Explained: What UN's New Climate Change Report Means For India And Why It Is Worrying
The climate change report by UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said that the world may have lost the opportunity to keep global warming under 1.5 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels.
The report further said that the world is running out of time even to slow climate change.?However, it said that it may be possible to bring down global temperatures after crossing that threshold by the end of the century.
Its consequences in India
The observations that the IPCC report makes for the weather patterns and its consequences in Asia is of particular importance in the Indian context.The most important of these observations, are assessments made about Asian monsoons, which could be telling about the monsoon patterns in India - a country where the monsoon season is a source of life and livelihood.
Models also indicate a lengthening of the monsoon over India by the end of the 21st century, with the South Asian Monsoon precipitation projected to increase, said the Sixth Assessment Report of the IPCC, approved by 195 member countries.
"Experiments with constant forcing indicate that at 1.5 degrees and 2 degrees Celsius global warming levels, mean precipitation and monsoon extremes are projected to intensify in summer over India and South Asia," the report said.
"CMIP5 models project an increase in short intense active days and decrease in long active days, with no significant change in the number of break spells for India," the report said.
Why it is worrying
Rainfalls, floods and droughts will also increase. Droughts will occur more because soil will lose moisture. Due to an increase in temperature, there will be more water evaporation which will in turn decrease soil moisture and lead to droughts, R Krishnan, Executive Director, Centre for Climate Change Research (CCCR), IndianInstitute of Tropical Research and one of the co-authors of the report said.
"During the 21st century, snow-covered areas and snow volumes will decrease in most of the Hindu-Kush Himalayan and snowline elevations will rise and glacier volumes will decline", the report said with "high confidence".
"A general wetting across the whole Tibetan Plateau and the Himalaya is projected, with increases in heavy precipitation in the 21st century", it added.
"For India, the predictions in this report mean people labouring in longer and more frequent heat waves, warmer nights for our winter crops, erratic monsoon rains for our summer crops, destructive floods and storms that disrupt power supply for drinking water or medical oxygen production," said Ulka Kelkar, director, climate program, World Resources Institute India (WRI).? ? ?
The report states that there has been new evidence of the effect of local land use and land cover change on heavy precipitation.There is a growing set of literature linking increases in heavy precipitation in urban centres to urbanisation.
Urbanisation intensifies extreme precipitation, especially in the afternoon and early evening, over the urban area and its downwind region, the report said.India has been witnessing rapid urbanisation over the last few decades.
The Southwest Monsoon contributes to over 70 per cent of rainfall of the country and is a prime driver of the economy which is still largely dependent on agriculture.?Other climate experts spoke about India's precarious position now in the fight against climate change as emission-mitigation strategies and targets earlier provided by nations now seem inadequate.
