‘We’re all in big trouble’
Climate panel sees a dire future
EARTH IS in more hot water than ever before, and so are we, an expert United Nations climate panel warned in a grim, new report on Wednesday.
Sea levels are rising at an ever-faster rate as ice and snow shrink, and oceans are getting more acidic and losing oxygen, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a report issued as world leaders met at the United Nations.
It warned that if steps aren’t taken to reduce emissions and slow global warming, seas will rise three feet by the end of the century, with many fewer fish, less snow and ice, stronger and wetter hurricanes, and other nastier weather systems.
“The oceans and the icy parts of the world are in big trouble, and that means we’re all in big trouble, too,” said one of the report’s lead authors, Michael Oppenheimer, professor of geosciences and international affairs at Princeton University. “The changes are accelerating.” The dire effects will be felt on both land and sea, harming people, plants, animals, food, societies, infrastructure, and the global economy. In fact, the international team of scientists projected for the first time that some island nations would probably become uninhabitable.
The oceans absorb more than 90 per cent of the excess heat from carbon pollution in the air as well as much of the carbon dioxide itself. Earth’s snow and ice, called the cryosphere, are also being eroded.
“The world’s oceans and cryosphere have been taking the heat for climate change for decades. The consequences for nature and humanity are sweeping and severe,” said Ko Barrett, vice-chair of the IPCC and a deputy assistant administrator for research at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.