Many people around the world hear about global warming without fully understanding the implications and consequences. We are told that in certain areas, the temperature will rise by a certain amount within the next couple of years – but what does that look like?
Areas of Europe are predicted to face the most immense temperature changes. In the summer, it’s expected to become 3.5 degrees Celsius warmer and in the winter 4.7 degrees Celsius warmer.
This can be hard to put into perspective which is why a study at ETH, a university in Zurich, was conducted to compare the current temperature of one city with another which has the temperature of how the first city would be in the future.
The lead author of the study, Jean-Francois Bastin said that these comparisons “help people visualize the impact of climate change in their own city, within their lifetime”.
It is said that London will feel more like Barcelona, Madrid like Marrakesh, Seattle like San Fransisco and New York like Virginia Beach.
This has major consequences for the cities in tropical areas. It doesn’t increase the temperature as much in those places but the the wet and dry seasons will change significantly. It will lead to extreme floods during the wet seasons and extreme drought and water shortage in the dry season.
An example of a tropical place with extreme drought is Chennai, India which I spoke about in the previous blog post.
It is extremely difficult to find a solution for this as it is not something which can be saved over night. It requires the whole world to face up to this issue and be determined to do something about it. We need to reduce CO2 emissions; save energy, consume less, use greener transportation and invest in renewables.
If the world could collectively follow those guidelines to fight climate change then I believe we can make a difference in how our planet will look in the next generations to come.
References:
Yeung, J. (2019, July 11). By 2050, London’s climate will be as warm as
Barcelona’s, study says. Retrieved July 16, 2019, from
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/07/11/europe/climate-cities-report-intl-hnk/
index.html
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