A tool translates corporate emissions into concrete harms — people exposed to heat, corals lost, crops reduced

# What the new tracer does

# How it works, in plain terms

All results are given as best estimates with a likely uncertainty range and include links back to the original studies used for the calculations.

# Why this changes the conversation Corporate and government actors often describe their emissions as negligible at the global scale. The tracer directly challenges that defence by showing how any quantified emissions map to measurable harms. Projected impacts stop being abstract — the tool can express outcomes as numbers of people exposed to unprecedented heat, the equivalent minimum-diet food loss for hundreds of thousands of people, or millions of corals damaged during bleaching events.

Researchers involved say the aim is accountability rather than blame. Legal and human-rights advocates see practical applications for climate litigation, where establishing a causal link between an emitter's actions and harms has been a barrier.

# Example: Hunter Valley Operations coal proposal Operations (HVO) coal project in New South Wales as an example. The project's projected emissions — about 809 million tonnes of CO2 if approved — produce several translated impacts when run through the tracer. Examples cited include reduced crop production equivalent to the minimum dietary needs of hundreds of thousands of people, exposure of large numbers to unprecedented heat, and millions of coral colonies affected on the Great Barrier Reef during bleaching events.

# Who built the tracer and who funds it The tracer was developed by scientists at the Australian National University, the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Weather of the 21st Century, and the Lethal Humidity Global Council. Funding was provided by the Minderoo Foundation. The Australian Human Rights Institute at the University of New South Wales is a partner through its Australian Climate Accountability Project.

# Reactions and possible uses

# Bottom line Tracer converts technical CO2 figures into specific, evidence-based estimates of harm across human and ecological metrics. That translation can change public understanding, inform policy debates, and supply quantified links useful in legal and accountability contexts.