The pace and scale of climate change may now be outstripping even the most sobering predictions of the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), according to the findings of a new report by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
"Climate
Change Science Compendium 2009" was compiled in association with
scientists around the world, and comes with less than 80 days to go to
the crucial UN climate convention meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark.
This analysis of the very latest, peer-reviewed science indicates that many predictions at the upper end of the IPCC’s forecasts are becoming ever more likely.
Meanwhile, the newly emerging science points to some events thought likely to occur in longer-term time horizons, as already happening or set to happen far sooner than had previously been thought.
For instance, researchers have become increasingly concerned about ocean acidification linked with the absorption of carbon dioxide in seawater and the impact on shellfish and coral reefs. Water that can corrode a shell-making substance called aragonite is already welling up along the California coast, decades earlier than existing models predict.
Losses from glaciers, ice-sheets and the Polar Regions appear to be happening faster than anticipated, with the Greenland ice sheet, for example, recently seeing melting some 60% higher than the previous record of 1998.
Some scientists are now warning that sea levels could rise by up to two meters by 2100 and five to ten times that over following centuries.
There is also growing concern among some scientists that thresholds or tipping points may now be reached in a matter of years or a few decades including dramatic changes to the Indian sub-continent’s monsoon, the Sahara and West Africa monsoons, and climate systems affecting a critical ecosystem like the Amazon rainforest.
The report also underlines concern by scientists that the planet is now committed to some damaging and irreversible impacts as a result of the greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere. These include losses of tropical and temperate mountain glaciers affecting perhaps 20% to 25% of the human population in terms of drinking water, irrigation and hydro-power. Also, shifts in the hydrological cycle could result in the disappearance of regional climates and the spread of drylands northwards and southwards away from the equator.
Recent science suggests that it may still be possible to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. However, this will only happen if there is immediate, cohesive and decisive action to both cut emissions and assist vulnerable countries adapt.
"This Climate Change Science Compendium is a wake-up call. The time for hesitation is over," the United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon wrote, in a foreword to the document. "We need the world to realize, once and for all, that the time to act is now and we must work together to address this monumental challenge. This is the moral challenge of our generation."
The Compendium reviews some 400 major scientific contributions on Earth Systems and climate change that have been released through peer-reviewed literature, or from research institutions, over the last three years.
"The Compendium can never replace the painstaking rigour of an IPCC process," Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director, said." However, scientific knowledge on climate change and forecasting of the likely impacts has been advancing rapidly since the landmark 2007 IPCC report."
"Many governments have asked to be kept abreast of the latest findings. I am sure that this report fulfils that request and will inform ministers’ decisions when they meet in the Danish capital in only a few weeks time," Steiner said.
The research findings and observations in the Compendium are divided into five categories: Earth Systems, Ice, Oceans, Ecosystems and Management.
The full report can be downloaded at the link below.
Loading...