WMO State of the Global Climate 2020 report said the past six years were the warmest on record. The Paris Agreement commits to pursue efforts to limit temperature increase to this level. The averaged temperature estimate over the next 20 years is expected to reach or exceed 1.5☌ of warming. In 2020 the annual mean temperature was 1.2 C above the normal. The report shows that emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are responsible for approximately 1.1☌ during the last ten years of warming since 1850-1900. It provides new estimates of the chances of crossing the global warming level of 1.5☌ in the next decades, and finds that unless there are immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, limiting warming to close to 1.5☌ or even 2☌ will be beyond reach. The report shows that the observed average rate of heating accelerated during the period 2006-2018 compared to the period 1971–2006. This resulted in hundreds of casualties and many millions of dollars in economic losses,” said Prof. For example, in the month of July alone, up to two months worth of rainfall fell in two days in Germany, whilst parts of the central Chinese province of Henan received more accumulated rainfall in the space of four days than the annual average. “Many countries this year are bearing witness to this. This brings more intense rainfall and associated flooding, as well as more intense drought in many regions. The IPCC report shows how climate change is intensifying the water cycle. Further warming will amplify permafrost thawing, and the loss of seasonal snow cover, melting of glaciers and ice sheets, and loss of summer Arctic sea ice, according to the report. The Arctic is heating more than twice as fast as the global average. Siberia – a region traditionally associated with permafrost - has once again seen huge wildfires after exceptional heatwaves, fires and low Arctic sea ice in 2020,” said Prof. In recent days, we have seen devastating fires in Turkey and Greece amid an intense and long-lasting heatwave in the Mediterranean. “Fires in North America stoked by heat and drought have sent plumes of smoke across the Atlantic. Recorded an incredible temperature of 49.6☌ – breaking all previous records - as part of an intense and extensive heatwave in North America. “The extreme heat we have witnessed in 2021 bears all the hallmarks of human-induced climate change. At 2☌ of global warming, heat extremes would more often reach critical tolerance thresholds for agriculture and health, the report shows. For 1.5☌ of global warming, there will be increasing heat waves, longer warm seasons and shorter cold seasons as well as changes in precipitation patterns affecting flooding and drought occurrences. The IPCC report projects that in the coming decades climate changes will increase in all regions. WMO and the UN Environment Programme established the IPCC in 1988. “As co-founder of the IPCC, WMO pays tribute to the remarkable achievement of the scientists involved for their dedication and tireless work. However, greenhouse gas concentrations, especially carbon dioxide, remain at record levels,” said Prof. Some of the negative changes are already locked into the climate system but others still can be addressed if we make strong, rapid and sustained reductions in emissions now. “It is a foretaste of what faces future generations. “The harsh reality of climate change is playing out in real time before our very eyes,” said WMO Secretary-General Prof. "The internationally agreed threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius is perilously close," said Mr. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described it as "a code red for humanity." Evidence of observed changes in extremes such as heatwaves, heavy precipitation, droughts, and the proportion of intense tropical cyclones, and, in particular, their attribution to human influence, has strengthened since the last IPCC Assessment Report in 2014. It says that human-induced climate change is already affecting many weather and climate extremes in every region across the globe. Many changes due to past and future greenhouse gas emissions are irreversible for centuries to millennia, especially changes in the ocean, ice sheets and global sea level, says the report. The scale of recent changes is unprecedented in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group I report, Climate Change 2021: the Physical Science Basis, provides the clearest and most comprehensive assessment to date of warming of the atmosphere, oceans and land. A landmark new report by hundreds of the world’s top climate scientists is a clarion call for immediate action to slash greenhouse gases in the face of unprecedented and accelerating climate change, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said today.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |