Rising temperatures could melt most Himalayan glaciers by 2100

Region could see 8-degree change

NEW DELHI — Rising temperatures in the Himalayas, home to most of the world’s tallest mountains, will melt at least one-third of the region’s glaciers by the end of the century even if the world’s most ambitious climate change targets are met, according to a report released Monday.

If those goals are not achieved, and global warming and greenhouse gas emissions continue at their current rates, the Himalayas could lose two-thirds of its glaciers by 2100, according to the report, the Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment.

Under those more dire circumstances, the Himalayas could heat up by 8 degrees Fahrenheit by century’s end, bringing radical disruptions to food and water supplies, and mass population displacement.

Glaciers in the Hindu Kush Himalayan Region, which spans over 2,000 miles of Asia, provide water resources to around a quarter of the world’s population.

“This is a climate crisis you have not heard of,” said Philippus Wester, a lead author of the report. “Impacts on people in the region, already one of the world’s most fragile and hazardprone mountain regions, will range from worsened air pollution to an increase in extreme weather events.”

One of the most complete studies on mountain warming, the assessment was put together over five years by 210 authors. The report includes input from more than 350 researchers and policymakers from 22 countries.

In October, a landmark report from the United Nations’ scientific panel on climate change found that if greenhouse gas emissions continued at the current rate, the atmosphere would warm by as much as 2.7 degrees above preindustrial levels by 2040. Avoiding further damage from this rise would require transforming the world economy at a speed and scale that has “no documented historic precedent,” the report said.