Page 53 - Climate Change

Italy's deadly floods example of climate change's all-or-nothing extremes

The floods that sent rivers of mud tearing through towns in Italy's northeast are another drenching dose of climate change's all-or-nothing weather extremes, something that has been happening around the globe, scientists say. The coastal region of Emilia-Romagna was struck twice, first by heavy rain two weeks ago on drought-parched ground that could not absorb it, causing rivers to overflow overnight, followed by this week's deluge that killed 14 and caused damages estimated in the billions of euros. In a changing climate, more rain is coming, but it's falling on fewer days in less useful and more dangerous downpours. The hard-hit Emilia-Romagna region was particularly vulnerable. Its location between the Apennine mountains and the Adriatic Sea trapped the weather system this week that dumped half the average annual amount of rain in 36 hours. "These are events that developed with persistence and are classified as rare,' Fabrizio Curcio, the head of Italy's Civil Protection Agency,

'More likely than not': Rise in world temp to breach 1.50C by 2027

Weather phenomenon, while distinct from climate change, is likely to boost extremes and bring warmer weather to North America and drought to South America, with the Amazon at greater risk of fires

One-fifth of Indians likely to be exposed to below-normal monsoon: SASCOF

There is a 52 per cent probability of below-normal precipitation in the north and a 40 per cent probability of below-normal rainfall in the central parts of the country

April heatwaves were '30 times more likely' due of climate change: Experts

Human-caused climate change made April's record-breaking humid heatwave in India, Bangladesh, Laos, and Thailand at least 30 times more likely

UN forecasts 2 in 3 chance of briefly hitting key heat limit soon

There's a two-out-of-three chance within the next five years that the world will temporarily reach the internationally accepted global temperature threshold for limiting the worst effects of climate change, a new World Meteorological Organisation report forecasts. It likely would only be a fleeting and less worrisome flirtation with the agreed-upon climate danger point, the United Nations weather agency said on Wednesday. That's because scientists expect a temporary burst of heat from an El Nino will supercharge human-caused warming from the burning of coal, oil and gas to new heights and then slip back down a bit. The 2015 Paris climate agreement set 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) as a global guardrail in atmospheric warming, with countries pledging to try to prevent that much long-term warming if possible. Scientists in a special 2018 United Nations report said going past that point would be drastically and dangerously different with more death, destruction and damag

Countries need to integrate climate change in regional, global plans

Women and children are vulnerable to the effects of climate change in terms of their health and wellbeing, a top WHO official said, stressing the need for a united approach by countries in promoting the integration of health and climate change in their regional and global plans to consider their needs. Citing an example, Dr Anshu Banerjee, Director Department of Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and Ageing at the World Health Organisation, Geneva, said pregnancy represents a moment of heightened vulnerability to climate hazards. This is due to the various physiological changes that take place in pregnancy and that make this population particularly sensitive to heat stress, Dr Banerjee, who was here last week to attend the 'International Maternal Newborn Health Conference' (IMNHC 2023), said. "The same is for newborns: their immature immune systems and their reduced ability to regulate their own temperature puts them at greater risk when climate extremes occur- not to ..

Billion new ACs will save lives from soaring temps but will cook the planet

But expanding AC coverage too quickly also threatens to worsen the crisis it's responding to. Most units use a refrigerant that's far more damaging than carbon dioxide

Big money rushes into carbon capture and storage. Can it deliver this time?

But after decades of failing to reach the scale needed to make a real difference, the people responsible for approving generous subsidies and directing billions in investment want proof

European Union adopts law banning products which fuel deforestation

The 27 European Union countries have formally adopted new rules that should help the bloc reduce its contribution to global deforestation by regulating the trade in a series of goods. Under the legislation, companies trading palm oil, cattle, wood, coffee, cocoa, rubber and soy will need to verify that the goods they sell in the EU have not led to deforestation and forest degradation anywhere in the world since 2021. The regulation also covers derived products such as chocolate or printed paper. Forests are an important natural means of removing greenhouse gas emissions from the atmosphere, since plants absorb carbon dioxide when they grow. According to the World Resource Institute, a forest area the size of 10 soccer pitches disappears in the world every minute and the EU says that without the new regulation it could be responsible for the loss of 248,000 hectares of deforestation per year a surface almost as large as member country Luxembourg. The law will force companies to sh

Rich countries not doing enough to control climate change: Pacific island

Pacific Island leaders are criticising rich countries for not doing enough to control climate change despite being responsible for much of the problem, and for profiting from loans provided to vulnerable nations to mitigate the effects. Leaders and representatives from Pacific Island nations demanded at a UN climate change conference on Monday in Bangkok that the world make more effort to put aside differences in combating the environmental impact, especially as their countries emerge from the economic devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic. Prime Minister Mark Brown of the Cook Islands said the finance model for combatting climate change giving out loans to reduce the impact is not the way to go for countries in his region with such small populations that produce inconsequential amounts of carbon emissions but suffer the most from the effects. He encouraged a shift toward grants or interest-free loans to help ease the financial burden on poorer countries. All we're doing is adding

Energy transition in EU for 2030 climate target is irreversible: Report

The findings show that European laws will set in stone major transformations of the European economy by 2030: Wind and solar power will be the main sources of electricity, accounting for 55%

Govt launches 'Meri LiFE' app to encourage young to battle climate change

The government on Monday launched "Meri LiFE" (My Life) mobile application to empower young people and encourage their participation in tackling climate change. The app, inspired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Mission LiFE, aims to promote mindful utilisation instead of wasteful consumption. LiFE stands for lifestyle for environment. Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav said the application will foster a nationwide movement for LiFE, demonstrating the power of citizens in saving the environment. The Union environment ministry serves as the coordinating authority for implementing Mission LiFE at the national level. It has been mobilising various stakeholders, including central ministries, state governments, institutions, and private organisations, to align their activities with LiFE and raise awareness about sustainable practices. A month-long mass mobilisation drive is being conducted to further promote LiFE and enhance nationwide advocacy. It will culminate in a grand

RBI, green finance and the blue planet: How are banks placed in all this?

The central bank's report seeks to nudge banks and financial institutions to catalyse risk mitigation from climate change

Volkswagen's annual meeting hit by protests over climate strategy, China

While weathering criticism over its China presence, VW is dealing with the pressing task of stemming a slide in market share in its biggest market

New AI model by IBM-NASA designed to help track Earth's climate change

"The model could speed up geospatial analysis by three to four times, and can help reduce the amount of data cleaning and labelling required in training a traditional deep-learning model"

Study provides more evidence of climate change being human-caused: PNAS

A new research has provided evidence of climate change being human-caused and showed that specific signals from human activities have altered the temperature structure of Earth's atmosphere. Scientists have long recognised differences between tropospheric and lower stratospheric temperature trends as a "fingerprint" of human effects on climate. This fingerprint, however, neglected information from the mid to upper stratosphere, 25 to 50 kilometres above the Earth's surface, the inclusion of which improves the detectability of a human fingerprint by a factor of five, the scientists involved in the study said. "Enhanced detectability occurs because the mid to upper stratosphere has a large cooling signal from human-caused CO2 increases, small noise levels of natural internal variability, and differing signal and noise patterns," the study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) said. Noise in the troposphere can include day-to-day weather, interannual ...

Global climate diplomacy: World is focusing on wrong climate scoreboard

Under the Paris Agreement, every country committed to making changes that will help keep global average temperature rise well below 2C and ideally below 1.5C

Three Adani Group firms lose endorsement of UN-backed climate group

Adani Green, Adani Transmission Ltd. and Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone Ltd. were removed in late April

AI's threat to world may be 'more urgent' than climate change: Pioneer

He added: "With climate change, it's very easy to recommend what you should do. If you do that, eventually things will be okay. For this it's not at all clear what you should do"

82% of Indians either alarmed or concerned about global warming, says study

About 82 per cent of Indians are either alarmed or concerned about global warming and are in support of bringing in energy policies to reduce its effects, reveals a new study. The study report, Global Warming's Four Indias, 2022: An Audience Segmentation Analysis, prepared by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication and CVoter International, identified four types of audiences within the Indian public who were classified as 'The Alarmed', consisting of 54 per cent, 'The Concerned', 20 per cent, 'The Cautious', 11 per cent, and 'The Disengaged', consisting of just 7 per cent. The study has found that the majority of the people belonging to three segments backed the formulation of policies to fight climate change and opined that the Indian government should be doing more to address global warming. They also backed the development of a national programme to teach Indians about global warming, train people on renewable energy jobs, encourage local communities to build check dams