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Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Crucial Effects of Global Warming May Not Be Far From Our Shores

SINKING CITIES


It was reported in 2010 that 7 cities around the world were sinking due to rising sea levels.

7 cities threatened to sink

 The unfortunate cities listed were Bangkok, New York, Houston, Shanghai,
New Orleans, Venice and Mexico City.

In September, 2013, 20 cities were in the danger category of being lost to the waves.

20 cities to sink

The latest article on November 9, 2015 titled megacities hit hard by surging sea levels;

megacities to be hard hit

Reports indicate that even a rise in temperature of 2 degrees Celcius due to global warming, large areas of Shanghai, Mumbai and New york and other coastal cities will be submerged under the waves.A spike of 2 degrees Celcius in the Earth's temperature will submerge land currently inhabited by 280 million people.An increase of 4 degrees Celcius will cover areas occupied by more than 600 million people.
Sea level rises corresponding to these 2 C or 4 C scenarios could unfold in two hundred years, but would more likely happen over many centuries, perhaps as long as 2,000 years, according to the research, published by Climate Central.
A 195 nation UN Climate Summit in Paris, from November 30 to December 11, 2015 plans to cap the rise in Earth's temperatures to 2 C above pre-industrial levels is the core goal. 
Drastically reducing the output of greenhouse gases is the most effective way to slow global warming. 
It is still serious challenging to achieve the 2 degree goal.
The UN has warned that even if emissions reduction pledges -- many of them conditioned on financial aid -- submitted by 150 nations ahead of the Paris summit are fulfilled, it would still put the world towards a temperature increment of 3 degrees Celcius

In the new report, the country hit hardest by sea level rise under a 4 C scenario is China.
Today,  Chinese coastal cities where some 145 million people live would eventually be lost as the ocean swamp in when  temperatures soar.
Four of the 10 most devastated megacities would be Chinese: land occupied today by 44 million people in Shanghai, Tianjin, Hong Kong and Taizhou would be underwater.
India, Vietnam and Bangladesh do not fare much better. All told, Asia is home to 75 percent of the populations that today reside in zones that would no longer be classified as land in a climate-altered future.
Thirty-four million people in Japan, 25 million the United States, 20 million in the Philippines, 19 million in Egypt and 16 million in Brazil are also in future 4 C seascapes.
The sea level rise corresponding to 2 C would eventually be 4.7 metres, and for 4 C almost double that, the study found.
The projections are based on climate models taking into account the expansion of ocean water as it warms, the melting of glaciers, and the decay of both the Greenland and West Antarctic icesheets.
Normally a study of this nature would be published by a peer-reviewed journal, as was the earlier research on the US.
In this case, however, the new results should be taken into account ahead of the crucial climate summit in Paris.
AFP sent the study to four experts -- including Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, until this year Vice-President of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- for evaluation, and all of them described the work as "solid" and methodologically sound.
From the study, it was implied that the stakes at the Paris negotiations are extremely high as it could affect the global boundaries between land and sea.
We shall wait for the outcome of the UN Summit and hope the Governments of the member countries will have the political will to implement the resolutions to be agreed upon. Our continued existence on Earth may depend on it.












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