Climate Wire | Heat waves intensified to record levels in South Asia last month as a result of climate change.
India and Bangladesh are at least 30 times more likely to experience blight, new research says It is said that it was
The findings were reported Wednesday by World Weather Attribution, an international scientific consortium dedicated to linking climate change with extreme weather around the world.
The event lasted until late April and marked one of the most notable heatwaves in recent history to hit South Asia. Temperatures exceeded 105 degrees Fahrenheit in much of the region. Laos hit an all-time high of 110 degrees Fahrenheit, while Thailand reached an unprecedented 114 degrees Fahrenheit.
According to the heat index levels (a measure of temperature and humidity), the human-feeling temperature reached 129 degrees Fahrenheit in some parts of central Thailand.
Such levels are “extremely dangerous” for human health, said Chaya Vadhanapoorth, a scientist at Chiang Mai University in Thailand and one of the study authors.
Imputed studies combine observational data and climate models to investigate the impact of climate change on extreme weather. Models allow scientists to compare the real world with a hypothetical world where human-induced warming did not exist.
In India and Bangladesh, extreme heat last month was not uncommon. In today’s climate, such an event has about a 20% chance of occurring in any given year.
Still, the study found that climate change made the phenomenon about 30 times more likely to occur. Temperatures were also about 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than they would have been without the effects of global warming.
Extreme heat is much rarer in Thailand and Laos. The researchers found that the odds of this type of event occurring in any given year are only about 0.5 percent. It would have been virtually impossible in a world without climate change.
The heat has caused deaths and hospitalizations to skyrocket, closed schools in some areas and made it unsafe for outdoor workers such as farmers, construction workers and street vendors to carry out their daily tasks. South Asia is home to some of the world’s most vulnerable people to extreme heat, and the effects of heatwaves tend to be unevenly distributed across societies.
“Factors such as age, gender, socioeconomic status, caste and class in the region all come together to determine whether people have access to particular resources or not,” said Emmanuel Raju, director of the Copenhagen Center. It’s important to have a conversation about the deciding factors,” he said. He is a recipient of the University of Copenhagen Disaster Research Award and co-author of another study.
Many people in the region live in informal settlements, often with limited access to medical care and fans and other cooling devices. These people are among the most at risk of illness and death from extreme heat.
People who work outdoors also face serious health risks when extreme heat hits, he added. That means they may have to choose between protecting their health or losing their wages.
“It’s important to discuss who can adapt, who can cope, and who has the resources to do it,” Raju said.
As global temperatures continue to rise, researchers say it is important to extend the use of heat management plans across South Asia. Many places already have plans in place, including early warning systems and mechanisms to issue heat advisories.
But these systems are “disjointed,” said Anshu Ogla, a public policy expert at the Indian Institute of Technology and study co-author. Also, these systems are not always designed to reach the most vulnerable communities.
Heatwaves around the world will continue to get worse unless world leaders take sufficient action to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Temperatures around the world have already risen to dangerous levels, making it critical for communities to adapt to the heat to prevent future warming from worsening, researchers said.
“Adaptation is not an alternative,” says Raju. “We need to talk about both. We need to talk about mitigation and adaptation, which are central to these processes, to reduce the impacts we see in the world today.”
Reprinted from E&E News with permission of POLITICO, LLC. Copyright 2023. E&E News provides important news for energy and environmental professionals.
