Study reveals Earth to warm over 2 degrees by 2100
Study reveals Earth to warm over 2 degrees by 2100
TECH & SCI By Fan Yixin
2017-08-05
By the end of this century, world temperatures are likely to rise by more than 2 degrees Celsius, a study revealed on Monday.
The temperatures will increase before 2100 by 2 to 4.9 degrees Celsius with a 90% chance. Only 5% chance indicates warming could be at or below 2 degrees Celsius, one of the many targets Paris Agreement is tackling, the study published in Nature Climate Change shows.
Adrian Raftery, the lead author of the study and a professor at the University of Washington, said failing the target would have dramatic consequences on people's livelihoods.
"Countries need to change the economic incentives for producing carbon – for example by introducing a carbon tax – and encourage innovation that would improve energy efficiency."
Adrian Raftery, lead author of 'Less than 2 °Celsius warming by 2100 unlikely' via Reuters
That is putting 350 million people in 31 countries and regions in danger of deadly heat waves and other health hazard. Weather-related disasters, such as drought, heat wave and rising sea levels, are expected to cause 152,000 deaths annually in Europe between 2071 and 2100, jumping from 3,000 a year between 1981 and 2010, CNN reported.
The number of expected death is 50 times larger than at present, the study in the Lancet Planetary Health journal said. It added that heatwaves would lead to 99 percent of all weather-related deaths.
According to the UN Environment Program, 12 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions should be cut from the current 54 billion annually, mainly from fossil fuels burning, to keep the rise below 2 Celsius.
Ramping up efforts to improve carbon efficiency are key to limit future warming, Raftery told Reuters.
"Countries need to change the economic incentives for producing carbon – for example by introducing a carbon tax – and encourage innovation that would improve energy efficiency," he said. "We should be learning more from countries that are particularly carbon-efficient, like France, which has a very low-carbon transport infrastructure."
Another study published on Nature Climate Change in June suggested outperforming Paris Agreement would not stop half of the world's population being exposed to fatal heat waves.
"Even if we outperform the Paris targets, the population exposed to deadly heat will be about 50% by 2100."
Camilo Mora, lead author of 'Global risk of deadly heat'
"Many people around the world are already paying the ultimate price of heat waves, and while models suggest that this is likely to continue, it could be much worse if emissions are not considerably reduced,” said Camilo Mora, lead author of the study and a biogeography professer at University of Hawaii.
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