 degrees.
According to the IPCC, even with 1.5 degrees of global warming, the globe "faces inescapable many climate dangers" in the upcoming 20 years.
Even momentarily exceeding a 1.5 degree rise will have "extra severe repercussions, some of which will be irreversible."
