GLOBAL MELTDOWN

The catalogue of disasters that are happening right now

Across the planet, rising temperatures are taking their toll

CARBON DIOXIDE

New research has found that levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere - the main cause of global warming - are higher than at any time in the past 625,000 years. HOTTEST EVER

This year is expected to be the warmest ever recorded; 1998 was the hottest so far, but the past three years currently occupy the next three places.

DESERTIFICATION

The giant Kalahari desert, already four times the size of Britain, threatens to become larger still, covering farmland in Namibia, Botswana and South Africa.

EXPANDING OCEANS

The level of the world's seas and oceans is rising twice as fast as in the past, as their waters expand in rising temperatures and glaciers melt.

OCEAN EXILES

The people of the Carteret Islands, a scattering of atolls off Papua New Guinea in the South Pacific, have started to leave as their homes succumb to rising seas.

HURRICANES

Hurricane Epsilon - the 14th of the year - is forming in the Atlantic, even though the worst recorded hurricane season by far formally ended on Wednesday.

GLACIER MELT

Greenland glaciers have suddenly started racing towards the sea and melting. Much the same is beginning to happen to glaciers in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.

WATER SHORTAGE

Areas such as the western USA, which depend on mountain snows for their water supplies, are running short as less snow falls - and what does fall melts earlier.

DISAPPEARING SPECIES

Sealife and birdlife have declined catastrophically this year along America's north-west Pacific coast, after a similar meltdown in the North Sea.

CORAL REEFS

Corals on the Great Barrier Reef are bleaching out and dying as sea temperatures rise and scientists fear that the whole reef may perish by 2050.
Also in this section

There is a growing evidence that abrupt global climate change is a distinct possibility. Generally climate scientists believe that a global temperature change of +2C (2 degrees Celsius, or centigrade) will trigger abrupt climate change, with many severe ecological changes and damage on a global scale.

From a report by the International Climate Change Taskforce:

"Beyond the 2C level, the risks to human societies and ecosystems grow significantly."

"Above the 2C level, the risks of abrupt, accelerated or runaway climate change also increase. The possibilities include reaching climatic tipping points leading, for example, to the loss of the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets (which, between them, could raise sea levels more than 10m over the space of a few centuries. The circulation of water in the North Atlantic could also shut down, altering the Gulf Stream which warms north-west Europe."

From Ice Is Melting Everywhere by Danielle Murray:

"Arctic permafrost has warmed by up to 2 degrees Celsius in recent decades, with soils thawing to greater depths. By the end of this century, the southern permafrost boundary is projected to shift northward by several hundred kilometers, changing regional vegetation patterns."

"The Greenland ice sheet is the largest land ice mass in the Northern Hemisphere. It holds enough fresh water to raise the earth’s sea level by 7.2 meters (24 feet) if it were to melt completely, a result expected if the regional temperature rises 3 degrees Celsius.

Scientists project that concentrations of greenhouse gases will be high enough by 2100 to push temperatures past this threshold."

(This indicates that scientists say that by 2100 the glacial melt will be locked into place by the CO 2? and temperature increases; it would take decades to centuries for all the melting to then happen, but it would be 'locked into place' that humanity faces such a huge increase in sea levels.)

"The Amundsen Sea region in the West Antarctic has experienced some of the world’s greatest temperature change, with annual temperatures up 2.5 degrees Celsius over the past 60 years. The glaciers flowing into the sea from the Antarctic continent have been getting thinner for the past 15 years, and ice shelves in the region have decreased by more than 13,500 square kilometers since the 1970s.

Since the collapse of the Delaware-sized Larsen B Ice Shelf in 2002, satellites have shown a two to sixfold increase in the speed of glaciers flowing toward the former ice shelf. While most glaciers typically move a few centimeters to several hundred meters annually, these glaciers are currently moving as much as 1.5 kilometers each year.

"Glaciers in West Antarctica are discharging about 250 cubic kilometers of ice and water into the ocean per year, 60 percent more than is accumulated in their catchment areas - a net change sufficient to raise global sea levels by more than 0.2 millimeters per year."

"Such widespread glacial melting has local as well as global effects. Global sea level has risen 10–20 centimeters in the past century. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, up to 1 meter of sea level rise is projected by 2100, with half the rise attributed to melting ice and half to thermal expansion. As sea level rises, inundation and loss of coastal land will force millions of people to relocate."

14 April 2006:
The world's temperature is on course to rise by more than three degrees Centigrade despite efforts to combat global warming, Britain's chief scientist Stephan King has warned. See Stark warning over climate change

What will this mean to the earth if it becomes true?

Seas rise

2100, and the world's temperature has risen by 3C. The ice cap covering Greenland is in retreat, eventually adding 7 metres to sea levels, and the west Antarctic ice sheet starts melting. Arctic summer sea ice disappears, killing the polar bear. You can sail to the North Pole. Coastal urban populations in Africa and Asia are at risk.

Rainforest retreats

The Amazon breaks down as rainfall decreases, causing the forest to collapse into savannah. It deals a devastating blow to global biodiversity - the basin is home to millions of species of wildlife - and the earth's ability to recycle carbon emissions. The ocean and the soil become net carbon contributors, further speeding global warming.

Weather worsens

Climate increasingly volatile as warming adds energy to weather systems. Events of the past decade foreshadow floods (Bangladesh, India), drought (east Africa), hurricanes and cyclones (Mozambique, Nicaragua and Honduras), forest fires (the Mediterranean, Alaska and Russia) and insect plagues (Canada) that wrack the globe.

Drought spreads

Africa's Great Lakes shrivel; Malawi's wetlands dry up and acute water shortages threaten fishing and farming livelihoods (40 per cent of its GDP). Worldwide, 3bn people face severe "water stress", with possible water wars in Central Asia and Africa. Mass migration out of North Africa. By 2100, Peru faces drought as its glaciers melt.

Ecosystems collapse

A fifth of the world's surface has changed significantly, from melting Arctic tundra to vanishing cloud forest in Queensland, Australia (exterminating the native Golden Bowerbird, above). A 3.7C rise would kill or critically endanger 40 per cent of Africa's mammals. Up to 38 per cent of Europe's birds and 20 per cent of its plants are extinct or at risk.

Famine grows

Snow melts earlier in the year so water sources dry before crops finish growing in areas such as the Sierra Nevada and northern India, left. Up to 400 million people at risk of hunger as 400 million tons of cereal crops are lost, with Africa hit worst. Crop yields fall for the first time since the agricultural revolution in Europe, Russia and America.

Spread of diseases

55 Percentage of the world's population would be exposed to dengue fever - up from 30 per cent in 1990. Insect-borne diseases like dengue and malaria, which already claim 1.3m lives a year, would spread away from the equator towards the poles.

And more ....

3bn Population at risk of water shortages as rising temperatures dry surface water and reduce rainfall.

54 Percentage of mammals that will die in South Africa (worst-case scenario). Up to 40 per cent of the country's birds, 70 per cent of butterflies and 45 per cent of reptiles will also be extinct or critically endangered.

1/2 Nature reserves that will no longer be able to fulfil their conservation objectives, due to dying species or habitats.

-10c British temperature drop during wintertime, once global warming reaches the point where it disrupts Atlantic Ocean currents and switches off the Gulf Stream, which currently warms our island. The North Atlantic marine ecosystem could also collapse when half the plankton die. It is not known exactly what the "tipping point" temperature for this is, but 3C would be close.

[ ... ] (to be continued)

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Page last modified on April 17, 2006, at 10:32 PM