essay on global warming and its consequences

• ENVIRONMENT

How global warming is disrupting life on Earth

The signs of global warming are everywhere, and are more complex than just climbing temperatures.

Our planet is getting hotter. Since the Industrial Revolution—an event that spurred the use of fossil fuels in everything from power plants to transportation—Earth has warmed by 1 degree Celsius, about 2 degrees Fahrenheit.  

That may sound insignificant, but 2023 was the hottest year on record , and all 10 of the hottest years on record have occurred in the past decade.  

Global warming and climate change are often used interchangeably as synonyms, but scientists prefer to use “climate change” when describing the complex shifts now affecting our planet’s weather and climate systems.  

Climate change encompasses not only rising average temperatures but also natural disasters, shifting wildlife habitats, rising seas , and a range of other impacts. All of these changes are emerging as humans continue to add heat-trapping greenhouse gases , like carbon dioxide and methane, to the atmosphere.

What causes global warming?

When fossil fuel emissions are pumped into the atmosphere, they change the chemistry of our atmosphere, allowing sunlight to reach the Earth but preventing heat from being released into space. This keeps Earth warm, like a greenhouse, and this warming is known as the greenhouse effect .  

Carbon dioxide is the most commonly found greenhouse gas and about 75 percent of all the climate warming pollution in the atmosphere. This gas is a product of producing and burning oil, gas, and coal. About a quarter of Carbon dioxide also results from land cleared for timber or agriculture.  

Methane is another common greenhouse gas. Although it makes up only about 16 percent of emissions, it's roughly 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide and dissipates more quickly. That means methane can cause a large spark in warming, but ending methane pollution can also quickly limit the amount of atmospheric warming. Sources of this gas include agriculture (mostly livestock), leaks from oil and gas production, and waste from landfills.  

What are the effects of global warming?  

One of the most concerning impacts of global warming is the effect warmer temperatures will have on Earth's polar regions and mountain glaciers. The Arctic is warming four times faster than the rest of the planet. This warming reduces critical ice habitat and it disrupts the flow of the jet stream, creating more unpredictable weather patterns around the globe.  

( Learn more about the jet stream. )

A warmer planet doesn't just raise temperatures. Precipitation is becoming more extreme as the planet heats. For every degree your thermometer rises, the air holds about seven percent more moisture. This increase in moisture in the atmosphere can produce flash floods, more destructive hurricanes, and even paradoxically, stronger snow storms.  

The world's leading scientists regularly gather to review the latest research on how the planet is changing. The results of this review is synthesized in regularly published reports known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.  

A recent report outlines how disruptive a global rise in temperature can be:

• Coral reefs are now a highly endangered ecosystem. When corals face environmental stress, such as high heat, they expel their colorful algae and turn a ghostly white, an effect known as coral bleaching . In this weakened state, they more easily die.  
• Trees are increasingly dying from drought , and this mass mortality is reshaping forest ecosystems.
• Rising temperatures and changing precipitation patterns are making wildfires more common and more widespread. Research shows they're even moving into the eastern U.S. where fires have historically been less common.
• Hurricanes are growing more destructive and dumping more rain, an effect that will result in more damage. Some scientists say we even need to be preparing for Cat 6 storms . (The current ranking system ends at Cat 5.)

How can we limit global warming?  

Limiting the rising in global warming is theoretically achievable, but politically, socially, and economically difficult.  

Those same sources of greenhouse gas emissions must be limited to reduce warming. For example, oil and gas used to generate electricity or power industrial manufacturing will need to be replaced by net zero emission technology like wind and solar power. Transportation, another major source of emissions, will need to integrate more electric vehicles, public transportation, and innovative urban design, such as safe bike lanes and walkable cities.  

( Learn more about solutions to limit global warming. )

One global warming solution that was once considered far fetched is now being taken more seriously: geoengineering. This type of technology relies on manipulating the Earth's atmosphere to physically block the warming rays of the sun or by sucking carbon dioxide straight out of the sky.

Restoring nature may also help limit warming. Trees, oceans, wetlands, and other ecosystems help absorb excess carbon—but when they're lost, so too is their potential to fight climate change.  

Ultimately, we'll need to adapt to warming temperatures, building homes to withstand sea level rise for example, or more efficiently cooling homes during heat waves.  

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• CLIMATE CHANGE
• ENVIRONMENT AND CONSERVATION
• POLAR REGIONS

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Fossil fuels – coal, oil and gas – are by far the largest contributor to global climate change, accounting for over 75 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions. As greenhouse gas emissions blanket the Earth, they trap the sun’s heat. This leads to global warming and climate change. The world is now warming faster than at any point in recorded history. Warmer temperatures over time are changing weather patterns and disrupting the usual balance of nature. This poses many risks to human beings and all other forms of life on Earth. 

Sacred plant helps forge a climate-friendly future in Paraguay

El Niño and climate crisis raise drought fears in Madagascar

The El Niño climate pattern, a naturally occurring phenomenon, can significantly disrupt global weather systems, but the human-made climate emergency is exacerbating the destructive effects.

“Verified for Climate” champions: Communicating science and solutions

Gustavo Figueirôa, biologist and communications director at SOS Pantanal, and Habiba Abdulrahman, eco-fashion educator, introduce themselves as champions for “Verified for Climate,” a joint initiative of the United Nations and Purpose to stand up to climate disinformation and put an end to the narratives of denialism, doomism, and delay.

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ENCYCLOPEDIC ENTRY

Climate change.

Climate change is a long-term shift in global or regional climate patterns. Often climate change refers specifically to the rise in global temperatures from the mid-20th century to present.

Earth Science, Climatology

Fracking tower

Fracking is a controversial form of drilling that uses high-pressure liquid to create cracks in underground shale to extract natural gas and petroleum. Carbon emissions from fossils fuels like these have been linked to global warming and climate change.

Photograph by Mark Thiessen / National Geographic

Climate is sometimes mistaken for weather. But climate is different from weather because it is measured over a long period of time, whereas weather can change from day to day, or from year to year. The climate of an area includes seasonal temperature and rainfall averages, and wind patterns. Different places have different climates. A desert, for example, is referred to as an arid climate because little water falls, as rain or snow, during the year. Other types of climate include tropical climates, which are hot and humid , and temperate climates, which have warm summers and cooler winters.

Climate change is the long-term alteration of temperature and typical weather patterns in a place. Climate change could refer to a particular location or the planet as a whole. Climate change may cause weather patterns to be less predictable. These unexpected weather patterns can make it difficult to maintain and grow crops in regions that rely on farming because expected temperature and rainfall levels can no longer be relied on. Climate change has also been connected with other damaging weather events such as more frequent and more intense hurricanes, floods, downpours, and winter storms.

In polar regions, the warming global temperatures associated with climate change have meant ice sheets and glaciers are melting at an accelerated rate from season to season. This contributes to sea levels rising in different regions of the planet. Together with expanding ocean waters due to rising temperatures, the resulting rise in sea level has begun to damage coastlines as a result of increased flooding and erosion.

The cause of current climate change is largely human activity, like burning fossil fuels , like natural gas, oil, and coal. Burning these materials releases what are called greenhouse gases into Earth’s atmosphere . There, these gases trap heat from the sun’s rays inside the atmosphere causing Earth’s average temperature to rise. This rise in the planet's temperature is called global warming. The warming of the planet impacts local and regional climates. Throughout Earth's history, climate has continually changed. When occuring naturally, this is a slow process that has taken place over hundreds and thousands of years. The human influenced climate change that is happening now is occuring at a much faster rate.

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The Effects of Climate Change

The effects of human-caused global warming are happening now, are irreversible for people alive today, and will worsen as long as humans add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.

• We already see effects scientists predicted, such as the loss of sea ice, melting glaciers and ice sheets, sea level rise, and more intense heat waves.
• Scientists predict global temperature increases from human-made greenhouse gases will continue. Severe weather damage will also increase and intensify.

Earth Will Continue to Warm and the Effects Will Be Profound

Global climate change is not a future problem. Changes to Earth’s climate driven by increased human emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases are already having widespread effects on the environment: glaciers and ice sheets are shrinking, river and lake ice is breaking up earlier, plant and animal geographic ranges are shifting, and plants and trees are blooming sooner.

Effects that scientists had long predicted would result from global climate change are now occurring, such as sea ice loss, accelerated sea level rise, and longer, more intense heat waves.

The magnitude and rate of climate change and associated risks depend strongly on near-term mitigation and adaptation actions, and projected adverse impacts and related losses and damages escalate with every increment of global warming.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Some changes (such as droughts, wildfires, and extreme rainfall) are happening faster than scientists previously assessed. In fact, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) — the United Nations body established to assess the science related to climate change — modern humans have never before seen the observed changes in our global climate, and some of these changes are irreversible over the next hundreds to thousands of years.

Scientists have high confidence that global temperatures will continue to rise for many decades, mainly due to greenhouse gases produced by human activities.

The IPCC’s Sixth Assessment report, published in 2021, found that human emissions of heat-trapping gases have already warmed the climate by nearly 2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.1 degrees Celsius) since 1850-1900. 1 The global average temperature is expected to reach or exceed 1.5 degrees C (about 3 degrees F) within the next few decades. These changes will affect all regions of Earth.

The severity of effects caused by climate change will depend on the path of future human activities. More greenhouse gas emissions will lead to more climate extremes and widespread damaging effects across our planet. However, those future effects depend on the total amount of carbon dioxide we emit. So, if we can reduce emissions, we may avoid some of the worst effects.

The scientific evidence is unequivocal: climate change is a threat to human wellbeing and the health of the planet. Any further delay in concerted global action will miss the brief, rapidly closing window to secure a liveable future.

Here are some of the expected effects of global climate change on the United States, according to the Third and Fourth National Climate Assessment Reports:

Future effects of global climate change in the United States:

U.S. Sea Level Likely to Rise 1 to 6.6 Feet by 2100

Global sea level has risen about 8 inches (0.2 meters) since reliable record-keeping began in 1880. By 2100, scientists project that it will rise at least another foot (0.3 meters), but possibly as high as 6.6 feet (2 meters) in a high-emissions scenario. Sea level is rising because of added water from melting land ice and the expansion of seawater as it warms. Image credit: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0

Climate Changes Will Continue Through This Century and Beyond

Global climate is projected to continue warming over this century and beyond. Image credit: Khagani Hasanov, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0

Hurricanes Will Become Stronger and More Intense

Scientists project that hurricane-associated storm intensity and rainfall rates will increase as the climate continues to warm. Image credit: NASA

More Droughts and Heat Waves

Droughts in the Southwest and heat waves (periods of abnormally hot weather lasting days to weeks) are projected to become more intense, and cold waves less intense and less frequent. Image credit: NOAA

Longer Wildfire Season

Warming temperatures have extended and intensified wildfire season in the West, where long-term drought in the region has heightened the risk of fires. Scientists estimate that human-caused climate change has already doubled the area of forest burned in recent decades. By around 2050, the amount of land consumed by wildfires in Western states is projected to further increase by two to six times. Even in traditionally rainy regions like the Southeast, wildfires are projected to increase by about 30%.

Changes in Precipitation Patterns

Climate change is having an uneven effect on precipitation (rain and snow) in the United States, with some locations experiencing increased precipitation and flooding, while others suffer from drought. On average, more winter and spring precipitation is projected for the northern United States, and less for the Southwest, over this century. Image credit: Marvin Nauman/FEMA

Frost-Free Season (and Growing Season) will Lengthen

The length of the frost-free season, and the corresponding growing season, has been increasing since the 1980s, with the largest increases occurring in the western United States. Across the United States, the growing season is projected to continue to lengthen, which will affect ecosystems and agriculture.

Global Temperatures Will Continue to Rise

Summer of 2023 was Earth's hottest summer on record, 0.41 degrees Fahrenheit (F) (0.23 degrees Celsius (C)) warmer than any other summer in NASA’s record and 2.1 degrees F (1.2 C) warmer than the average summer between 1951 and 1980. Image credit: NASA

Arctic Is Very Likely to Become Ice-Free

Sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean is expected to continue decreasing, and the Arctic Ocean will very likely become essentially ice-free in late summer if current projections hold. This change is expected to occur before mid-century.

U.S. Regional Effects

Climate change is bringing different types of challenges to each region of the country. Some of the current and future impacts are summarized below. These findings are from the Third 3 and Fourth 4 National Climate Assessment Reports, released by the U.S. Global Change Research Program .

• Northeast. Heat waves, heavy downpours, and sea level rise pose increasing challenges to many aspects of life in the Northeast. Infrastructure, agriculture, fisheries, and ecosystems will be increasingly compromised. Farmers can explore new crop options, but these adaptations are not cost- or risk-free. Moreover, adaptive capacity , which varies throughout the region, could be overwhelmed by a changing climate. Many states and cities are beginning to incorporate climate change into their planning.
• Northwest. Changes in the timing of peak flows in rivers and streams are reducing water supplies and worsening competing demands for water. Sea level rise, erosion, flooding, risks to infrastructure, and increasing ocean acidity pose major threats. Increasing wildfire incidence and severity, heat waves, insect outbreaks, and tree diseases are causing widespread forest die-off.
• Southeast. Sea level rise poses widespread and continuing threats to the region’s economy and environment. Extreme heat will affect health, energy, agriculture, and more. Decreased water availability will have economic and environmental impacts.
• Midwest. Extreme heat, heavy downpours, and flooding will affect infrastructure, health, agriculture, forestry, transportation, air and water quality, and more. Climate change will also worsen a range of risks to the Great Lakes.
• Southwest. Climate change has caused increased heat, drought, and insect outbreaks. In turn, these changes have made wildfires more numerous and severe. The warming climate has also caused a decline in water supplies, reduced agricultural yields, and triggered heat-related health impacts in cities. In coastal areas, flooding and erosion are additional concerns.

1. IPCC 2021, Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis , the Working Group I contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

2. IPCC, 2013: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Stocker, T.F., D. Qin, G.-K. Plattner, M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Boschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xia, V. Bex and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA.

3. USGCRP 2014, Third Climate Assessment .

4. USGCRP 2017, Fourth Climate Assessment .

Related Resources

A Degree of Difference

So, the Earth's average temperature has increased about 2 degrees Fahrenheit during the 20th century. What's the big deal?

What’s the difference between climate change and global warming?

“Global warming” refers to the long-term warming of the planet. “Climate change” encompasses global warming, but refers to the broader range of changes that are happening to our planet, including rising sea levels; shrinking mountain glaciers; accelerating ice melt in Greenland, Antarctica and the Arctic; and shifts in flower/plant blooming times.

Is it too late to prevent climate change?

Humans have caused major climate changes to happen already, and we have set in motion more changes still. However, if we stopped emitting greenhouse gases today, the rise in global temperatures would begin to flatten within a few years. Temperatures would then plateau but remain well-elevated for many, many centuries.

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Global Warming: Causes And Consequences

The familiar photo of the Earth spinning in the blackness of space that was taken 50 years ago by William Anders, an astronaut on the Apollo 8 lunar mission, starkly illustrated our isolation on this planet. Now we face a crisis as the climate and environmental conditions that support life as we know it become ever more fragile owing to CO 2 -induced global warming. The evidence suggests there is significant risk that areas of the Earth in tropical zones may become uninhabitable and that significant food chains will collapse in this century. 

Spaceship Earth

The familiar photo of the Earth spinning in the blackness of space that was taken 50 years ago by William Anders, an astronaut on the Apollo 8 lunar mission, starkly illustrated our isolation on this planet. Now we face a crisis as the climate and environmental conditions that support life as we know it become ever more fragile owing to CO 2 -induced global warming. The evidence suggests there is significant risk that areas of the Earth in tropical zones may become uninhabitable and that significant food chains will collapse in this century. We agree with those who say that the highest human priority now is to greatly reduce human societies’ reliance on CO 2 -producing oil and coal. However, even the most optimistic projections of reduced CO 2 production and resulting reductions in climatic warming suggest that future generations will face daunting problems. Fortunately, this growing disruption is occurring at a time of unprecedented breakthroughs in science and technology. Although there are many things that can be done to ameliorate individual events, the worldwide effort is uncoordinated and there is widespread resistance from vested economic and political interest groups. Here, we first survey the consequences of the rapid rise in CO 2 emissions and then consider the possibility that new genetic technologies can help mitigate some of the biological consequences of global changes in climate patterns.

Life on Earth has evolved in an interconnected ecology determined by weather patterns, movements of global tectonic plates, and the dynamic surface chemistry of oceans and land. The creatures on Earth—all the humans, animals, plants, bacteria, fungi, and viruses—are dependent on each another as well as on this enveloping ecosystem. Since the Earth is an integrated system, significant changes in any internal component or in external influences induce movement toward a new equilibrium. Throughout the history of the Earth there have been long periods of cooling leading to growth of massive continental ice sheets, interspersed with warm intervals. While the causes of these ice ages are not fully understood, the principal contributing factors have been identified. The composition of the atmosphere, particularly the concentration of carbon dioxide and methane, is important. Also changes in the Earth’s orbit around the sun, changes in the tilt in the Earth’s axis, impacts of large meteorites, and eruptions of super volcanoes. The latter two phenomena can both put massive amounts of particulate matter and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

In two instances, biological phenomena have disrupted the composition of the atmosphere with global consequences. One was the Great Oxidation Event or the Oxidation Catastrophe, around 2.45 billion years ago. This occurred after a bacterial species, an ancestor of contemporary cyanobacteria, evolved the ability to produce oxygen as a byproduct of photosynthesis. This event had extraordinary consequences for ocean chemistry and eventually for the slow accumulation of atmospheric oxygen to contemporary levels over an interval of several million years. The newly oxygenated atmosphere was toxic to virtually all the anaerobic organisms that then populated the earth. These organisms died and were replaced by creatures that could thrive in the new oxygenated atmosphere. 1 Now, the current human-induced increase in atmospheric CO 2 is the second biological disruption of atmospheric composition that is producing global warming with credible predictions of ever more dire consequences in coming decades. Consequences we are already seeing include:

Accelerating rise in global sea level owing to irreversible melting of glacial ice in the European Alps, melting of arctic ice, and of greatest concern, melting of the land ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica.

Large changes in climate patterns that have led to cataclysmic wild fires encouraged by the hottest summers on record and extreme floods stemming from new and disruptive storm patterns.

Acidification and warming of the oceans leading to decimation of coral reefs and other changes that are disrupting the marine food chain.

The global redistribution of bacterial, fungal, and viral pathogens and their vectors out of the tropics and into temperate zones and the emergence of previously unknown pathogens.

As the Earth’s climate continues to warm owing to increasing levels of atmospheric CO 2 the mean sea level will rise. 2 The mean sea level has risen about 8 inches since the late 1800s, and projections suggest an accelerating rise of between 2 and 6 feet by 2100. 3 The predominant contributor to the future sea level increase will be melting of the enormous land-based ice sheets and glaciers on Antarctica and Greenland. The amount of the rise will be strongly dependent on mankind’s success in limiting future CO 2 emissions. However, even the lowest estimates portend devastating consequences: 4 loss of arable land owing to flooding and salt water intrusion (e.g., Vietnam, Bangladesh, California’s Salinas valley 5 ); major population displacements (100 million people will be displaced by a three-foot rise); many coastal areas may have to be abandoned (e.g., South Florida and Miami 6 ).

We are already experiencing changes in global weather patterns. Regions accustomed to temperate temperatures and predictable periods of rainfall are seeing prolonged drought and periods of extreme high temperature, while other regions are experiencing excess rain and snowfall along with lower ambient temperatures. In parts of Australia, drought and peak summer temperatures nearing 116 o F are causing vast wildfires. Simultaneously, U.S. states around the Great Lakes have experienced winter temperatures of -34 o C (-29.2 o F) that are significantly colder than temperatures in the Arctic. This skewing of ambient temperatures in North America is due to changes in the jet stream that have allowed polar air from the Arctic to flow into zones normally buffered against temperature extremes. Global warming contributes to these unusual weather patterns through its influence on the polar vortex, a wide expanse of swirling cold air near the pole. 7 Over a surprisingly short time, the average temperature rise at the north polar region has been higher than in some more southerly areas. While average temperatures across the globe have now increased to 1.2 o C above preindustrial revolution levels, the poles have seen an average increase of 3 o C. During March 2018, temperatures in Siberia were 15 o C (59 o F) above historical averages, and Greenland experienced a period of 61 hours above freezing (three times longer than any previous year), while temperatures were unusually low in Europe. These disruptions in global weather patterns have caused long-term drought conditions in some regions and unprecedented floods in others, leading to loss of arable land and precipitous reductions in agricultural production. Those who deny climate change often point to periods of extreme cold in unexpected regions as evidence supporting their views, without understanding that the large-scale changes in weather patterns are a central consequence of global warming. When the oceans warm, global weather patterns are disrupted in many areas in unexpected ways.

It is important to recognize that these global events are interconnected. For example, consider the consequences of sustained rainfall on degraded farmland: Increased rainfall leads to soil erosion, that in turn results in the release of phosphorous from fertilized soil into rivers and the oceans. That release, in turn can stimulate algal blooms and red tides, further reducing the ocean oxygen levels that are already lowered by warming waters. These phenomena add to the impacts of warming and acidification on food chains in the ocean.

What will be the impact of global warming on our land-based food supply and our ability to maintain the animals and plants we depend on? Warming is already slowing yield gains in most wheat-growing locations, and global wheat production is expected to fall by 6% for each 1°C of further temperature increase while becoming more variable. 8 Global production of corn is similarly at risk. 9 Global warming will alter world food production patterns, with crop productivity reduced in low latitudes and tropical regions but increased somewhat in high latitude regions. This will lead to trade changes with expanded sales of food products from the mid-to-high latitudes to lower latitude regions. 10

Extinction of species owing to expanding human activities around the globe has been accelerating over the last two centuries. Now the onset of changes in the climate is accelerating the rate of extinctions. Disruptions of habitats, loss of food sources, and the spread of infectious diseases are happening at a rate that cannot be accommodated by evolutionary adaptation. The number of species that have gone extinct in the last century alone would have taken between 800 and 1000 years to disappear in previous mass extinctions. 11 During one of these extinctions, the Permian-Triassic extinction 250 million years ago, 12,13 the earth lost 96% of all marine species, 100% of the coral reefs, and 70% of terrestrial vertebrates. In that event, the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere led to ocean warming and to ocean acidification that together played a key role in the global loss of life. Recovery from that extinction event took more than 10 million years.

Currently, we are experiencing a 6 th mass extinction, 11 and we are approaching up to 100x higher rates of extinction than the background rate. There are two critical differences now. First, the current rate of change to the earth’s ecosystem is occurring in a few decades rather than over thousands of years as in the previous five extinction periods. Second, the events underlying the current cataclysm are man-made. Metaphorically, we are riding a runaway climate train with no one at the controls.

Effects on the Oceans

In the past there have been few established populations of invasive species identified in the high northern latitudes, that is, the northern coasts of Canada or Russia. With the continuing loss of Arctic sea ice, this situation will change. There has been rapid growth of shipping traffic along the northern coast of Russia in recent years, a large cruise ship went through the Northwest Passage in 2016, and now multiple arctic cruises are advertised each year. We can expect continuing expansion in arctic shipping activities, mineral/energy exploration, fishing, and tourism in future years. These new northern transport routes offer shorter and less expensive connections between northern hemisphere ports, so the shipping traffic will inevitably grow as more ice melts and warmer weather seasons get longer. Introduction of invasive species into these Arctic regions will follow rapidly. This will bring new challenges to the native inhabitants—humans, wildlife, and plants—of these northern ocean and terrestrial habitats. There will be greater competition for food sources and introduction of new infectious diseases. This sequence of events has occurred innumerable times before when alien populations expanded into new regions. 14

Currently, the oceans absorb 93% of the heat trapped by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, thus slowing warming of land masses. But the resulting rapid warming of the oceans directly impacts marine life and related food chains. Consider, for example, the coral reefs along over 93,000 miles of coastline rimming the oceans—one of the largest ecosystems on the planet.

A thriving coral reef is comprised of groups of millions of identical tiny polyps a few millimeters wide and a few centimeters long, each with a calcite skeleton. Millions of these tiny stony skeletons accumulate over generations to form the large hard coral reefs found along tropical shorelines. Many of the coral species obtain most of their nutrients from photosynthetic algae plants called zooxanthellae . When the sea around them warms excessively, the polyps expel the zooxanthellae and the coral becomes completely white—a condition called coral bleaching. Corals can survive bleaching events and restore the zooxanthellae , if conditions normalize quickly enough. But the bleaching events are highly stressful, and the corals will die if occurrence of bleaching events persists. When this happens, only the dead coral skeletons—which can be immense—are left.

The Great Barrier Reef, 500 feet thick at some points, extends discontinuously for over 1500 miles off the coast of eastern Australia. By 2018, half of the Great Barrier Reef had died from heat stress. Similar damage is occurring in the Caribbean and the rest of the world’s tropical shorelines. 15,16

Loss of the ocean reef ecosystems could substantially compromise the Earths ability to sustain the health and well-being of its inhabitants. Fish populations in the coral reefs are the source of food for hundreds of millions of people. Loss of the reefs disrupts the marine food chain which causes loss of local food supplies, stressed populations, and conflicts over fishing rights.

There is now a global sense of urgency to develop methods to restore and maintain the health of the reefs considering their increasing destruction. Corals can evolve to survive in changed conditions—warmer, more acidic, etc. However, the rate of natural adaptation is too slow relative to the current rate of changes in their ocean environment, so there is widespread devastation of established reefs. This has led to efforts to accelerate the rate of adaptation. In some stressed reefs, small coral colonies are found that have successfully adapted to the local changes in temperature and increased acidity. Reef preservationists have shown that corals harvested from these colonies can be nurtured in coral “farms” and then used to seed new growth in damaged areas. Scientists are also experimenting with selective breeding to develop coral strains better adapted to changed conditions. 17–19

In Indonesia another attempt at coral reef remediation involves attaching optimized coral polyps to metal rods planted within the compromised reefs. The application of a mild electric shock causes minerals in the water to precipitate and adhere to the metal structures, thus stimulating calcification with the goal of creating the more native ‘cement’ of a reef’s exoskeleton, referred to as ‘Biorock.’ 20 The resulting limestone surface increases the growth of the corals under conditions that would normally lead to their death. All these schemes are highly promising, but there are daunting cost and logistical barriers to scaling restoration efforts to address the vast areas of lost reefs.

Global Warming Is Changing the Distribution of Animal and Plant Pathogens

The last century has seen radical changes in the pattern, volume, and speed of transport of people and cargo between widely separated regions on the planet. One consequence has been the increase in direct long-distance human transport of dangerous infectious diseases by person to person transmission. Surveillance of travelers at entry points, coupled with identification, treatment, and when necessary, quarantine of the infected persons and their contacts, has been the response strategy. But diseases that are carried by intermediate vectors, for example, mosquitoes or ticks, present a different and more complex challenge. Any such vector is adapted to thrive in some environmental niche—characterized by a temperature and rainfall range, urban or rural, indoor or outdoor, etc. When a region’s climate warms, it may become hospitable to new vectors, which will then inevitably arrive either by expansion from adjacent territories or as accidental hitchhikers in freight shipments or transport vehicles.

For example, in a remarkably short time, human viruses like Zika, Dengue, Chikungunya, Yellow Fever, and West Nile have spread into regions of the Caribbean, Latin America, and the United States that until recently had ambient temperatures below that required to support their transmission. In addition, fungal infections of food plants, like the blights infecting Cavendish bananas and cocoa trees, have become a global problem. The rapid spread of global disease caused by changes in atmospheric temperature, ocean temperature, erratic and drenching rains, and floods in one geographic location accompanied by droughts in another location is being facilitated by migration of the vectors, such as mosquitoes, ticks, bats, and rats, that carry the pathogens. Insect vectors are exquisitely sensitive to changes in temperature, and warmer temperatures increase their breeding season and life span. Zika, Dengue, Chikungunya, and Yellow Fever viruses soon follow arrival of the common Aedes aegypti mosquito and are then transmitted among humans by the female mosquito. Other mosquito species transmit West Nile virus, the malaria parasite, and the parasitic nematode worm that causes the human disfiguring disease lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis).

Ticks are another rapidly spreading vector. Although most tick species do not harbor pathogens harmful to humans, Lyme disease is caused by a tick-borne bacterial pathogen, Borrelia burgdorferi . Until recently, ticks were inhibited over much of North America by cold winters, but with increasing average temperatures and milder winters they are becoming established further north. Lyme disease is now endemic in Canada, so the government has recently established tick surveillance networks.

The vector-borne bacterial pathogen Candidatus Liberibacter that causes citrus greening disease is a serious agricultural threat. Liberibacter are transferred to citrus trees by an insect vector, the Asian citrus psyllid or jumping plant lice. The disease causes the decline and death of citrus trees by blocking the flow of nutrients and sugars from the leaves to the roots. Once infected, the tree is doomed. Liberibacter have recently migrated along with the citrus psyllid vector to warming temperate climate zones worldwide, including ten U.S. states. 21 The resulting Citrus Greening infections have devastated the Florida citrus industry and destroyed citrus groves in Asia, Brazil, and the Dominican Republic. In the United States, the damage has been less in states further north than Florida, probably because of their cooler temperatures, but as the climate warms, the citrus greening infections will likely continue moving northward.

Owing to the huge financial impact of citrus greening, there are multiple biology-based efforts underway to disrupt the infection pathway either by eliminating the psyllid vector, by killing the bacterial Liberibacter pathogen, or by developing an infection resistant citrus tree variety. 22 Insect warfare has also been tried by introduction of a wasp that preys specifically on the Asian citrus psyllid. This strategy works, but it only reduces, rather than eliminating, the citrus psyllid population. 23

Each biological approach tried so far has its pros and cons. Insecticides can kill the citrus psyllid, but they may also threaten beneficial insects. Antibiotics may kill the Liberibacter, but their use can also increase bacterial antibiotic resistance and thus loss of antibiotic effectiveness for treating human diseases. This story of the challenges of containing the spread of the citrus greening disease is representative of similar challenges encountered in trying to deal with a myriad of newly encroaching diseases, some carried by other insect vectors. Are there better solutions on the horizon? It may be that recent advances in genetic technology will lead to more effective approaches.

Can New Genetic Technologies Reduce Global Warming Consequences?

Along with the increasing threat of climate change to human health and agriculture, we are experiencing a revolution in genetic engineering technology. Perhaps this will lead to new methods for effective surveillance and for mitigation of the redistribution of vectors that transmit disease.

The new CRISPR Cas9 technology lets us change specific genes in an insect or animal vector, thus making it either unable to serve as a reservoir for a given pathogen (known as a population modification drive) or eliminating the ability of the vector to propagate (known as a suppression drive). A suppression drive targets the reproductive capacity of the insect vector and can lead to a population crash, potentially wiping out a species. A population modification drive does not affect the reproduction capability of the insect, but it prevents the vector from harboring the pathogen or it prevents transmitting the pathogen to the human host. With these technologies, the genetic makeup of a few individuals in a targeted vector species is changed in such a manner that once these individuals are released into the wild, the change spreads rapidly throughout the entire vector population. Gene drives only affect sexually reproducing species, and thus they cannot be used directly on bacterial and viral pathogens.

Malaria transmission has been used as a test case to explore use of a vector gene drive to contain the spread of a disease. The results have been encouraging. In 2015, 200 million people worldwide were infected with malaria and between 500,000 and 700,000 died from the disease. Seventy-two percent of these were children under 5 years of age. In 2016, the number of cases worldwide increased to 216 million. Of 3,500 mosquito species, only those that belong to a subset called Anopheles can transmit the malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum , to a human by means of a bite from a female. The Anopheles stephensi mosquito, endemic to India and South Asia, carries the malaria parasite in that region. These mosquitoes were experimentally gene edited so that they could no longer carry the malaria parasite, establishing a population modification gene drive. A key trick in a gene drive is to engineer both copies of the chromosome so that all the offspring of a mating between a normal mosquito and a genetically altered one carry the genetic profile of the desired alteration, rather than just half the offspring, which is normally the case. Under laboratory conditions, it was demonstrated that this population modification drive leads to rapid spread of the desired genetically-altered mosquito and disappearance of the normal mosquitoes. The genetically altered mosquitoes cannot harbor the malaria parasite. This suggests that release of this genetically altered mosquito into the wild would halt the spread of malaria and thus save millions of lives. Eventually the malaria parasite could naturally mutate to overcome the genetic change in its mosquito host allowing it to once again infect humans, but this might not occur for a long time.

Another example is the Anopheles gambiae mosquito, which transmits malaria in sub-Saharan Africa. In another series of gene drive experiments, gene editing was used to change genes that the female mosquito needs for egg production, thereby creating female sterility (a suppression gene drive). In this case, the goal was just to reduce the number of mosquitoes transmitting malaria, but the technique could potentially wipe out the entire population of Anopheles gambiae . The combined challenge of climate change, which is altering the geographic distribution of the vector mosquitoes, and growing resistance to drugs routinely used to treat malaria-infected patients is making gene editing of the insect vectors an increasingly attractive potential solution. However, the notion of eliminating an entire insect species troubles many people.

In another test case, gene drives are being explored as a way of controlling transmission of Lyme disease by ticks on the U.S. island of Nantucket. Owing to recent increases in the population of island ticks, over 40% of the 10,000 inhabitants of Nantucket have, or have had, Lyme disease. Both deer and the white foot mouse can transmit the Lyme disease pathogen, Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria, to ticks, and the pathogen can then be transmitted to humans by the ticks. Ticks feed on the deer or white foot mice carrying Borrelia and the infected ticks bite humans, passing on Lyme disease. A plan was proposed by Kevin Esvelt (MIT) and Sam Telford (Tufts U., Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine) to use a gene drive to reduce the population of white footed mice that are infected with Borrelia . To do this, the mice would be genetically engineered so that they are immune to infection by the Lyme disease bacterial pathogen and thus could not accumulate infectious Borrelia . In this case, there would still be the same number of mice and the same number of ticks, but the number of ticks able to transmit Borrelia would be significantly reduced. Thousands of altered mice would be released on the island. The gene drive would ensure that the genetic alteration would pass down through all following generations of mice on the island, disrupting the cycle of transmission. The plan is to first test the genetically modified mice on an uninhabited island and then, with the concurrence of the inhabitants of both Nantucket Island and Martha’s Vineyard, release the genetically altered mice. The first step will be to get the concurrence and support of the inhabitants of these islands, because the gene drive would be altering the environment shared by all inhabitants.

Recently, a new gene editing application has been developed to alter the response of plants to environmental challenges. The proposed scheme involves spraying a field of plants with millions of insect vectors carrying viruses that are programmed to edit the genome of a plant such as maize to become drought resistant, in one growing season. This technique would be significantly faster than a gene drive. Further, this method would not permanently alter the genetic makeup of future plant generations, as is the case with gene drives. The goal is to engineer drought-resistant and temperature-tolerant plants, thereby securing the food supply during times of climate instability. But there is a catch, as once released into the wild, controlling these insect vectors would be difficult, if not impossible. As a result, this work has been limited so far to the laboratory. There is also concern that the method could be adapted as a biological weapon, enabling destruction of targeted food crops over wide areas by adverse genetic manipulation of the plants’ chromosomes. In addition to controlling mosquito vectors and tick-borne Lyme disease, gene drives are also being devised to control the nematode worms that carry the parasite causing Schistosomiasis.

Gene drives have not yet been released in the wild to mitigate vector-borne transmission of disease as there are critical questions to be resolved as noted above. Although the biology is ready, there are many questions of governance, safety, and ethics to be answered. Caution is important, since once the genetically-altered vectors are released, there is no assured way of controlling them at this point.

In July 2015, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences convened a meeting to discuss “the promise and perils of gene drives.” Critical questions raised at the meeting were:

Will an entire species of vector be wiped out? Methods are being devised to slow the gene drive so that only a portion of the offspring contain the genetically engineered alterations. These “Daisy chain drives,” have been engineered to be self-limiting and eventually disappear from the population.

Have techniques been devised that could control a runaway gene drive? By creating a second gene drive that undoes the genetic alterations of the first gene drive, essentially “a molecular eraser,” it is hoped a gene drive could be reversed, but not before unintended consequences to the ecosystem become apparent.

Can the altered genetic traits be transferred to other insect species ? Unlikely, but possible. If this occurred, the potential for wiping out beneficial insect species would lead to further ecological disruptions, compounding the ravages of climate change.

Global Warming Mitigation Will Require a Coordinated International Effort

Many climate scientists and other thoughtful people have had concerns about the deteriorating global ecosystem for several decades now. The contribution of human activity to this escalating cataclysm is well documented. Predictions of dire consequences have been noted and sporadic attempts by the international community have been made to mitigate the ongoing onslaught of carbon emissions. But global warming is a problem that can only be solved by global cooperation because the world’s ecosystem is an integrated system. The causes of environmental degradation cannot be addressed by a patchwork of uncoordinated responses. We are dependent upon achieving international cooperation to mount a coordinated, science-based response.

In the United States today, political calculations relating to oil and coal interests have halted government acknowledgement of the risks of continuing future emissions of CO 2 into the atmosphere. In December 2018, at a UN Climate Change Conference in Poland, Wells Griffith, Mr. Trump’s international energy and climate adviser, said “We strongly believe that no country should have to sacrifice their economic prosperity or energy security in pursuit of environmental sustainability.” The attendees broke into jeers and mocking laughter. 24 Do not think that the United States is alone in this stance. We are aligned with other major fossil fuel producing nations, including Russia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Australia. We are now well beyond the time of debating about validity of the predictions about what will happen if climate change is left unaddressed. Rather, we are trying to mitigate what has already happened, while, as a society, summoning the courage and the will to leave fossil fuels in the ground and switch to alternative energy sources. Renewable power resources and improvements in the efficiency of our energy use can be important components of our energy future for the rest of this century. But, practically speaking, nuclear power will probably also have to be a major component of the future energy portfolio in order to meet world energy demands while greatly reducing use of fossil fuels. 25, 26 That too is controversial. These are existential choices that call for an unprecedented level of wisdom and societal responsiveness in the world’s political systems. It does seem likely that achieving the necessary global political response will only come when there is widespread public fear and panic as the realization of the danger percolates into public consciousness. 27 It is extraordinary that the current U.S. national leadership both denies existence of the global warming problem and actively promotes more use of fossil fuels. The longer we delay reduction in global CO 2 emissions, the worse the ultimate catastrophe will be.

Authors’ Note:

We believe the world energy economy must shift rapidly from reliance on fossil fuels—coal, oil, and gas—to cleaner alternatives or our children and grandchildren will suffer dire consequences. We encourage the reader to personally assess the risks and potential solutions. To that end, we have included references for further reading that are openly accessible on the Internet.

Lucy Shapiro is a professor in the Department of Developmental Biology at Stanford University School of Medicine where she holds the Virginia and D. K. Ludwig Chair in Cancer Research and is the director of the Beckman Center for Molecular and Genetic Medicine. Harley McAdams is an emeritus professor at the Department of Developmental Biology at Stanford University School of Medicine.

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Essay on Global Warming

• Updated on  
• Apr 27, 2024

Being able to write an essay is an integral part of mastering any language. Essays form an integral part of many academic and scholastic exams like the SAT , and UPSC amongst many others. It is a crucial evaluative part of English proficiency tests as well like IELTS , TOEFL , etc. Major essays are meant to emphasize public issues of concern that can have significant consequences on the world. To understand the concept of Global Warming and its causes and effects, we must first examine the many factors that influence the planet’s temperature and what this implies for the world’s future. Here’s an unbiased look at the essay on Global Warming and other essential related topics.

Short Essay on Global Warming and Climate Change?

Since the industrial and scientific revolutions, Earth’s resources have been gradually depleted. Furthermore, the start of the world’s population’s exponential expansion is particularly hard on the environment. Simply put, as the population’s need for consumption grows, so does the use of natural resources , as well as the waste generated by that consumption.

Climate change has been one of the most significant long-term consequences of this. Climate change is more than just the rise or fall of global temperatures; it also affects rain cycles, wind patterns, cyclone frequencies, sea levels, and other factors. It has an impact on all major life groupings on the planet.

Also Read: World Population Day

What is Global Warming?

Global warming is the unusually rapid increase in Earth’s average surface temperature over the past century, primarily due to the greenhouse gases released by people burning fossil fuels . The greenhouse gases consist of methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, carbon dioxide, water vapour, and chlorofluorocarbons. The weather prediction has been becoming more complex with every passing year, with seasons more indistinguishable, and the general temperatures hotter.

The number of hurricanes, cyclones, droughts, floods, etc., has risen steadily since the onset of the 21st century. The supervillain behind all these changes is Global Warming. The name is quite self-explanatory; it means the rise in the temperature of the Earth.

Also Read: What is a Natural Disaster?

What are the Causes of Global Warming?

According to recent studies, many scientists believe the following are the primary four causes of global warming:

• Deforestation 
• Greenhouse emissions
• Carbon emissions per capita

Extreme global warming is causing natural disasters , which can be seen all around us. One of the causes of global warming is the extreme release of greenhouse gases that become trapped on the earth’s surface, causing the temperature to rise. Similarly, volcanoes contribute to global warming by spewing excessive CO2 into the atmosphere.

The increase in population is one of the major causes of Global Warming. This increase in population also leads to increased air pollution . Automobiles emit a lot of CO2, which remains in the atmosphere. This increase in population is also causing deforestation, which contributes to global warming.

The earth’s surface emits energy into the atmosphere in the form of heat, keeping the balance with the incoming energy. Global warming depletes the ozone layer, bringing about the end of the world. There is a clear indication that increased global warming will result in the extinction of all life on Earth’s surface.

Also Read: Land, Soil, Water, Natural Vegetation, and Wildlife Resources

Solutions for Global Warming

Of course, industries and multinational conglomerates emit more carbon than the average citizen. Nonetheless, activism and community effort are the only viable ways to slow the worsening effects of global warming. Furthermore, at the state or government level, world leaders must develop concrete plans and step-by-step programmes to ensure that no further harm is done to the environment in general.

Although we are almost too late to slow the rate of global warming, finding the right solution is critical. Everyone, from individuals to governments, must work together to find a solution to Global Warming. Some of the factors to consider are pollution control, population growth, and the use of natural resources.

One very important contribution you can make is to reduce your use of plastic. Plastic is the primary cause of global warming, and recycling it takes years. Another factor to consider is deforestation, which will aid in the control of global warming. More tree planting should be encouraged to green the environment. Certain rules should also govern industrialization. Building industries in green zones that affect plants and species should be prohibited.

Also Read: Essay on Pollution

Effects of Global Warming

Global warming is a real problem that many people want to disprove to gain political advantage. However, as global citizens, we must ensure that only the truth is presented in the media.

This decade has seen a significant impact from global warming. The two most common phenomena observed are glacier retreat and arctic shrinkage. Glaciers are rapidly melting. These are clear manifestations of climate change.

Another significant effect of global warming is the rise in sea level. Flooding is occurring in low-lying areas as a result of sea-level rise. Many countries have experienced extreme weather conditions. Every year, we have unusually heavy rain, extreme heat and cold, wildfires, and other natural disasters.

Similarly, as global warming continues, marine life is being severely impacted. This is causing the extinction of marine species as well as other problems. Furthermore, changes are expected in coral reefs, which will face extinction in the coming years. These effects will intensify in the coming years, effectively halting species expansion. Furthermore, humans will eventually feel the negative effects of Global Warming.

Also Read: Concept of Sustainable Development

Sample Essays on Global Warming

Here are some sample essays on Global Warming:

Essay on Global Warming Paragraph in 100 – 150 words

Global Warming is caused by the increase of carbon dioxide levels in the earth’s atmosphere and is a result of human activities that have been causing harm to our environment for the past few centuries now. Global Warming is something that can’t be ignored and steps have to be taken to tackle the situation globally. The average temperature is constantly rising by 1.5 degrees Celsius over the last few years.

The best method to prevent future damage to the earth, cutting down more forests should be banned and Afforestation should be encouraged. Start by planting trees near your homes and offices, participate in events, and teach the importance of planting trees. It is impossible to undo the damage but it is possible to stop further harm.

Also Read: Social Forestry

Essay on Global Warming in 250 Words

Over a long period, it is observed that the temperature of the earth is increasing. This affected wildlife, animals, humans, and every living organism on earth. Glaciers have been melting, and many countries have started water shortages, flooding, and erosion and all this is because of global warming. 

No one can be blamed for global warming except for humans. Human activities such as gases released from power plants, transportation, and deforestation have increased gases such as carbon dioxide, CFCs, and other pollutants in the earth’s atmosphere.                                              The main question is how can we control the current situation and build a better world for future generations. It starts with little steps by every individual. 

Start using cloth bags made from sustainable materials for all shopping purposes, instead of using high-watt lights use energy-efficient bulbs, switch off the electricity, don’t waste water, abolish deforestation and encourage planting more trees. Shift the use of energy from petroleum or other fossil fuels to wind and solar energy. Instead of throwing out the old clothes donate them to someone so that it is recycled. 

Donate old books, don’t waste paper.  Above all, spread awareness about global warming. Every little thing a person does towards saving the earth will contribute in big or small amounts. We must learn that 1% effort is better than no effort. Pledge to take care of Mother Nature and speak up about global warming.

Also Read: Types of Water Pollution

Essay on Global Warming in 500 Words

Global warming isn’t a prediction, it is happening! A person denying it or unaware of it is in the most simple terms complicit. Do we have another planet to live on? Unfortunately, we have been bestowed with this one planet only that can sustain life yet over the years we have turned a blind eye to the plight it is in. Global warming is not an abstract concept but a global phenomenon occurring ever so slowly even at this moment. Global Warming is a phenomenon that is occurring every minute resulting in a gradual increase in the Earth’s overall climate. Brought about by greenhouse gases that trap the solar radiation in the atmosphere, global warming can change the entire map of the earth, displacing areas, flooding many countries, and destroying multiple lifeforms. Extreme weather is a direct consequence of global warming but it is not an exhaustive consequence. There are virtually limitless effects of global warming which are all harmful to life on earth. The sea level is increasing by 0.12 inches per year worldwide. This is happening because of the melting of polar ice caps because of global warming. This has increased the frequency of floods in many lowland areas and has caused damage to coral reefs. The Arctic is one of the worst-hit areas affected by global warming. Air quality has been adversely affected and the acidity of the seawater has also increased causing severe damage to marine life forms. Severe natural disasters are brought about by global warming which has had dire effects on life and property. As long as mankind produces greenhouse gases, global warming will continue to accelerate. The consequences are felt at a much smaller scale which will increase to become drastic shortly. The power to save the day lies in the hands of humans, the need is to seize the day. Energy consumption should be reduced on an individual basis. Fuel-efficient cars and other electronics should be encouraged to reduce the wastage of energy sources. This will also improve air quality and reduce the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Global warming is an evil that can only be defeated when fought together. It is better late than never. If we all take steps today, we will have a much brighter future tomorrow. Global warming is the bane of our existence and various policies have come up worldwide to fight it but that is not enough. The actual difference is made when we work at an individual level to fight it. Understanding its import now is crucial before it becomes an irrevocable mistake. Exterminating global warming is of utmost importance and each one of us is as responsible for it as the next.  

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Essay on Global Warming UPSC

Always hear about global warming everywhere, but do we know what it is? The evil of the worst form, global warming is a phenomenon that can affect life more fatally. Global warming refers to the increase in the earth’s temperature as a result of various human activities. The planet is gradually getting hotter and threatening the existence of lifeforms on it. Despite being relentlessly studied and researched, global warming for the majority of the population remains an abstract concept of science. It is this concept that over the years has culminated in making global warming a stark reality and not a concept covered in books. Global warming is not caused by one sole reason that can be curbed. Multifarious factors cause global warming most of which are a part of an individual’s daily existence. Burning of fuels for cooking, in vehicles, and for other conventional uses, a large amount of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, and methane amongst many others is produced which accelerates global warming. Rampant deforestation also results in global warming as lesser green cover results in an increased presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere which is a greenhouse gas.  Finding a solution to global warming is of immediate importance. Global warming is a phenomenon that has to be fought unitedly. Planting more trees can be the first step that can be taken toward warding off the severe consequences of global warming. Increasing the green cover will result in regulating the carbon cycle. There should be a shift from using nonrenewable energy to renewable energy such as wind or solar energy which causes less pollution and thereby hinder the acceleration of global warming. Reducing energy needs at an individual level and not wasting energy in any form is the most important step to be taken against global warming. The warning bells are tolling to awaken us from the deep slumber of complacency we have slipped into. Humans can fight against nature and it is high time we acknowledged that. With all our scientific progress and technological inventions, fighting off the negative effects of global warming is implausible. We have to remember that we do not inherit the earth from our ancestors but borrow it from our future generations and the responsibility lies on our shoulders to bequeath them a healthy planet for life to exist. 

Also Read: Essay on Disaster Management

Climate Change and Global Warming Essay

Global Warming and Climate Change are two sides of the same coin. Both are interrelated with each other and are two issues of major concern worldwide. Greenhouse gases released such as carbon dioxide, CFCs, and other pollutants in the earth’s atmosphere cause Global Warming which leads to climate change. Black holes have started to form in the ozone layer that protects the earth from harmful ultraviolet rays. 

Human activities have created climate change and global warming. Industrial waste and fumes are the major contributors to global warming. 

Another factor affecting is the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation and also one of the reasons for climate change.  Global warming has resulted in shrinking mountain glaciers in Antarctica, Greenland, and the Arctic and causing climate change. Switching from the use of fossil fuels to energy sources like wind and solar. 

When buying any electronic appliance buy the best quality with energy savings stars. Don’t waste water and encourage rainwater harvesting in your community. 

Also Read: Essay on Air Pollution

Tips to Write an Essay

Writing an effective essay needs skills that few people possess and even fewer know how to implement. While writing an essay can be an assiduous task that can be unnerving at times, some key pointers can be inculcated to draft a successful essay. These involve focusing on the structure of the essay, planning it out well, and emphasizing crucial details.

Mentioned below are some pointers that can help you write better structure and more thoughtful essays that will get across to your readers:

• Prepare an outline for the essay to ensure continuity and relevance and no break in the structure of the essay
• Decide on a thesis statement that will form the basis of your essay. It will be the point of your essay and help readers understand your contention
• Follow the structure of an introduction, a detailed body followed by a conclusion so that the readers can comprehend the essay in a particular manner without any dissonance.
• Make your beginning catchy and include solutions in your conclusion to make the essay insightful and lucrative to read
• Reread before putting it out and add your flair to the essay to make it more personal and thereby unique and intriguing for readers  

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Ans. Both natural and man-made factors contribute to global warming. The natural one also contains methane gas, volcanic eruptions, and greenhouse gases. Deforestation, mining, livestock raising, burning fossil fuels, and other man-made causes are next.

Ans. The government and the general public can work together to stop global warming. Trees must be planted more often, and deforestation must be prohibited. Auto usage needs to be curbed, and recycling needs to be promoted.

Ans. Switching to renewable energy sources , adopting sustainable farming, transportation, and energy methods, and conserving water and other natural resources.

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Digvijay Singh

Having 2+ years of experience in educational content writing, withholding a Bachelor's in Physical Education and Sports Science and a strong interest in writing educational content for students enrolled in domestic and foreign study abroad programmes. I believe in offering a distinct viewpoint to the table, to help students deal with the complexities of both domestic and foreign educational systems. Through engaging storytelling and insightful analysis, I aim to inspire my readers to embark on their educational journeys, whether abroad or at home, and to make the most of every learning opportunity that comes their way.

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This was really a good essay on global warming… There has been used many unic words..and I really liked it!!!Seriously I had been looking for a essay about Global warming just like this…

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I want to learn how to write essay writing so I joined this page.This page is very useful for everyone.

Hi, we are glad that we could help you to write essays. We have a beginner’s guide to write essays ( https://leverageedu.com/blog/essay-writing/ ) and we think this might help you.

It is not good , to have global warming in our earth .So we all have to afforestation program on all the world.

thank you so much

Very educative , helpful and it is really going to strength my English knowledge to structure my essay in future

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Global warming is the increase in 𝓽𝓱𝓮 ᴀᴠᴇʀᴀɢᴇ ᴛᴇᴍᴘᴇʀᴀᴛᴜʀᴇs ᴏғ ᴇᴀʀᴛʜ🌎 ᴀᴛᴍᴏsᴘʜᴇʀᴇ

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Essay on Consequences of Global Warming for Students and Children

500 words essay on consequences of global warming.

We all have been very well aware of the climate change that is happening these days. The wind patterns, temperature, atmospheric pressure, humidity and all determine our climate. The different part of the world has different climates, for instance, dry, moderate, tropical and more. The climate is what determines the seasons of that area. As we are human beings, our aspect of life depends on the environment around us. That is why we need a healthy and stable one to lead a normal life. However, global warming is disrupting this pattern.

What is Global Warming?

Global warming processes in which the temperature of the earth rises steadily and constantly. It is a threatening problem which will bring great danger to all living beings. Similarly, there are many reasons for this phenomenon.

The enhanced levels of carbon dioxide , as well as greenhouse gases , contribute to it greatly. If we do not take measures to tackle this problem now, the living beings will soon face their doom. Moreover, we need to realize its harmful consequences so we can work on fixing it quickly.

Furthermore, everyone must be made aware of how they contribute to the increasing level of global warming. Most importantly, we must find an alternative that will help in tackling this issue at the very earliest to save earth and life on it.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Consequences of Global Warming

We must all know by now that the temperature of earth has gotten warmer by one degree Celsius . Although it looks small in number now but the consequences it has are massive. It is so because the amount of energy we need to augment this temperature even by one degree Celsius is huge. This extra energy is equivalent to force-feeding our climate system.

We are experiencing hotter and hotter days due to global warming only. Each year we are breaking the record for experience the hottest day, month or year. The worrying degree has gone as far as 54 degrees Celsius. Moreover, the frequent and intense extreme weather events we are facing are also due to that only. You see forest fires, droughts , floods , and more natural disasters becoming more and more common. For instance, the Amazon Rainforest fire being the latest one.

The melting of ice caps and glaciers is also a result of global warming only. All this melted ice just creates a rise in the water volume of the oceans. The sea levels are increasing due to this. Moreover, the warmer the temperature gets, the more the mass of the water expands. It poses a great threat to the low-lying islands and coastal cities.

Furthermore, our oceans are becoming warmer and acidifying. As these water bodies absorb most of the excess heat as well as Carbon Dioxide they have become more acidic. This, in turn, also results in coral bleaching. In addition, it also drives stronger storms. This rising acidity poses a great threat to aquatic life and disrupts their food chain. Thus, we need to soon get together to eliminate this problem to help our earth heal.

FAQs on the Consequences of Global Warming

Q.1 What is global warming?

A.1 Global warming is a process in which the earth’s temperature keeps increasing constantly. It is a great problem for the earth and its inhabitants. The higher levels of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases contribute to it.

Q.2 What are the consequences of global warming?

A.2 Global warming has severe consequences. It results in hotter days, rising sea levels, frequent and intense extreme weather events, acidifying oceans, coral bleaching and more. It also hampers the ecosystems, species, and damages homes.

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Are the Effects of Global Warming Really that Bad?

Short answer: Yes. Even a seemingly slight average temperature rise is enough to cause a dramatic transformation of our planet.

The Missouri River encroaches on homes in Sioux City, Iowa, during a 2011 flood

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Five and a half degrees Fahrenheit. It may not sound like much—perhaps the difference between wearing a sweater and not wearing one on an early-spring day. But for the world in which we live—which climate experts project will be at least 5.7 degrees Fahrenheit warmer by 2100 , relative to pre-industrial levels (1850–1900), should global emissions continue on their current path—this small rise will have grave consequences. These impacts are already becoming apparent for every ecosystem and living thing, including us.

Human influences are the number one cause of global warming , especially the carbon pollution we cause by burning fossil fuels and the pollution capture we prevent by destroying forests. The carbon dioxide, methane, soot, and other pollutants we release into the atmosphere act like a blanket, trapping the sun's heat and causing the planet to warm. Evidence shows that the 2010s were hotter than any other decade on record —and every decade since the 1960s has averaged hotter than the previous one. This warming is altering the earth's climate system, including its land, atmosphere, oceans, and ice, in far-reaching ways.

More frequent and severe weather

Higher temperatures are worsening many types of disasters, including storms, heat waves, floods, and droughts. A warmer climate creates an atmosphere that can collect, retain, and unleash more water, changing weather patterns in such a way that wet areas become wetter and dry areas drier.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in 2021, there were 20 weather and climate disaster events in the United States—including severe storms, floods, drought, and wildfires—that individually caused at least $1 billion in losses . “Disasters in 2021 had a staggering total price tag of $145 billion—and that’s an underestimate because it excludes health damages,” says Vijay Limaye , senior scientist at NRDC. “These climate and weather disasters endanger people across the country throughout the entire year. In fact, more than 4 in 10 Americans live in a county that was struck by climate-related disasters in 2021.”

The increasing number of droughts, intense storms, and floods we're seeing as our warming atmosphere holds—and then dumps—more moisture poses risks to public health and safety too. Prolonged dry spells mean more than just scorched lawns. Drought conditions jeopardize access to clean drinking water, fuel out-of-control wildfires, and result in dust storms, extreme heat events, and flash flooding in the States. Elsewhere around the world, lack of water is a leading cause of death and serious disease and is contributing to crop failure. At the opposite end of the spectrum, heavier rains cause streams, rivers, and lakes to overflow, which damages life and property, contaminates drinking water, creates hazardous-material spills, and promotes mold infestation and unhealthy air. A warmer, wetter world is also a boon for foodborne and waterborne illnesses and disease-carrying insects, such as mosquitoes, fleas, and ticks.

Higher death rates

Today's scientists point to climate change as the biggest global health threat of the 21st century. It's a threat that impacts all of us—especially children, the elderly, low-income communities, and minorities—and in a variety of direct and indirect ways. As temperatures spike, so does the incidence of illness, emergency room visits, and death.

"There are more hot days in places where people aren't used to it," Limaye says. "They don't have air-conditioning or can't afford it. One or two days isn't a big deal. But four days straight where temperatures don't go down, even at night, leads to severe health consequences." In the United States, hundreds of heat-related deaths occur each year due to direct impacts and the indirect effects of heat-exacerbated, life-threatening illnesses, such as heat exhaustion, heatstroke, and cardiovascular and kidney diseases. Indeed, extreme heat kills more Americans each year, on average, than hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and lightning combined.

Dirtier air

Rising temperatures also worsen air pollution by increasing ground-level ozone smog, which is created when pollution from cars, factories, and other sources react to sunlight and heat. Ground-level ozone is the main component of smog, and the hotter things get, the more of it we have. Dirtier air is linked to higher hospital admission rates and higher death rates for asthmatics. It worsens the health of people suffering from cardiac or pulmonary disease. And warmer temperatures also significantly increase airborne pollen , which is bad news for those who suffer from hay fever and other allergies.

Higher wildlife extinction rates

As humans, we face a host of challenges, but we're certainly not the only ones catching heat. As land and sea undergo rapid changes, the animals that inhabit them are doomed to disappear if they don't adapt quickly enough. Some will make it, and some won't. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Sixth Assessment Report , the risk of species extinction increases steeply with rises in global temperature —with invertebrates (specifically pollinators) and flowering plants being some of the most vulnerable. Moreover, a 2015 study showed that vertebrate species (animals with backbones, like fish, birds, mammals , amphibians, and reptiles) are also disappearing more than 100 times faster than the natural rate of extinction, due to human-driven climate change, pollution, and deforestation.

More acidic oceans

The earth's marine ecosystems are under pressure as a result of climate change. Oceans are becoming more acidic, due in large part to their absorption of some of our excess emissions. As this acidification accelerates, it poses a serious threat to underwater life, particularly creatures with calcium carbonate shells or skeletons, including mollusks, crabs, and corals. This can have a huge impact on shellfisheries . In total, the U.S. shellfish industry could lose more than $400 million annually by 2100 due to impacts of ocean acidification.

Higher sea levels

The polar regions are particularly vulnerable to a warming atmosphere. Average temperatures in the Arctic are rising twice as fast as they are elsewhere on earth, and the world's ice sheets are melting fast. This not only has grave consequences for the region's people, wildlife, and plants; its most serious impact may be on rising sea levels. By 2100, it's estimated our oceans will be 1.6 to 6.6 feet higher, threatening coastal systems and low-lying areas, encompassing entire island nations and the world’s largest cities, including Los Angeles, Miami, and New York City, as well as Mumbai, India; Rio de Janeiro; and Sydney, Australia.

But this isn’t the end of the story

There’s no question: Unchecked climate change promises a frightening future, and it's too late to fully turn back the clock. We've already taken care of that by pumping a century's worth of pollution into the atmosphere. “Even if we stopped all carbon dioxide emissions tomorrow, we'd still see some dangerous effects,” Limaye says. That, of course, is the bad news.

But there's also good news. By aggressively reducing our global emissions now, “we can avoid a lot of the severe consequences that climate change would otherwise bring,” says Limaye. While change must happen at the highest levels of government and business, your voice matters too: to your friends, to your families, and to your community leaders. Together, we can envision a safer, healthier, more equitable future—and build toward it. You can join with millions of people around the world fighting climate change and even work to reduce fossil fuels in your own life .

This story was originally published on March 15, 2016, and has been updated with new information and links.

This NRDC.org story is available for online republication by news media outlets or nonprofits under these conditions: The writer(s) must be credited with a byline; you must note prominently that the story was originally published by NRDC.org and link to the original; the story cannot be edited (beyond simple things such as grammar); you can’t resell the story in any form or grant republishing rights to other outlets; you can’t republish our material wholesale or automatically—you need to select stories individually; you can’t republish the photos or graphics on our site without specific permission; you should drop us a note to let us know when you’ve used one of our stories.

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What are the effects of global warming?

The effects of global warming will be far-reaching and often devastating, scientists have warned.

• Temperature extremes
• Extreme weather

Sea levels and ocean acidification

Plants and animals, social effects.

• Further reading

Additional resources

Bibliography.

The effects of global warming can be seen and felt across the planet. Global warming , the gradual heating of Earth's surface, oceans and atmosphere, is caused by human activity, primarily the burning of fossil fuels that pump carbon dioxide (CO2), methane and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Already, the consequences of global warming are measurable and visible.

"We can observe this happening in real time in many places," Josef Werne, a professor of geology and environmental science at the University of Pittsburgh, told Live Science. "Ice is melting in both polar ice caps and mountain glaciers. Lakes around the world, including Lake Superior, are warming rapidly — in some cases faster than the surrounding environment. Animals are changing migration patterns and plants are changing the dates of activity," such as trees budding their leaves earlier in the spring and dropping them later in the fall.

Here is an in-depth look at the ongoing effects of global warming.

Global warming increases average temperatures and temperature extremes

One of the most immediate and obvious consequences of global warming is the increase in temperatures around the world. The average global temperature has increased by about 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit (0.8 degrees Celsius) over the past 100 years, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Since record keeping began in 1895, the hottest year on record worldwide was 2016, according to NOAA and NASA data . That year Earth's surface temperature was 1.78 degrees F (0.99 degrees C) warmer than the average across the entire 20th century. Before 2016, 2015 was the warmest year on record, globally. And before 2015? Yep, 2014. In fact, all 10 of the warmest years on record have occurred since 2005, which tied with 2013 as the 10th-warmest year on record, according to NOAA’s Global Climate Report 2021 . Rounding out the top 6 hottest years on record across the globe are (in order of hottest to not as hot): 2020, 2019, 2015, 2017 and 2021.

For the contiguous United States and Alaska, 2016 was the second-warmest year on record and the 20th consecutive year that the annual average surface temperature exceeded the 122-year average since record keeping began, according to NOAA . Shattered heat records in the U.S. are increasingly becoming the norm: June 2021, for example, saw the warmest temperatures on record for that month for 15.2%of the contiguous U.S. That's the largest extent of record warm temperatures ever recorded in the country, according to the National Centers for Environmental Information .

Global warming increases extreme weather events

As global average temperatures warm, weather patterns are changing. An immediate consequence of global warming is extreme weather. 

These extremes come in a lot of different flavors. Paradoxically, one effect of climate change can be colder-than-normal winters in some areas.

Changes in climate can cause the polar jet stream — the boundary between the cold North Pole air and the warm equatorial air — to migrate south, bringing with it cold, Arctic air. This is why some states can have a sudden cold snap or colder-than-normal winter, even during the long-term trend of global warming, Werne explained.

Werne received his doctorate in Geological Sciences at Northwestern University in 2000 with an emphasis in Biogeochemistry. He was a postdoctoral research scientist at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research from 2000 to 2002 and on the faculty of the Large Lakes Observatory and Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry (assistant/associate professor) at the University of Minnesota Duluth, before joining the department in 2012. Werne spent a year in Perth, Australia, as a visiting senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies of the University of Western Australia, as well as a visiting scientist in the Western Australia Organic and Isotope Geochemistry Centre at Curtin University.

"Climate is, by definition, the long-term average of weather, over many years. One cold (or warm) year or season has little to do with overall climate. It is when those cold (or warm) years become more and more regular that we start to recognize it as a change in climate rather than simply an anomalous year of weather," he said. Global warming is also changing other extreme weather. According to the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory of NOAA , hurricanes are likely to become more intense, on average, in a warming world. Most computer models suggest that hurricane frequency will stay about the same (or even decrease), but those storms that do form will have the capacity to drop more rain due to the fact that warmer air holds more moisture.

"And even if they become less frequent globally, hurricanes could still become more frequent in some particular areas," said atmospheric scientist Adam Sobel, author of " Storm Surge: Hurricane Sandy, Our Changing Climate, and Extreme Weather of the Past and Future " (HarperWave, 2014). "Additionally, scientists are confident that hurricanes will become more intense due to climate change." This is because hurricanes get their energy from the temperature difference between the warm tropical ocean and the cold upper atmosphere. Global warming increases that temperature difference. "Since the most damage by far comes from the most intense hurricanes — such as typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in 2013 — this means that hurricanes could become overall more destructive," said Sobel, a Columbia University professor in the departments of Earth and Environmental Sciences, and Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics. (Hurricanes are called typhoons in the western North Pacific, and they're called cyclones in the South Pacific and Indian oceans.) What's more, hurricanes of the future will be hitting shorelines that are already prone to flooding due to the sea-level rise caused by climate change. This means that any given storm will likely cause more damage than it would have in a world without global warming.

Lightning is another weather feature that is being affected by global warming. According to a 2014 study , a 50% increase in the number of lightning strikes within the United States is expected by 2100 if global temperatures continue to rise. The researchers of the study found a 12% increase in lightning activity for every 1.8 degree F (1 degree C) of warming in the atmosphere. NOAA established the U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI) in 1996 to track extreme weather events. The number of extreme weather events that are among the most unusual in the historical record, according to the CEI, has been rising over the last four decades. Scientists project that extreme weather events, such as heat waves, droughts , blizzards and rainstorms will continue to occur more often and with greater intensity due to global warming, according to Climate Central . Climate models forecast that global warming will cause climate patterns worldwide to experience significant changes. These changes will likely include major shifts in wind patterns, annual precipitation and seasonal temperatures variations. These impacts vary by location and geography. For example, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) , the eastern United States has been trending wetter over time, while the West – and particularly the Southwest – have become increasingly dry. Because high levels of greenhouse gases are likely to remain in the atmosphere for many years, these changes are expected to last for several decades or longer, according to the EPA.

Global warming melts ice

One of the primary manifestations of climate change so far is melt. North America, Europe and Asia have all seen a trend toward less snow cover between 1960 and 2015, according to 2016 research published in the journal Current Climate Change Reports. According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, there is now 10% less permafrost , or permanently frozen ground, in the Northern Hemisphere than there was in the early 1900s. The thawing of permafrost can cause landslides and other sudden land collapses . It can also release long-buried microbes, as in a 2016 case when a cache of buried reindeer carcasses thawed and caused an outbreak of anthrax . One of the most dramatic effects of global warming is the reduction in Arctic sea ice. Sea ice hit record-low extents in both the fall and winter of 2015 and 2016, meaning that at the time when the ice is supposed to be at its peak, it was lagging. The melt means there is less thick sea ice that persists for multiple years. That means less heat is reflected back into the atmosphere by the shiny surface of the ice and more is absorbed by the comparatively darker ocean, creating a feedback loop that causes even more melt, according to NASA's Operation IceBridge . Glacial retreat, too, is an obvious effect of global warming. Only 25 glaciers bigger than 25 acres are now found in Montana's Glacier National Park, where about 150 glaciers were once found, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. A similar trend is seen in glacial areas worldwide. According to a 2016 study in the journal Nature Geoscience, there is a 99% likelihood that this rapid retreat is due to human-caused climate change. Some glaciers retreated up to 15 times as much as they would have without global warming, those researchers found.

In general, as ice melts, sea levels rise. According to a 2021 report by the World Meteorological Organization , the pace of sea level rise doubled from 0.08 inches (2.1 millimeters) per year between 1993 and 2002 to 0.17 inches (4.4 mm) per year between 2013 and 2021. 

Melting polar ice in the Arctic and Antarctic regions, coupled with melting ice sheets and glaciers across Greenland, North America, South America, Europe and Asia, are expected to raise sea levels significantly. Global sea levels have risen about 8 inches since 1870, according to the EPA, and the rate of increase is expected to accelerate in the coming years. If current trends continue, many coastal areas, where roughly half of the Earth's human population lives, will be inundated.

Researchers project that by 2100, average sea levels will be 2.3 feet (.7 meters) higher in New York City, 2.9 feet (0.88 m) higher at Hampton Roads, Virginia, and 3.5 feet (1.06 m) higher at Galveston, Texas, the EPA reports. According to an IPCC report , if greenhouse gas emissions remain unchecked, global sea levels could rise by as much as 3 feet (0.9 meters) by 2100. That estimate is an increase from the estimated 0.9 to 2.7 feet (0.3 to 0.8 meters) that was predicted in the 2007 IPCC report for future sea-level rise.

Sea level isn't the only thing changing for the oceans due to global warming. As levels of CO2 increase, the oceans absorb some of that gas, which increases the acidity of seawater. Werne explains it this way: "When you dissolved CO2 in water, you get carbonic acid. This is the same exact thing that happens in cans of soda. When you pop the top on a can of Dr Pepper, the pH is 2 — quite acidic."  

Since the Industrial Revolution began in the early 1700s, the acidity of the oceans has increased about 25 percent, according to the EPA. "This is a problem in the oceans, in large part, because many marine organisms make shells out of calcium carbonate (think corals, oysters), and their shells dissolve in acid solution," said Werne. "So as we add more and more CO2 to the ocean, it gets more and more acidic, dissolving more and more shells of sea creatures. It goes without saying that this is not good for their health."

If current ocean acidification trends continue, coral reefs are expected to become increasingly rare in areas where they are now common, including most U.S. waters, the EPA reports. In 2016 and 2017, portions of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia were hit with bleaching , a phenomenon in which coral eject their symbiotic algae. Bleaching is a sign of stress from too-warm waters, unbalanced pH or pollution; coral can recover from bleaching, but back-to-back episodes make recovery less likely.

The effects of global warming on Earth's ecosystems are expected to be significant and widespread. Many species of plants and animals are already moving their range northward or to higher altitudes as a result of warming temperatures, according to a report from the National Academy of Sciences.

"They are not just moving north, they are moving from the equator toward the poles. They are quite simply following the range of comfortable temperatures, which is migrating to the poles as the global average temperature warms," Werne said. Ultimately, he said, this becomes a problem when the rate of climate change velocity (how fast a region changes put into a spatial term) is faster than the rate that many organisms can migrate. Because of this, many animals may not be able to compete in the new climate regime and may go extinct.

Additionally, migratory birds and insects are now arriving in their summer feeding and nesting grounds several days or weeks earlier than they did in the 20th century, according to the EPA.

Warmer temperatures will also expand the range of many disease-causing pathogens that were once confined to tropical and subtropical areas, killing off plant and animal species that formerly were protected from disease.

In addition, animals that live in the polar regions are facing an existential threat. In the Arctic, the decline in sea ice and changes in ice melt threaten particularly ice-dependent species, such as narwhals ( Monodon monoceros ), polar bears ( Ursus maritimus ) and walruses ( Odobenus rosmarus ), the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) noted. Animals in the Antarctic also face serious challenges — in Oct. 2022 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declared emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) as endangered due to the threat of climate change. 

A 2020 study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggested that 1 in every 3 species of plant and animal are at risk of extinction by 2070 due to climate change.

As dramatic as the effects of climate change are expected to be on the natural world, the projected changes to human society may be even more devastating.

Agricultural systems will likely be dealt a crippling blow. Though growing seasons in some areas will expand, the combined impacts of drought, severe weather, lack of accumulated snowmelt, greater number and diversity of pests, lower groundwater tables and a loss of arable land could cause severe crop failures and livestock shortages worldwide.

North Carolina State University also notes that carbon dioxide is affecting plant growth. Though CO2 can increase the growth of plants, the plants may become less nutritious.

This loss of food security may, in turn, create havoc in international food markets and could spark famines, food riots, political instability and civil unrest worldwide, according to a number of analyses from sources as diverse as the U.S Department of Defense, the Center for American Progress and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

In addition to less nutritious food, the effect of global warming on human health is also expected to be serious. The American Medical Association has reported an increase in mosquito-borne diseases like malaria and dengue fever, as well as a rise in cases of chronic conditions like asthma, most likely as a direct result of global warming. The 2016 outbreak of Zika virus , a mosquito-borne illness, highlighted the dangers of climate change. The disease causes devastating birth defects in fetuses when pregnant women are infected, and climate change could make higher-latitude areas habitable for the mosquitoes that spread the disease, experts said. Longer, hotter summers could also lead to the spread of tick-borne illnesses .

Further reading on the impacts of global warming

Many governments and agencies keep up-to-date information on climate change research and statistics online. The most comprehensive and in-depth global reports are produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which released its Sixth Assessment Report on the science of climate change in 2021.

— 8 ominous climate milestones reached in 2021

— Ignoring climate change will lead to 'untold suffering,' scientist panel warns

— Earth's lower atmosphere is expanding due to climate change

For a historical look at the effects of climate change on Earth (and how modern warming compares), read Peter Brannen's " The Ends of the Earth: Volcanic Apocalypses, Lethal Oceans, and Our Quest to Understand Earth’s Past Mass Extinctions " (Ecco, 2017).

For more on the potential impacts of climate change in urban environments, the freely available book chapter Climate Change and its Impacts in the book " Climate Change Resilience in the Urban Environment " (IOP Publishing, 2017) covers the challenges that lay ahead for human populations.

Finally, for a psychological deep-dive on why all of this bad news is hard to take in, try " Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change " (Bloomsbury USA, 2015) by climate activist and communicator George Marshall.

• This NASA page includes a series of visualizations that illustrate how some of Earth's key climate indicators —  sea ice, sea level, global temperature and carbon dioxide — are changing over time.
• This NOAA sea-level rise learning module includes educational videos, background for teachers, learning objectives and more.
• ClimateBrief has gathered 10 of the best climate change videos on YouTube. 
• EPA: Climate Change: Basic Information  
• NASA: Global Climate Change
• NOAA: Climate News and Data

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Stephanie Pappas is a contributing writer for Live Science, covering topics ranging from geoscience to archaeology to the human brain and behavior. She was previously a senior writer for Live Science but is now a freelancer based in Denver, Colorado, and regularly contributes to Scientific American and The Monitor, the monthly magazine of the American Psychological Association. Stephanie received a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of South Carolina and a graduate certificate in science communication from the University of California, Santa Cruz. 

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• Factcheck: Why the recent ‘acceleration’ in global warming is what scientists expect

Zeke Hausfather

Over the past year, there has been a vigorous debate among scientists – and more broadly – about whether global warming is “accelerating”.

This, in turn, has led to questions about whether the world is warming “ faster than scientists expected ”.

Here, Carbon Brief takes a detailed look at the issue and finds that there is increasing evidence of an acceleration in the rate of warming over the past 15 years. 

However, this acceleration is broadly in line with projections from the latest generation of climate models and the recent sixth assessment report (AR6) from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). They all expect the world to warm notably faster in both current and future decades than the rate the world has experienced since 1970.

Carbon Brief’s analysis also reveals that the speed up in warming projected in the latest climate models (known as CMIP6 ) is similar to the acceleration estimated by prominent climate scientist Dr James Hansen and colleagues in their much-discussed 2023 paper in Oxford Open Climate Change . 

The IPCC’s AR6 also produced a set of “ assessed warming projections ” that incorporate multiple lines of evidence . While these project future warming levels a bit below the average of CMIP6 models, they still expect the rate of warming up to 2050 to be around 26% faster than the world has experienced to date since 1970.

Even with an apparent acceleration in recent warming, there remain major questions regarding drivers of 2023’s record-breaking heat relative to 2022, though annual temperatures still remain well within the range of climate-model projections.

An accelerating debate

Between 1970 and 2008, the world warmed at an approximately linear rate – by 0.18C per decade. 

However, in recent years, the rise in global surface temperatures has climbed above this long-term trend, with eight of the past nine years showing warming levels above what would be expected given the historical warming rate. 

In December 2022, former NASA scientist Dr James Hansen and colleagues published a preprint (later published as a peer-reviewed paper in 2023 ) projecting an acceleration in the rate of warming over the next few decades. Hansen and colleagues argued that the rate of warming would increase to between 0.27C and 0.36C per decade – or a 50-to-100% increase in the warming rate since 1970 – over the next 30 years.

These projections – coupled with the exceptional and unusual temperatures in 2023 – has fuelled a debate within the scientific community and among the broader public about a potential acceleration in warming in recent years.

This potential acceleration is illustrated in the figure below, which shows a composite of global surface temperatures from five different groups –  NASA GISTEMP , NOAA’s GlobalTemp , the UK Met Office/University of East Anglia’s HadCRUT5 , Berkeley Earth and Copernicus’ ERA5 – following an approach used by the World Meteorological Organization .

The circles indicate individual years and the dashed lines show the trend over 1970-2008 (blue) and 2009-23 (red). (The past 15 years are highlighted here as that is the time period that has previously been used to assess potential changes in the underlying trend in the scientific literature.)

The chart shows how the warming rate of 0.18C per decade seen since 1970 has almost doubled to roughly 0.3C per decade over the past 15 years. 

Researchers have proposed a number of potential contributors to the increased rate of warming seen in recent years.

One is the significant decline in global air pollution over the past few decades, as well as a 2020 phase-out of sulphur in marine fuels, which have reduced the levels of cooling aerosols in the atmosphere.

Other suggested factors include an approaching peak in the 11-year solar cycle, the 2022 eruption of the Hunga Tonga volcano and the continued increases in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations. 

The fact that the past 15 years ended on a particularly high point due to the current El Niño event might also result in higher warming rates – although the contribution of El Niño to overall 2023 temperatures remains an area of vigorous scientific debate .

It is possible to remove the estimated influence of some of the natural factors – such as El Niño and La Niña events, volcanic eruptions and variations in solar output – from the global temperature record. 

The figure below shows a version of the temperature record above where these natural factors are removed. The recent warming (red dashed line) is even more evident in this chart compared to the prior trend (blue).

However, despite this spate of very warm years, it is challenging to draw firm conclusions on the overall rate of global warming based on a time period as short as 15 years. 

Even though recent trends appear to show significant acceleration, the long-term trend remains – just barely – within the full range of uncertainty in climate model projections. 

There is a risk of conflating shorter-term climate variability with longer-term changes – a pitfall that the climate science community has encountered before. 

Parallels with the warming ‘hiatus’

The debate around a potential acceleration in warming shares similarities with another scientific contretemps – the so-called “ hiatus ” in warming of the early 21st century.

During the 15-year period from 1998 to 2012, the rate of warming at the surface appeared to nearly “pause” – or at least slow down dramatically compared to climate-model projections. 

The debate so consumed the scientific community – and some sections of the media – that there was a running joke among scientists that the journal Nature Climate Change should be renamed “Nature Hiatus” for the number of studies it published trying to explain the apparent slowdown.

In retrospect, the apparent hiatus and associated disagreement between climate models and observations was caused by a number of different factors. Key among them were natural variability (in the form of more heat uptake by the oceans), disparities in surface temperature records associated with a transition from ship engine room to automated buoy-based measurements of sea surface temperatures, and incomplete comparisons between climate models and observations that excluded areas such as the Arctic that had sparser observational coverage.

With the development of the 2015-16 “super” El Niño, any sign of a “pause” in warming quickly vanished and the argument faded away – though it made a brief return in climate-sceptic circles in more recent years. However, it left behind a lasting appreciation among many scientists for the danger of overinterpreting short-term climate variability and is one of the reasons why there has been reticence in some circles about current claims of an acceleration.

Nonetheless, there are a number of reasons to expect that what the world is currently experiencing is not just the influence of natural variability on top of human-caused warming . An acceleration of warming in recent decades also shows up in ocean heat content and in satellite measurements of the Earth’s energy imbalance .   

And, perhaps most importantly, an acceleration in the rate of warming in recent years – and over the coming decades – is exactly what is seen in climate models under a scenario in keeping with current global policies (known as SSP2-4.5 ). Under this scenario, greenhouse gas emissions remain around current levels until the middle of the century, alongside a decline in emissions of planet-cooling aerosols such as sulphur dioxide .

An expected acceleration

The most notable thing about the current apparent acceleration in warming is that it was expected.

Climate models have long shown a faster rate of warming in current and future decades than has been observed to date, though there is some disagreement among modelling estimates. 

The table below shows a compilation of both observed rates of warming to date and different model projections out to 2050. 

Global surface temperatures have warmed at a rate of 0.19C per decade between 1970 and 2023. They have warmed at a faster rate (~0.3C per decade) over the past 15 years – though with large uncertainties of 0.17C to 0.43C given the shorter time period.

The estimated human contribution to global warming of 0.23C for the past decade (2013 to 2022), as published in Earth System Science Data by Prof Piers Forster and colleagues, is based on a climate model emulator that is driven by an updated estimate of factors including the influence of greenhouse gases and aerosols on the Earth’s climate in recent years.

The IPCC’s AR6 provided “assessed warming projections” based on CMIP6 models – weighted based on their ability to accurately reproduce historical temperatures – and the recent synthesis of climate sensitivity estimates. These assessed warming projections show 0.24C warming per decade between 2015 and 2050 with an uncertainty range of 0.17C to 0.34C in the current-policy-type SSP2-4.5 scenario. This represents approximately 26% faster warming than the world has experienced since 1970.

The full CMIP6 ensemble of models has notably more warming than the IPCC-assessed warming projections. CMIP6 models, on average, warm by 0.29C per decade with a range of 0.2C to 0.4C, or 53% faster than historical warming since 1970.

The recent projections by Dr James Hansen and colleagues has a very similar projection of future warming rates to the CMIP6 ensemble, estimating warming of around 0.32C per decade with an uncertainty of 0.27C to 0.36C.

These estimates are summarised in the charts below, which show the historical warming rate (top left), the AR6 assessed range under SSP2-4.5 (top right), the CMIP6 models under SSP2-4.5 (bottom left) and Hansen et al’s future warming projection (bottom right). The blue dots and red dashed lines show observed data and the long-term trend, while the black lines and yellow shading show the average of model projections and their ranges.

In all three cases, there is an expectation of acceleration of warming both at present and in coming decades compared to the warming the world has experienced since 1970. 

However, this does not mean that the world will pass climate limits such as 1.5C sooner than expected. The current best estimates of when these thresholds will be passed are based on climate models that include the near-term warming acceleration.

The apparent acceleration of warming in recent years is well in line with climate model projections, which lends confidence that what the world is experiencing is a result of human activity rather than a result of natural variability.

However, this does not mean that the world will not experience cool years in the future; the next La Niña year – likely in 2025 – will probably end up well below some of the prior record-setting years. 

But, as long as global emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases fail to decline and the world continues to tackle aerosol pollution, the world will likely warm faster than experienced in the past.

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• Biology Article
• Essay on Global Warming

Essay On Global Warming

Essay on global warming is an important topic for students to understand. The essay brings to light the plight of the environment and the repercussion of anthropogenic activities. Continue reading to discover tips and tricks for writing an engaging and interesting essay on global warming.

Essay On Global Warming in 300 Words

Global warming is a phenomenon where the earth’s average temperature rises due to increased amounts of greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and ozone trap the incoming radiation from the sun. This effect creates a natural “blanket”, which prevents the heat from escaping back into the atmosphere. This effect is called the greenhouse effect.

Contrary to popular belief, greenhouse gases are not inherently bad. In fact, the greenhouse effect is quite important for life on earth. Without this effect, the sun’s radiation would be reflected back into the atmosphere, freezing the surface and making life impossible. However, when greenhouse gases in excess amounts get trapped, serious repercussions begin to appear. The polar ice caps begin to melt, leading to a rise in sea levels. Furthermore, the greenhouse effect is accelerated when polar ice caps and sea ice melts. This is due to the fact the ice reflects 50% to 70% of the sun’s rays back into space, but without ice, the solar radiation gets absorbed. Seawater reflects only 6% of the sun’s radiation back into space. What’s more frightening is the fact that the poles contain large amounts of carbon dioxide trapped within the ice. If this ice melts, it will significantly contribute to global warming. 

A related scenario when this phenomenon goes out of control is the runaway-greenhouse effect. This scenario is essentially similar to an apocalypse, but it is all too real. Though this has never happened in the earth’s entire history, it is speculated to have occurred on Venus. Millions of years ago, Venus was thought to have an atmosphere similar to that of the earth. But due to the runaway greenhouse effect, surface temperatures around the planet began rising. 

If this occurs on the earth, the runaway greenhouse effect will lead to many unpleasant scenarios – temperatures will rise hot enough for oceans to evaporate. Once the oceans evaporate, the rocks will start to sublimate under heat. In order to prevent such a scenario, proper measures have to be taken to stop climate change.

More to Read: Learn How Greenhouse Effect works

Tips To Writing the Perfect Essay

Consider adopting the following strategies when writing an essay. These are proven methods of securing more marks in an exam or assignment.

• Begin the essay with an introductory paragraph detailing the history or origin of the given topic.
• Try to reduce the use of jargons. Use sparingly if the topic requires it.
• Ensure that the content is presented in bulleted points wherever appropriate.
• Insert and highlight factual data, such as dates, names and places.
• Remember to break up the content into smaller paragraphs. 100-120 words per paragraph should suffice.
• Always conclude the essay with a closing paragraph.

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Global Warming Definition, Causes, Effects, Impacts, Solutions

Global Warming is a long-term increase in average global temperature. Read about Global Warming Definition, Causes, Effects, Impact on Climate Change & Solutions for the UPSC exam.

Table of Contents

What is Global Warming?

Global Warming is a long-term increase in average global temperature. It is considered a natural phenomenon, but anthropogenic activities on earth, particularly post Industrial Revolution , have led to an increase in the rate of this temperature increase. Various Reports published by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have time and again highlighted that since 1850 human activities have led to an increase of about 1 degree Celsius in average global temperature. Most of this warming has taken place in the second half of the 20th century. The fact that 5 of the hottest recorded year have occurred since 2015 can help us better understand the calamitous impact of anthropogenic activities.

Global Warming Causes

Green House Gases also known as GHGs in the atmosphere trap the solar radiations that are reflected by the earth’s surface. Under normal circumstances, most of these radiations escape into outer space. However, the release of GHGs by anthropogenic activities has increased their concentration in the atmosphere. Thus, the earth is getting hotter and hotter. 

Some of the common GHGs include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, chlorofluorocarbons, and water vapour, among others. The global warming potential of each GHG is different. For example, methane has a 25-time warming potential than carbon dioxide. Similarly, nitrous oxide has more than 250 times the warming potential than carbon dioxide. The top  anthropogenic activities that are responsible for the release of GHGs are shown below.

Global Warming and Green House Effect

Both phenomena are related to each other. Green House Gases also known as GHGs in the atmosphere trap the solar radiations that are reflected by the earth’s surface. Under normal circumstances, most of these radiations escape into outer space. However, the release of GHGs by anthropogenic activities has increased their concentration in the atmosphere. This is the primary cause of Global Warming . 

Global Warming Effects

Increase in the average temperature of the earth.

According to IPCC reports, human-induced global warming is responsible for nearly 1 degree Celsius temperature rise vis a vis pre-industrial level. Data from NASA suggest that 2016 has been the hottest year on record.

Frequency of Extreme Weather Events is Increasing

Across the globe, extreme weather events have increased in occurrence. For example, forest fires in California have become an annual event. Also, it is increasing in frequency each year. Most recently, we have recorded the phenomena of heat waves in Antarctica. The intensity of cyclones in the Bay of Bengal region has increased. Similarly, the frequency of occurrence of El Niño and La Niña has reduced from once in 8–10 years to once in 3–4 years now. More frequent episodes of floods and drought are being recorded every year across the world.

Melting of Ice

According to IPCC, there is 10% less permafrost in North Hemisphere at present compared to the 1900s. Remote sensing data suggest Arctic ice is melting fast. Experts suggest that not only will the sea level rise with the melting of glaciers, but there is also a danger of new bacteria and viruses being released into the environment which has so far been trapped in ice sheets. This may lead to outbreaks of disease and pandemics which are beyond the control of human medical sciences.

Sea Level Rise and Acidification of Ocean

A report published by WMO, suggests that the rate of sea level rise has doubled for the period between 2013 and 2021 compared to the rate for the period between 1993 and 2002. Earth scientists are suggesting that if this phenomenon continues, many human-inhabited coastal areas will be submerged into the sea in the coming decades. Also, with the concentration of carbon dioxide rising in the atmosphere, oceans are absorbing more of it. This is leading to ocean acidification. The impact of this phenomenon can be disastrous for ocean biodiversity, particularly the coral reefs. 

Adverse Impact on Terrestrial Ecosystems of the Earth

It has been recorded that many flora and fauna species are heading northwards in Northern Hemisphere. Significant changes have been observed in the migratory movements of birds across the world. Early arrival to their summer feeding and breeding grounds is quite evident. Expert biologists suggest that rising temperatures in the tropical and subtropical regions may lead to an outbreak of new diseases, which in turn may render many floral and faunal species extinct.

Social and Economic Impact

A rising number of extreme weather events will have an adverse impact on agriculture and fisheries. Rising global temperatures will have a negative impact on the productivity of human beings, particularly in tropical and subtropical regions of the earth. The impact on life and livelihoods of indigenous people across the world will be even more pronounced. 

Global Warming Solutions

Global cooperation for reduction of emissions.

It is time that the target of containing the global average temperature rise within 1.5 degrees Celsius of pre-industrial levels is taken seriously. Also, global efforts should be based on a spirit of Common But Differentiated Responsibility. This will ensure that historical injustices done to the global south are duly acknowledged, and they have an equal chance to transform themselves into developed countries. Countries must act proactively to achieve Net Zero Emission status at the earliest. 

Transition to Cleaner and Greener Forms of Energy

Thermal power plants based on coal should be made more efficient and inefficient ones should be phased off. Also, mass adoption of renewable forms of energy like solar should be promoted. Similarly, avenues for using hydrogen as energy fuel should be looked into. We must also explore the possibility of Nuclear fusion for energy generation, in addition to making nuclear fission-based energy generation safer.

Changes in Agricultural Practices and Land Use

Agriculture based on the use of nitrogenous fertilizers must be replaced with organic farming techniques. Also, methane gas released from agricultural and cattle waste must be trapped as biogas for domestic usage. Massive afforestation drives must be organized. Urban governments must make it a point to include green spaces in urban planning.

Improving Transportation System

The advent of E-vehicles is a welcome change, but we need to make the batteries used in these vehicles more efficient. Urban planners must make public transportation systems inherent as a benchmark of good urban planning. Also, urban planning should be such that it promotes more walking and cycling habits among the residents. 

Behavioural Changes

All the above discussions will have no meaning if we as individuals are not sensitive enough. We need to make reducing, reusing and recycling a mantra of our living. It should be our civic duty to save water, and wildlife and raise awareness among others. 

Solar Geoengineering

Solar geoengineering, a proposed climate intervention method, aims to counteract global warming by reflecting a portion of the sun’s rays back into space. One prominent approach involves injecting substances like sulphur dioxide into the upper atmosphere to create reflective aerosols. These particles can scatter sunlight, reducing the Earth’s temperature. However, solar geoengineering is a topic of debate, with concerns about its side effects, such as disrupted weather patterns and potential geopolitical risks. Research in this field is ongoing, but it remains a theoretical concept with limited practical implementation.

Can Solar Geoengineering Halt Global Warming?

Solar geoengineering, specifically solar radiation management (SRM), is under scrutiny as a potential method to mitigate global warming. SRM involves reflecting sunlight away from Earth, often by injecting substances like sulphur dioxide into the upper atmosphere to create reflective aerosols. However, its effectiveness remains a subject of debate, with concerns about potential side effects and ethical implications. While research in this field is ongoing, solar geoengineering is currently in a theoretical stage, with limited practical implementation.

Global Warming Conclusion

It is rightly said that “Charity begins at home.” Climate action will be more efficient if we go by this spirit. To begin with, each individual can make sure that what is happening in their house and immediate surroundings is in harmony with the environment. If this can happen, all the policies we are making at the local, national, regional and global levels will give far better results. 

Global Warming UPSC

Each year, we read about rising global temperatures. Also, catching the headlines is the news related to disasters caused by events like cyclones, forest fires, floods and drought. All these phenomena can be attributed to one single cause which is global warming. 

Global Warming is a long-term increase in average global temperature. It is considered a natural phenomenon, but anthropogenic activities on earth, particularly post-Industrial Revolution, have led to an increase in the rate of this temperature increase.

Sharing is caring!

Why is global warming a problem?

Global Warming at present rate can lead to disastrous impacts like rising sea level, out break of new diseases, extreme weather events among others.

What are 3 causes of global warming?

Human induced green house gas emission due to activities like agriculture, industrial emissions, transportation are the top 3 causes of global warming.

What are 5 effects of global warming?

Rising sea level, out break of new diseases, extreme weather events, changes in biodiversity and melting of glaciers are top 5 effects of global warming.

Why global warming is important?

Global warming at its natural rate is important to keep up the temperature of earth within the range that makes it habitable. This makes global warming important.

Can we control global warming?

Number of mitigation measures like shifting to cleaning forms of energy and transportation can be taken to control global warming.

Who help with global warming?

Global Warming is a collective challenge for entire humanity. Citizens, civil societies, governments and businesses must act in unison to address it.

I, Sakshi Gupta, am a content writer to empower students aiming for UPSC, PSC, and other competitive exams. My objective is to provide clear, concise, and informative content that caters to your exam preparation needs. I strive to make my content not only informative but also engaging, keeping you motivated throughout your journey!

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• Published: 17 April 2024

The economic commitment of climate change

• Maximilian Kotz   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2564-5043 1 , 2 ,
• Anders Levermann   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4432-4704 1 , 2 &
• Leonie Wenz   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8500-1568 1 , 3  

Nature volume  628 ,  pages 551–557 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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• Environmental economics
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• Projection and prediction

Global projections of macroeconomic climate-change damages typically consider impacts from average annual and national temperatures over long time horizons 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 . Here we use recent empirical findings from more than 1,600 regions worldwide over the past 40 years to project sub-national damages from temperature and precipitation, including daily variability and extremes 7 , 8 . Using an empirical approach that provides a robust lower bound on the persistence of impacts on economic growth, we find that the world economy is committed to an income reduction of 19% within the next 26 years independent of future emission choices (relative to a baseline without climate impacts, likely range of 11–29% accounting for physical climate and empirical uncertainty). These damages already outweigh the mitigation costs required to limit global warming to 2 °C by sixfold over this near-term time frame and thereafter diverge strongly dependent on emission choices. Committed damages arise predominantly through changes in average temperature, but accounting for further climatic components raises estimates by approximately 50% and leads to stronger regional heterogeneity. Committed losses are projected for all regions except those at very high latitudes, at which reductions in temperature variability bring benefits. The largest losses are committed at lower latitudes in regions with lower cumulative historical emissions and lower present-day income.

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Climate damage projections beyond annual temperature

Investment incentive reduced by climate damages can be restored by optimal policy

Climate economics support for the UN climate targets

Projections of the macroeconomic damage caused by future climate change are crucial to informing public and policy debates about adaptation, mitigation and climate justice. On the one hand, adaptation against climate impacts must be justified and planned on the basis of an understanding of their future magnitude and spatial distribution 9 . This is also of importance in the context of climate justice 10 , as well as to key societal actors, including governments, central banks and private businesses, which increasingly require the inclusion of climate risks in their macroeconomic forecasts to aid adaptive decision-making 11 , 12 . On the other hand, climate mitigation policy such as the Paris Climate Agreement is often evaluated by balancing the costs of its implementation against the benefits of avoiding projected physical damages. This evaluation occurs both formally through cost–benefit analyses 1 , 4 , 5 , 6 , as well as informally through public perception of mitigation and damage costs 13 .

Projections of future damages meet challenges when informing these debates, in particular the human biases relating to uncertainty and remoteness that are raised by long-term perspectives 14 . Here we aim to overcome such challenges by assessing the extent of economic damages from climate change to which the world is already committed by historical emissions and socio-economic inertia (the range of future emission scenarios that are considered socio-economically plausible 15 ). Such a focus on the near term limits the large uncertainties about diverging future emission trajectories, the resulting long-term climate response and the validity of applying historically observed climate–economic relations over long timescales during which socio-technical conditions may change considerably. As such, this focus aims to simplify the communication and maximize the credibility of projected economic damages from future climate change.

In projecting the future economic damages from climate change, we make use of recent advances in climate econometrics that provide evidence for impacts on sub-national economic growth from numerous components of the distribution of daily temperature and precipitation 3 , 7 , 8 . Using fixed-effects panel regression models to control for potential confounders, these studies exploit within-region variation in local temperature and precipitation in a panel of more than 1,600 regions worldwide, comprising climate and income data over the past 40 years, to identify the plausibly causal effects of changes in several climate variables on economic productivity 16 , 17 . Specifically, macroeconomic impacts have been identified from changing daily temperature variability, total annual precipitation, the annual number of wet days and extreme daily rainfall that occur in addition to those already identified from changing average temperature 2 , 3 , 18 . Moreover, regional heterogeneity in these effects based on the prevailing local climatic conditions has been found using interactions terms. The selection of these climate variables follows micro-level evidence for mechanisms related to the impacts of average temperatures on labour and agricultural productivity 2 , of temperature variability on agricultural productivity and health 7 , as well as of precipitation on agricultural productivity, labour outcomes and flood damages 8 (see Extended Data Table 1 for an overview, including more detailed references). References  7 , 8 contain a more detailed motivation for the use of these particular climate variables and provide extensive empirical tests about the robustness and nature of their effects on economic output, which are summarized in Methods . By accounting for these extra climatic variables at the sub-national level, we aim for a more comprehensive description of climate impacts with greater detail across both time and space.

Constraining the persistence of impacts

A key determinant and source of discrepancy in estimates of the magnitude of future climate damages is the extent to which the impact of a climate variable on economic growth rates persists. The two extreme cases in which these impacts persist indefinitely or only instantaneously are commonly referred to as growth or level effects 19 , 20 (see Methods section ‘Empirical model specification: fixed-effects distributed lag models’ for mathematical definitions). Recent work shows that future damages from climate change depend strongly on whether growth or level effects are assumed 20 . Following refs.  2 , 18 , we provide constraints on this persistence by using distributed lag models to test the significance of delayed effects separately for each climate variable. Notably, and in contrast to refs.  2 , 18 , we use climate variables in their first-differenced form following ref.  3 , implying a dependence of the growth rate on a change in climate variables. This choice means that a baseline specification without any lags constitutes a model prior of purely level effects, in which a permanent change in the climate has only an instantaneous effect on the growth rate 3 , 19 , 21 . By including lags, one can then test whether any effects may persist further. This is in contrast to the specification used by refs.  2 , 18 , in which climate variables are used without taking the first difference, implying a dependence of the growth rate on the level of climate variables. In this alternative case, the baseline specification without any lags constitutes a model prior of pure growth effects, in which a change in climate has an infinitely persistent effect on the growth rate. Consequently, including further lags in this alternative case tests whether the initial growth impact is recovered 18 , 19 , 21 . Both of these specifications suffer from the limiting possibility that, if too few lags are included, one might falsely accept the model prior. The limitations of including a very large number of lags, including loss of data and increasing statistical uncertainty with an increasing number of parameters, mean that such a possibility is likely. By choosing a specification in which the model prior is one of level effects, our approach is therefore conservative by design, avoiding assumptions of infinite persistence of climate impacts on growth and instead providing a lower bound on this persistence based on what is observable empirically (see Methods section ‘Empirical model specification: fixed-effects distributed lag models’ for further exposition of this framework). The conservative nature of such a choice is probably the reason that ref.  19 finds much greater consistency between the impacts projected by models that use the first difference of climate variables, as opposed to their levels.

We begin our empirical analysis of the persistence of climate impacts on growth using ten lags of the first-differenced climate variables in fixed-effects distributed lag models. We detect substantial effects on economic growth at time lags of up to approximately 8–10 years for the temperature terms and up to approximately 4 years for the precipitation terms (Extended Data Fig. 1 and Extended Data Table 2 ). Furthermore, evaluation by means of information criteria indicates that the inclusion of all five climate variables and the use of these numbers of lags provide a preferable trade-off between best-fitting the data and including further terms that could cause overfitting, in comparison with model specifications excluding climate variables or including more or fewer lags (Extended Data Fig. 3 , Supplementary Methods Section  1 and Supplementary Table 1 ). We therefore remove statistically insignificant terms at later lags (Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 and Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 ). Further tests using Monte Carlo simulations demonstrate that the empirical models are robust to autocorrelation in the lagged climate variables (Supplementary Methods Section  2 and Supplementary Figs. 4 and 5 ), that information criteria provide an effective indicator for lag selection (Supplementary Methods Section  2 and Supplementary Fig. 6 ), that the results are robust to concerns of imperfect multicollinearity between climate variables and that including several climate variables is actually necessary to isolate their separate effects (Supplementary Methods Section  3 and Supplementary Fig. 7 ). We provide a further robustness check using a restricted distributed lag model to limit oscillations in the lagged parameter estimates that may result from autocorrelation, finding that it provides similar estimates of cumulative marginal effects to the unrestricted model (Supplementary Methods Section 4 and Supplementary Figs. 8 and 9 ). Finally, to explicitly account for any outstanding uncertainty arising from the precise choice of the number of lags, we include empirical models with marginally different numbers of lags in the error-sampling procedure of our projection of future damages. On the basis of the lag-selection procedure (the significance of lagged terms in Extended Data Fig. 1 and Extended Data Table 2 , as well as information criteria in Extended Data Fig. 3 ), we sample from models with eight to ten lags for temperature and four for precipitation (models shown in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 and Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 ). In summary, this empirical approach to constrain the persistence of climate impacts on economic growth rates is conservative by design in avoiding assumptions of infinite persistence, but nevertheless provides a lower bound on the extent of impact persistence that is robust to the numerous tests outlined above.

Committed damages until mid-century

We combine these empirical economic response functions (Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 and Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 ) with an ensemble of 21 climate models (see Supplementary Table 5 ) from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP-6) 22 to project the macroeconomic damages from these components of physical climate change (see Methods for further details). Bias-adjusted climate models that provide a highly accurate reproduction of observed climatological patterns with limited uncertainty (Supplementary Table 6 ) are used to avoid introducing biases in the projections. Following a well-developed literature 2 , 3 , 19 , these projections do not aim to provide a prediction of future economic growth. Instead, they are a projection of the exogenous impact of future climate conditions on the economy relative to the baselines specified by socio-economic projections, based on the plausibly causal relationships inferred by the empirical models and assuming ceteris paribus. Other exogenous factors relevant for the prediction of economic output are purposefully assumed constant.

A Monte Carlo procedure that samples from climate model projections, empirical models with different numbers of lags and model parameter estimates (obtained by 1,000 block-bootstrap resamples of each of the regressions in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 and Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 ) is used to estimate the combined uncertainty from these sources. Given these uncertainty distributions, we find that projected global damages are statistically indistinguishable across the two most extreme emission scenarios until 2049 (at the 5% significance level; Fig. 1 ). As such, the climate damages occurring before this time constitute those to which the world is already committed owing to the combination of past emissions and the range of future emission scenarios that are considered socio-economically plausible 15 . These committed damages comprise a permanent income reduction of 19% on average globally (population-weighted average) in comparison with a baseline without climate-change impacts (with a likely range of 11–29%, following the likelihood classification adopted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); see caption of Fig. 1 ). Even though levels of income per capita generally still increase relative to those of today, this constitutes a permanent income reduction for most regions, including North America and Europe (each with median income reductions of approximately 11%) and with South Asia and Africa being the most strongly affected (each with median income reductions of approximately 22%; Fig. 1 ). Under a middle-of-the road scenario of future income development (SSP2, in which SSP stands for Shared Socio-economic Pathway), this corresponds to global annual damages in 2049 of 38 trillion in 2005 international dollars (likely range of 19–59 trillion 2005 international dollars). Compared with empirical specifications that assume pure growth or pure level effects, our preferred specification that provides a robust lower bound on the extent of climate impact persistence produces damages between these two extreme assumptions (Extended Data Fig. 3 ).

Estimates of the projected reduction in income per capita from changes in all climate variables based on empirical models of climate impacts on economic output with a robust lower bound on their persistence (Extended Data Fig. 1 ) under a low-emission scenario compatible with the 2 °C warming target and a high-emission scenario (SSP2-RCP2.6 and SSP5-RCP8.5, respectively) are shown in purple and orange, respectively. Shading represents the 34% and 10% confidence intervals reflecting the likely and very likely ranges, respectively (following the likelihood classification adopted by the IPCC), having estimated uncertainty from a Monte Carlo procedure, which samples the uncertainty from the choice of physical climate models, empirical models with different numbers of lags and bootstrapped estimates of the regression parameters shown in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 . Vertical dashed lines show the time at which the climate damages of the two emission scenarios diverge at the 5% and 1% significance levels based on the distribution of differences between emission scenarios arising from the uncertainty sampling discussed above. Note that uncertainty in the difference of the two scenarios is smaller than the combined uncertainty of the two respective scenarios because samples of the uncertainty (climate model and empirical model choice, as well as model parameter bootstrap) are consistent across the two emission scenarios, hence the divergence of damages occurs while the uncertainty bounds of the two separate damage scenarios still overlap. Estimates of global mitigation costs from the three IAMs that provide results for the SSP2 baseline and SSP2-RCP2.6 scenario are shown in light green in the top panel, with the median of these estimates shown in bold.

Damages already outweigh mitigation costs

We compare the damages to which the world is committed over the next 25 years to estimates of the mitigation costs required to achieve the Paris Climate Agreement. Taking estimates of mitigation costs from the three integrated assessment models (IAMs) in the IPCC AR6 database 23 that provide results under comparable scenarios (SSP2 baseline and SSP2-RCP2.6, in which RCP stands for Representative Concentration Pathway), we find that the median committed climate damages are larger than the median mitigation costs in 2050 (six trillion in 2005 international dollars) by a factor of approximately six (note that estimates of mitigation costs are only provided every 10 years by the IAMs and so a comparison in 2049 is not possible). This comparison simply aims to compare the magnitude of future damages against mitigation costs, rather than to conduct a formal cost–benefit analysis of transitioning from one emission path to another. Formal cost–benefit analyses typically find that the net benefits of mitigation only emerge after 2050 (ref.  5 ), which may lead some to conclude that physical damages from climate change are simply not large enough to outweigh mitigation costs until the second half of the century. Our simple comparison of their magnitudes makes clear that damages are actually already considerably larger than mitigation costs and the delayed emergence of net mitigation benefits results primarily from the fact that damages across different emission paths are indistinguishable until mid-century (Fig. 1 ).

Although these near-term damages constitute those to which the world is already committed, we note that damage estimates diverge strongly across emission scenarios after 2049, conveying the clear benefits of mitigation from a purely economic point of view that have been emphasized in previous studies 4 , 24 . As well as the uncertainties assessed in Fig. 1 , these conclusions are robust to structural choices, such as the timescale with which changes in the moderating variables of the empirical models are estimated (Supplementary Figs. 10 and 11 ), as well as the order in which one accounts for the intertemporal and international components of currency comparison (Supplementary Fig. 12 ; see Methods for further details).

Damages from variability and extremes

Committed damages primarily arise through changes in average temperature (Fig. 2 ). This reflects the fact that projected changes in average temperature are larger than those in other climate variables when expressed as a function of their historical interannual variability (Extended Data Fig. 4 ). Because the historical variability is that on which the empirical models are estimated, larger projected changes in comparison with this variability probably lead to larger future impacts in a purely statistical sense. From a mechanistic perspective, one may plausibly interpret this result as implying that future changes in average temperature are the most unprecedented from the perspective of the historical fluctuations to which the economy is accustomed and therefore will cause the most damage. This insight may prove useful in terms of guiding adaptation measures to the sources of greatest damage.

Estimates of the median projected reduction in sub-national income per capita across emission scenarios (SSP2-RCP2.6 and SSP2-RCP8.5) as well as climate model, empirical model and model parameter uncertainty in the year in which climate damages diverge at the 5% level (2049, as identified in Fig. 1 ). a , Impacts arising from all climate variables. b – f , Impacts arising separately from changes in annual mean temperature ( b ), daily temperature variability ( c ), total annual precipitation ( d ), the annual number of wet days (>1 mm) ( e ) and extreme daily rainfall ( f ) (see Methods for further definitions). Data on national administrative boundaries are obtained from the GADM database version 3.6 and are freely available for academic use ( https://gadm.org/ ).

Nevertheless, future damages based on empirical models that consider changes in annual average temperature only and exclude the other climate variables constitute income reductions of only 13% in 2049 (Extended Data Fig. 5a , likely range 5–21%). This suggests that accounting for the other components of the distribution of temperature and precipitation raises net damages by nearly 50%. This increase arises through the further damages that these climatic components cause, but also because their inclusion reveals a stronger negative economic response to average temperatures (Extended Data Fig. 5b ). The latter finding is consistent with our Monte Carlo simulations, which suggest that the magnitude of the effect of average temperature on economic growth is underestimated unless accounting for the impacts of other correlated climate variables (Supplementary Fig. 7 ).

In terms of the relative contributions of the different climatic components to overall damages, we find that accounting for daily temperature variability causes the largest increase in overall damages relative to empirical frameworks that only consider changes in annual average temperature (4.9 percentage points, likely range 2.4–8.7 percentage points, equivalent to approximately 10 trillion international dollars). Accounting for precipitation causes smaller increases in overall damages, which are—nevertheless—equivalent to approximately 1.2 trillion international dollars: 0.01 percentage points (−0.37–0.33 percentage points), 0.34 percentage points (0.07–0.90 percentage points) and 0.36 percentage points (0.13–0.65 percentage points) from total annual precipitation, the number of wet days and extreme daily precipitation, respectively. Moreover, climate models seem to underestimate future changes in temperature variability 25 and extreme precipitation 26 , 27 in response to anthropogenic forcing as compared with that observed historically, suggesting that the true impacts from these variables may be larger.

The distribution of committed damages

The spatial distribution of committed damages (Fig. 2a ) reflects a complex interplay between the patterns of future change in several climatic components and those of historical economic vulnerability to changes in those variables. Damages resulting from increasing annual mean temperature (Fig. 2b ) are negative almost everywhere globally, and larger at lower latitudes in regions in which temperatures are already higher and economic vulnerability to temperature increases is greatest (see the response heterogeneity to mean temperature embodied in Extended Data Fig. 1a ). This occurs despite the amplified warming projected at higher latitudes 28 , suggesting that regional heterogeneity in economic vulnerability to temperature changes outweighs heterogeneity in the magnitude of future warming (Supplementary Fig. 13a ). Economic damages owing to daily temperature variability (Fig. 2c ) exhibit a strong latitudinal polarisation, primarily reflecting the physical response of daily variability to greenhouse forcing in which increases in variability across lower latitudes (and Europe) contrast decreases at high latitudes 25 (Supplementary Fig. 13b ). These two temperature terms are the dominant determinants of the pattern of overall damages (Fig. 2a ), which exhibits a strong polarity with damages across most of the globe except at the highest northern latitudes. Future changes in total annual precipitation mainly bring economic benefits except in regions of drying, such as the Mediterranean and central South America (Fig. 2d and Supplementary Fig. 13c ), but these benefits are opposed by changes in the number of wet days, which produce damages with a similar pattern of opposite sign (Fig. 2e and Supplementary Fig. 13d ). By contrast, changes in extreme daily rainfall produce damages in all regions, reflecting the intensification of daily rainfall extremes over global land areas 29 , 30 (Fig. 2f and Supplementary Fig. 13e ).

The spatial distribution of committed damages implies considerable injustice along two dimensions: culpability for the historical emissions that have caused climate change and pre-existing levels of socio-economic welfare. Spearman’s rank correlations indicate that committed damages are significantly larger in countries with smaller historical cumulative emissions, as well as in regions with lower current income per capita (Fig. 3 ). This implies that those countries that will suffer the most from the damages already committed are those that are least responsible for climate change and which also have the least resources to adapt to it.

Estimates of the median projected change in national income per capita across emission scenarios (RCP2.6 and RCP8.5) as well as climate model, empirical model and model parameter uncertainty in the year in which climate damages diverge at the 5% level (2049, as identified in Fig. 1 ) are plotted against cumulative national emissions per capita in 2020 (from the Global Carbon Project) and coloured by national income per capita in 2020 (from the World Bank) in a and vice versa in b . In each panel, the size of each scatter point is weighted by the national population in 2020 (from the World Bank). Inset numbers indicate the Spearman’s rank correlation ρ and P -values for a hypothesis test whose null hypothesis is of no correlation, as well as the Spearman’s rank correlation weighted by national population.

To further quantify this heterogeneity, we assess the difference in committed damages between the upper and lower quartiles of regions when ranked by present income levels and historical cumulative emissions (using a population weighting to both define the quartiles and estimate the group averages). On average, the quartile of countries with lower income are committed to an income loss that is 8.9 percentage points (or 61%) greater than the upper quartile (Extended Data Fig. 6 ), with a likely range of 3.8–14.7 percentage points across the uncertainty sampling of our damage projections (following the likelihood classification adopted by the IPCC). Similarly, the quartile of countries with lower historical cumulative emissions are committed to an income loss that is 6.9 percentage points (or 40%) greater than the upper quartile, with a likely range of 0.27–12 percentage points. These patterns reemphasize the prevalence of injustice in climate impacts 31 , 32 , 33 in the context of the damages to which the world is already committed by historical emissions and socio-economic inertia.

Contextualizing the magnitude of damages

The magnitude of projected economic damages exceeds previous literature estimates 2 , 3 , arising from several developments made on previous approaches. Our estimates are larger than those of ref.  2 (see first row of Extended Data Table 3 ), primarily because of the facts that sub-national estimates typically show a steeper temperature response (see also refs.  3 , 34 ) and that accounting for other climatic components raises damage estimates (Extended Data Fig. 5 ). However, we note that our empirical approach using first-differenced climate variables is conservative compared with that of ref.  2 in regard to the persistence of climate impacts on growth (see introduction and Methods section ‘Empirical model specification: fixed-effects distributed lag models’), an important determinant of the magnitude of long-term damages 19 , 21 . Using a similar empirical specification to ref.  2 , which assumes infinite persistence while maintaining the rest of our approach (sub-national data and further climate variables), produces considerably larger damages (purple curve of Extended Data Fig. 3 ). Compared with studies that do take the first difference of climate variables 3 , 35 , our estimates are also larger (see second and third rows of Extended Data Table 3 ). The inclusion of further climate variables (Extended Data Fig. 5 ) and a sufficient number of lags to more adequately capture the extent of impact persistence (Extended Data Figs. 1 and 2 ) are the main sources of this difference, as is the use of specifications that capture nonlinearities in the temperature response when compared with ref.  35 . In summary, our estimates develop on previous studies by incorporating the latest data and empirical insights 7 , 8 , as well as in providing a robust empirical lower bound on the persistence of impacts on economic growth, which constitutes a middle ground between the extremes of the growth-versus-levels debate 19 , 21 (Extended Data Fig. 3 ).

Compared with the fraction of variance explained by the empirical models historically (<5%), the projection of reductions in income of 19% may seem large. This arises owing to the fact that projected changes in climatic conditions are much larger than those that were experienced historically, particularly for changes in average temperature (Extended Data Fig. 4 ). As such, any assessment of future climate-change impacts necessarily requires an extrapolation outside the range of the historical data on which the empirical impact models were evaluated. Nevertheless, these models constitute the most state-of-the-art methods for inference of plausibly causal climate impacts based on observed data. Moreover, we take explicit steps to limit out-of-sample extrapolation by capping the moderating variables of the interaction terms at the 95th percentile of the historical distribution (see Methods ). This avoids extrapolating the marginal effects outside what was observed historically. Given the nonlinear response of economic output to annual mean temperature (Extended Data Fig. 1 and Extended Data Table 2 ), this is a conservative choice that limits the magnitude of damages that we project. Furthermore, back-of-the-envelope calculations indicate that the projected damages are consistent with the magnitude and patterns of historical economic development (see Supplementary Discussion Section  5 ).

Missing impacts and spatial spillovers

Despite assessing several climatic components from which economic impacts have recently been identified 3 , 7 , 8 , this assessment of aggregate climate damages should not be considered comprehensive. Important channels such as impacts from heatwaves 31 , sea-level rise 36 , tropical cyclones 37 and tipping points 38 , 39 , as well as non-market damages such as those to ecosystems 40 and human health 41 , are not considered in these estimates. Sea-level rise is unlikely to be feasibly incorporated into empirical assessments such as this because historical sea-level variability is mostly small. Non-market damages are inherently intractable within our estimates of impacts on aggregate monetary output and estimates of these impacts could arguably be considered as extra to those identified here. Recent empirical work suggests that accounting for these channels would probably raise estimates of these committed damages, with larger damages continuing to arise in the global south 31 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 .

Moreover, our main empirical analysis does not explicitly evaluate the potential for impacts in local regions to produce effects that ‘spill over’ into other regions. Such effects may further mitigate or amplify the impacts we estimate, for example, if companies relocate production from one affected region to another or if impacts propagate along supply chains. The current literature indicates that trade plays a substantial role in propagating spillover effects 43 , 44 , making their assessment at the sub-national level challenging without available data on sub-national trade dependencies. Studies accounting for only spatially adjacent neighbours indicate that negative impacts in one region induce further negative impacts in neighbouring regions 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , suggesting that our projected damages are probably conservative by excluding these effects. In Supplementary Fig. 14 , we assess spillovers from neighbouring regions using a spatial-lag model. For simplicity, this analysis excludes temporal lags, focusing only on contemporaneous effects. The results show that accounting for spatial spillovers can amplify the overall magnitude, and also the heterogeneity, of impacts. Consistent with previous literature, this indicates that the overall magnitude (Fig. 1 ) and heterogeneity (Fig. 3 ) of damages that we project in our main specification may be conservative without explicitly accounting for spillovers. We note that further analysis that addresses both spatially and trade-connected spillovers, while also accounting for delayed impacts using temporal lags, would be necessary to adequately address this question fully. These approaches offer fruitful avenues for further research but are beyond the scope of this manuscript, which primarily aims to explore the impacts of different climate conditions and their persistence.

Policy implications

We find that the economic damages resulting from climate change until 2049 are those to which the world economy is already committed and that these greatly outweigh the costs required to mitigate emissions in line with the 2 °C target of the Paris Climate Agreement (Fig. 1 ). This assessment is complementary to formal analyses of the net costs and benefits associated with moving from one emission path to another, which typically find that net benefits of mitigation only emerge in the second half of the century 5 . Our simple comparison of the magnitude of damages and mitigation costs makes clear that this is primarily because damages are indistinguishable across emissions scenarios—that is, committed—until mid-century (Fig. 1 ) and that they are actually already much larger than mitigation costs. For simplicity, and owing to the availability of data, we compare damages to mitigation costs at the global level. Regional estimates of mitigation costs may shed further light on the national incentives for mitigation to which our results already hint, of relevance for international climate policy. Although these damages are committed from a mitigation perspective, adaptation may provide an opportunity to reduce them. Moreover, the strong divergence of damages after mid-century reemphasizes the clear benefits of mitigation from a purely economic perspective, as highlighted in previous studies 1 , 4 , 6 , 24 .

Historical climate data

Historical daily 2-m temperature and precipitation totals (in mm) are obtained for the period 1979–2019 from the W5E5 database. The W5E5 dataset comes from ERA-5, a state-of-the-art reanalysis of historical observations, but has been bias-adjusted by applying version 2.0 of the WATCH Forcing Data to ERA-5 reanalysis data and precipitation data from version 2.3 of the Global Precipitation Climatology Project to better reflect ground-based measurements 49 , 50 , 51 . We obtain these data on a 0.5° × 0.5° grid from the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP) database. Notably, these historical data have been used to bias-adjust future climate projections from CMIP-6 (see the following section), ensuring consistency between the distribution of historical daily weather on which our empirical models were estimated and the climate projections used to estimate future damages. These data are publicly available from the ISIMIP database. See refs.  7 , 8 for robustness tests of the empirical models to the choice of climate data reanalysis products.

Future climate data

Daily 2-m temperature and precipitation totals (in mm) are taken from 21 climate models participating in CMIP-6 under a high (RCP8.5) and a low (RCP2.6) greenhouse gas emission scenario from 2015 to 2100. The data have been bias-adjusted and statistically downscaled to a common half-degree grid to reflect the historical distribution of daily temperature and precipitation of the W5E5 dataset using the trend-preserving method developed by the ISIMIP 50 , 52 . As such, the climate model data reproduce observed climatological patterns exceptionally well (Supplementary Table 5 ). Gridded data are publicly available from the ISIMIP database.

Historical economic data

Historical economic data come from the DOSE database of sub-national economic output 53 . We use a recent revision to the DOSE dataset that provides data across 83 countries, 1,660 sub-national regions with varying temporal coverage from 1960 to 2019. Sub-national units constitute the first administrative division below national, for example, states for the USA and provinces for China. Data come from measures of gross regional product per capita (GRPpc) or income per capita in local currencies, reflecting the values reported in national statistical agencies, yearbooks and, in some cases, academic literature. We follow previous literature 3 , 7 , 8 , 54 and assess real sub-national output per capita by first converting values from local currencies to US dollars to account for diverging national inflationary tendencies and then account for US inflation using a US deflator. Alternatively, one might first account for national inflation and then convert between currencies. Supplementary Fig. 12 demonstrates that our conclusions are consistent when accounting for price changes in the reversed order, although the magnitude of estimated damages varies. See the documentation of the DOSE dataset for further discussion of these choices. Conversions between currencies are conducted using exchange rates from the FRED database of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis 55 and the national deflators from the World Bank 56 .

Future socio-economic data

Baseline gridded gross domestic product (GDP) and population data for the period 2015–2100 are taken from the middle-of-the-road scenario SSP2 (ref.  15 ). Population data have been downscaled to a half-degree grid by the ISIMIP following the methodologies of refs.  57 , 58 , which we then aggregate to the sub-national level of our economic data using the spatial aggregation procedure described below. Because current methodologies for downscaling the GDP of the SSPs use downscaled population to do so, per-capita estimates of GDP with a realistic distribution at the sub-national level are not readily available for the SSPs. We therefore use national-level GDP per capita (GDPpc) projections for all sub-national regions of a given country, assuming homogeneity within countries in terms of baseline GDPpc. Here we use projections that have been updated to account for the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the trajectory of future income, while remaining consistent with the long-term development of the SSPs 59 . The choice of baseline SSP alters the magnitude of projected climate damages in monetary terms, but when assessed in terms of percentage change from the baseline, the choice of socio-economic scenario is inconsequential. Gridded SSP population data and national-level GDPpc data are publicly available from the ISIMIP database. Sub-national estimates as used in this study are available in the code and data replication files.

Climate variables

Following recent literature 3 , 7 , 8 , we calculate an array of climate variables for which substantial impacts on macroeconomic output have been identified empirically, supported by further evidence at the micro level for plausible underlying mechanisms. See refs.  7 , 8 for an extensive motivation for the use of these particular climate variables and for detailed empirical tests on the nature and robustness of their effects on economic output. To summarize, these studies have found evidence for independent impacts on economic growth rates from annual average temperature, daily temperature variability, total annual precipitation, the annual number of wet days and extreme daily rainfall. Assessments of daily temperature variability were motivated by evidence of impacts on agricultural output and human health, as well as macroeconomic literature on the impacts of volatility on growth when manifest in different dimensions, such as government spending, exchange rates and even output itself 7 . Assessments of precipitation impacts were motivated by evidence of impacts on agricultural productivity, metropolitan labour outcomes and conflict, as well as damages caused by flash flooding 8 . See Extended Data Table 1 for detailed references to empirical studies of these physical mechanisms. Marked impacts of daily temperature variability, total annual precipitation, the number of wet days and extreme daily rainfall on macroeconomic output were identified robustly across different climate datasets, spatial aggregation schemes, specifications of regional time trends and error-clustering approaches. They were also found to be robust to the consideration of temperature extremes 7 , 8 . Furthermore, these climate variables were identified as having independent effects on economic output 7 , 8 , which we further explain here using Monte Carlo simulations to demonstrate the robustness of the results to concerns of imperfect multicollinearity between climate variables (Supplementary Methods Section  2 ), as well as by using information criteria (Supplementary Table 1 ) to demonstrate that including several lagged climate variables provides a preferable trade-off between optimally describing the data and limiting the possibility of overfitting.

We calculate these variables from the distribution of daily, d , temperature, T x , d , and precipitation, P x , d , at the grid-cell, x , level for both the historical and future climate data. As well as annual mean temperature, \({\bar{T}}_{x,y}\) , and annual total precipitation, P x , y , we calculate annual, y , measures of daily temperature variability, \({\widetilde{T}}_{x,y}\) :

the number of wet days, Pwd x , y :

and extreme daily rainfall:

in which T x , d , m , y is the grid-cell-specific daily temperature in month m and year y , \({\bar{T}}_{x,m,{y}}\) is the year and grid-cell-specific monthly, m , mean temperature, D m and D y the number of days in a given month m or year y , respectively, H the Heaviside step function, 1 mm the threshold used to define wet days and P 99.9 x is the 99.9th percentile of historical (1979–2019) daily precipitation at the grid-cell level. Units of the climate measures are degrees Celsius for annual mean temperature and daily temperature variability, millimetres for total annual precipitation and extreme daily precipitation, and simply the number of days for the annual number of wet days.

We also calculated weighted standard deviations of monthly rainfall totals as also used in ref.  8 but do not include them in our projections as we find that, when accounting for delayed effects, their effect becomes statistically indistinct and is better captured by changes in total annual rainfall.

Spatial aggregation

We aggregate grid-cell-level historical and future climate measures, as well as grid-cell-level future GDPpc and population, to the level of the first administrative unit below national level of the GADM database, using an area-weighting algorithm that estimates the portion of each grid cell falling within an administrative boundary. We use this as our baseline specification following previous findings that the effect of area or population weighting at the sub-national level is negligible 7 , 8 .

Empirical model specification: fixed-effects distributed lag models

Following a wide range of climate econometric literature 16 , 60 , we use panel regression models with a selection of fixed effects and time trends to isolate plausibly exogenous variation with which to maximize confidence in a causal interpretation of the effects of climate on economic growth rates. The use of region fixed effects, μ r , accounts for unobserved time-invariant differences between regions, such as prevailing climatic norms and growth rates owing to historical and geopolitical factors. The use of yearly fixed effects, η y , accounts for regionally invariant annual shocks to the global climate or economy such as the El Niño–Southern Oscillation or global recessions. In our baseline specification, we also include region-specific linear time trends, k r y , to exclude the possibility of spurious correlations resulting from common slow-moving trends in climate and growth.

The persistence of climate impacts on economic growth rates is a key determinant of the long-term magnitude of damages. Methods for inferring the extent of persistence in impacts on growth rates have typically used lagged climate variables to evaluate the presence of delayed effects or catch-up dynamics 2 , 18 . For example, consider starting from a model in which a climate condition, C r , y , (for example, annual mean temperature) affects the growth rate, Δlgrp r , y (the first difference of the logarithm of gross regional product) of region r in year y :

which we refer to as a ‘pure growth effects’ model in the main text. Typically, further lags are included,

and the cumulative effect of all lagged terms is evaluated to assess the extent to which climate impacts on growth rates persist. Following ref.  18 , in the case that,

the implication is that impacts on the growth rate persist up to NL years after the initial shock (possibly to a weaker or a stronger extent), whereas if

then the initial impact on the growth rate is recovered after NL years and the effect is only one on the level of output. However, we note that such approaches are limited by the fact that, when including an insufficient number of lags to detect a recovery of the growth rates, one may find equation ( 6 ) to be satisfied and incorrectly assume that a change in climatic conditions affects the growth rate indefinitely. In practice, given a limited record of historical data, including too few lags to confidently conclude in an infinitely persistent impact on the growth rate is likely, particularly over the long timescales over which future climate damages are often projected 2 , 24 . To avoid this issue, we instead begin our analysis with a model for which the level of output, lgrp r , y , depends on the level of a climate variable, C r , y :

Given the non-stationarity of the level of output, we follow the literature 19 and estimate such an equation in first-differenced form as,

which we refer to as a model of ‘pure level effects’ in the main text. This model constitutes a baseline specification in which a permanent change in the climate variable produces an instantaneous impact on the growth rate and a permanent effect only on the level of output. By including lagged variables in this specification,

we are able to test whether the impacts on the growth rate persist any further than instantaneously by evaluating whether α L  > 0 are statistically significantly different from zero. Even though this framework is also limited by the possibility of including too few lags, the choice of a baseline model specification in which impacts on the growth rate do not persist means that, in the case of including too few lags, the framework reverts to the baseline specification of level effects. As such, this framework is conservative with respect to the persistence of impacts and the magnitude of future damages. It naturally avoids assumptions of infinite persistence and we are able to interpret any persistence that we identify with equation ( 9 ) as a lower bound on the extent of climate impact persistence on growth rates. See the main text for further discussion of this specification choice, in particular about its conservative nature compared with previous literature estimates, such as refs.  2 , 18 .

We allow the response to climatic changes to vary across regions, using interactions of the climate variables with historical average (1979–2019) climatic conditions reflecting heterogenous effects identified in previous work 7 , 8 . Following this previous work, the moderating variables of these interaction terms constitute the historical average of either the variable itself or of the seasonal temperature difference, \({\hat{T}}_{r}\) , or annual mean temperature, \({\bar{T}}_{r}\) , in the case of daily temperature variability 7 and extreme daily rainfall, respectively 8 .

The resulting regression equation with N and M lagged variables, respectively, reads:

in which Δlgrp r , y is the annual, regional GRPpc growth rate, measured as the first difference of the logarithm of real GRPpc, following previous work 2 , 3 , 7 , 8 , 18 , 19 . Fixed-effects regressions were run using the fixest package in R (ref.  61 ).

Estimates of the coefficients of interest α i , L are shown in Extended Data Fig. 1 for N  =  M  = 10 lags and for our preferred choice of the number of lags in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 . In Extended Data Fig. 1 , errors are shown clustered at the regional level, but for the construction of damage projections, we block-bootstrap the regressions by region 1,000 times to provide a range of parameter estimates with which to sample the projection uncertainty (following refs.  2 , 31 ).

Spatial-lag model

In Supplementary Fig. 14 , we present the results from a spatial-lag model that explores the potential for climate impacts to ‘spill over’ into spatially neighbouring regions. We measure the distance between centroids of each pair of sub-national regions and construct spatial lags that take the average of the first-differenced climate variables and their interaction terms over neighbouring regions that are at distances of 0–500, 500–1,000, 1,000–1,500 and 1,500–2000 km (spatial lags, ‘SL’, 1 to 4). For simplicity, we then assess a spatial-lag model without temporal lags to assess spatial spillovers of contemporaneous climate impacts. This model takes the form:

in which SL indicates the spatial lag of each climate variable and interaction term. In Supplementary Fig. 14 , we plot the cumulative marginal effect of each climate variable at different baseline climate conditions by summing the coefficients for each climate variable and interaction term, for example, for average temperature impacts as:

These cumulative marginal effects can be regarded as the overall spatially dependent impact to an individual region given a one-unit shock to a climate variable in that region and all neighbouring regions at a given value of the moderating variable of the interaction term.

Constructing projections of economic damage from future climate change

We construct projections of future climate damages by applying the coefficients estimated in equation ( 10 ) and shown in Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 (when including only lags with statistically significant effects in specifications that limit overfitting; see Supplementary Methods Section  1 ) to projections of future climate change from the CMIP-6 models. Year-on-year changes in each primary climate variable of interest are calculated to reflect the year-to-year variations used in the empirical models. 30-year moving averages of the moderating variables of the interaction terms are calculated to reflect the long-term average of climatic conditions that were used for the moderating variables in the empirical models. By using moving averages in the projections, we account for the changing vulnerability to climate shocks based on the evolving long-term conditions (Supplementary Figs. 10 and 11 show that the results are robust to the precise choice of the window of this moving average). Although these climate variables are not differenced, the fact that the bias-adjusted climate models reproduce observed climatological patterns across regions for these moderating variables very accurately (Supplementary Table 6 ) with limited spread across models (<3%) precludes the possibility that any considerable bias or uncertainty is introduced by this methodological choice. However, we impose caps on these moderating variables at the 95th percentile at which they were observed in the historical data to prevent extrapolation of the marginal effects outside the range in which the regressions were estimated. This is a conservative choice that limits the magnitude of our damage projections.

Time series of primary climate variables and moderating climate variables are then combined with estimates of the empirical model parameters to evaluate the regression coefficients in equation ( 10 ), producing a time series of annual GRPpc growth-rate reductions for a given emission scenario, climate model and set of empirical model parameters. The resulting time series of growth-rate impacts reflects those occurring owing to future climate change. By contrast, a future scenario with no climate change would be one in which climate variables do not change (other than with random year-to-year fluctuations) and hence the time-averaged evaluation of equation ( 10 ) would be zero. Our approach therefore implicitly compares the future climate-change scenario to this no-climate-change baseline scenario.

The time series of growth-rate impacts owing to future climate change in region r and year y , δ r , y , are then added to the future baseline growth rates, π r , y (in log-diff form), obtained from the SSP2 scenario to yield trajectories of damaged GRPpc growth rates, ρ r , y . These trajectories are aggregated over time to estimate the future trajectory of GRPpc with future climate impacts:

in which GRPpc r , y =2020 is the initial log level of GRPpc. We begin damage estimates in 2020 to reflect the damages occurring since the end of the period for which we estimate the empirical models (1979–2019) and to match the timing of mitigation-cost estimates from most IAMs (see below).

For each emission scenario, this procedure is repeated 1,000 times while randomly sampling from the selection of climate models, the selection of empirical models with different numbers of lags (shown in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 and Supplementary Tables 2 – 4 ) and bootstrapped estimates of the regression parameters. The result is an ensemble of future GRPpc trajectories that reflect uncertainty from both physical climate change and the structural and sampling uncertainty of the empirical models.

Estimates of mitigation costs

We obtain IPCC estimates of the aggregate costs of emission mitigation from the AR6 Scenario Explorer and Database hosted by IIASA 23 . Specifically, we search the AR6 Scenarios Database World v1.1 for IAMs that provided estimates of global GDP and population under both a SSP2 baseline and a SSP2-RCP2.6 scenario to maintain consistency with the socio-economic and emission scenarios of the climate damage projections. We find five IAMs that provide data for these scenarios, namely, MESSAGE-GLOBIOM 1.0, REMIND-MAgPIE 1.5, AIM/GCE 2.0, GCAM 4.2 and WITCH-GLOBIOM 3.1. Of these five IAMs, we use the results only from the first three that passed the IPCC vetting procedure for reproducing historical emission and climate trajectories. We then estimate global mitigation costs as the percentage difference in global per capita GDP between the SSP2 baseline and the SSP2-RCP2.6 emission scenario. In the case of one of these IAMs, estimates of mitigation costs begin in 2020, whereas in the case of two others, mitigation costs begin in 2010. The mitigation cost estimates before 2020 in these two IAMs are mostly negligible, and our choice to begin comparison with damage estimates in 2020 is conservative with respect to the relative weight of climate damages compared with mitigation costs for these two IAMs.

Data availability

Data on economic production and ERA-5 climate data are publicly available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4681306 (ref. 62 ) and https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/reanalysis-datasets/era5 , respectively. Data on mitigation costs are publicly available at https://data.ene.iiasa.ac.at/ar6/#/downloads . Processed climate and economic data, as well as all other necessary data for reproduction of the results, are available at the public repository https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10562951  (ref. 63 ).

Code availability

All code necessary for reproduction of the results is available at the public repository https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10562951  (ref. 63 ).

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Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge financing from the Volkswagen Foundation and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf of the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany and Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Open access funding provided by Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung (PIK) e.V.

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Extended data figures and tables

Extended data fig. 1 constraining the persistence of historical climate impacts on economic growth rates..

The results of a panel-based fixed-effects distributed lag model for the effects of annual mean temperature ( a ), daily temperature variability ( b ), total annual precipitation ( c ), the number of wet days ( d ) and extreme daily precipitation ( e ) on sub-national economic growth rates. Point estimates show the effects of a 1 °C or one standard deviation increase (for temperature and precipitation variables, respectively) at the lower quartile, median and upper quartile of the relevant moderating variable (green, orange and purple, respectively) at different lagged periods after the initial shock (note that these are not cumulative effects). Climate variables are used in their first-differenced form (see main text for discussion) and the moderating climate variables are the annual mean temperature, seasonal temperature difference, total annual precipitation, number of wet days and annual mean temperature, respectively, in panels a – e (see Methods for further discussion). Error bars show the 95% confidence intervals having clustered standard errors by region. The within-region R 2 , Bayesian and Akaike information criteria for the model are shown at the top of the figure. This figure shows results with ten lags for each variable to demonstrate the observed levels of persistence, but our preferred specifications remove later lags based on the statistical significance of terms shown above and the information criteria shown in Extended Data Fig. 2 . The resulting models without later lags are shown in Supplementary Figs. 1 – 3 .

Extended Data Fig. 2 Incremental lag-selection procedure using information criteria and within-region R 2 .

Starting from a panel-based fixed-effects distributed lag model estimating the effects of climate on economic growth using the real historical data (as in equation ( 4 )) with ten lags for all climate variables (as shown in Extended Data Fig. 1 ), lags are incrementally removed for one climate variable at a time. The resulting Bayesian and Akaike information criteria are shown in a – e and f – j , respectively, and the within-region R 2 and number of observations in k – o and p – t , respectively. Different rows show the results when removing lags from different climate variables, ordered from top to bottom as annual mean temperature, daily temperature variability, total annual precipitation, the number of wet days and extreme annual precipitation. Information criteria show minima at approximately four lags for precipitation variables and ten to eight for temperature variables, indicating that including these numbers of lags does not lead to overfitting. See Supplementary Table 1 for an assessment using information criteria to determine whether including further climate variables causes overfitting.

Extended Data Fig. 3 Damages in our preferred specification that provides a robust lower bound on the persistence of climate impacts on economic growth versus damages in specifications of pure growth or pure level effects.

Estimates of future damages as shown in Fig. 1 but under the emission scenario RCP8.5 for three separate empirical specifications: in orange our preferred specification, which provides an empirical lower bound on the persistence of climate impacts on economic growth rates while avoiding assumptions of infinite persistence (see main text for further discussion); in purple a specification of ‘pure growth effects’ in which the first difference of climate variables is not taken and no lagged climate variables are included (the baseline specification of ref.  2 ); and in pink a specification of ‘pure level effects’ in which the first difference of climate variables is taken but no lagged terms are included.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Climate changes in different variables as a function of historical interannual variability.

Changes in each climate variable of interest from 1979–2019 to 2035–2065 under the high-emission scenario SSP5-RCP8.5, expressed as a percentage of the historical variability of each measure. Historical variability is estimated as the standard deviation of each detrended climate variable over the period 1979–2019 during which the empirical models were identified (detrending is appropriate because of the inclusion of region-specific linear time trends in the empirical models). See Supplementary Fig. 13 for changes expressed in standard units. Data on national administrative boundaries are obtained from the GADM database version 3.6 and are freely available for academic use ( https://gadm.org/ ).

Extended Data Fig. 5 Contribution of different climate variables to overall committed damages.

a , Climate damages in 2049 when using empirical models that account for all climate variables, changes in annual mean temperature only or changes in both annual mean temperature and one other climate variable (daily temperature variability, total annual precipitation, the number of wet days and extreme daily precipitation, respectively). b , The cumulative marginal effects of an increase in annual mean temperature of 1 °C, at different baseline temperatures, estimated from empirical models including all climate variables or annual mean temperature only. Estimates and uncertainty bars represent the median and 95% confidence intervals obtained from 1,000 block-bootstrap resamples from each of three different empirical models using eight, nine or ten lags of temperature terms.

Extended Data Fig. 6 The difference in committed damages between the upper and lower quartiles of countries when ranked by GDP and cumulative historical emissions.

Quartiles are defined using a population weighting, as are the average committed damages across each quartile group. The violin plots indicate the distribution of differences between quartiles across the two extreme emission scenarios (RCP2.6 and RCP8.5) and the uncertainty sampling procedure outlined in Methods , which accounts for uncertainty arising from the choice of lags in the empirical models, uncertainty in the empirical model parameter estimates, as well as the climate model projections. Bars indicate the median, as well as the 10th and 90th percentiles and upper and lower sixths of the distribution reflecting the very likely and likely ranges following the likelihood classification adopted by the IPCC.

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Kotz, M., Levermann, A. & Wenz, L. The economic commitment of climate change. Nature 628 , 551–557 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07219-0

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• Global Warming Essay

Essay on Global Warming

The last few decades have been monumental when it comes to technological development. Humans have developed systems and machines that make our lives easier. Especially during the early modern period from the early 16th century to as far as the late 18the century, also commonly referred to as “The Scientific Revolution” or “The Enlightenment”, modern technology leapt ahead in development in such a short time frame compared to all of history.

However, with the development of society, there has been a severe detriment to the quality of Earth’s environment. One of the most massive threats to the condition of the planet is climate change. Inadequate research and reckless misuse of natural resources are some of the core reasons for the deteriorating condition of the planet.

To understand the concept of Global Warming and its causes and effects, we need to take an in-depth look into many factors that affect the temperature of the planet and what that means for the future of the world. Here is an objective look at the topic of Global Warming and other important related topics.

What is Climate Change?

Ever since the industrial and scientific revolution, Earth is slowly being used up for its resources. Moreover, the onset of the exponential increase in the world’s population is also very taxing on the environment. 

Simply put, as the need for consumption of the population increases, both the utilisation of natural resources and the waste generated from the use of said resources have also increased massively. 

One of the main results of this over the many years has become climate change. Climate change is not just the rise or fall of temperature of different areas of the world; it is also a change in the rain cycles, wind patterns, cyclone frequencies, sea levels, etc. It affects all major life groups on the planet in some way or the other.  

What is Global Warming?

Global Warming is often considered an effect of Climate change. Global Warming is the rapid increase in the temperature of the Earth’s environment that is causing many life-threatening issues to arise.

Global Warming is a dangerous effect on our environment that we are facing these days. Rapid industrialization, increase in the population growth and pollution are causing a rise in Global Warming. Global Warming refers to the increase in the average temperature of the earth's surface during the last century. One of the reasons why Global Warming is dangerous is because it disturbs the overall ecology of the planet. This results in floods, famine, cyclones and other issues. There are many causes and results of this warming and is a danger for the existence of life on earth.

The sign of Global Warming is already visible with many natural phenomena happening around globally, affecting each living species.

Here is some data that can help to give a more precise understanding of the reality of Global Warming in the last few years:

On average, the world’s temperature is about 1.5°C higher than during the start of the industrial revolution in the late 1700s. That may not seem a lot to you, but that is an average estimate. This number is only increasing. Many parts of the world face far more severe changes in temperature that affect the planet’s overall health.

In 1950, the world’s CO 2 emissions were at 6 billion tonnes which had quadrupled in volume until 1990, just 40 years later to 22 billion tonnes. Not only that, unchecked CO 2 emissions today have reached a whopping 35 billion tonnes.

The most evident causes of Global Warming are industrialization, urbanization, deforestation, and sophisticated human activities. These human activities have led to an increase in the emission of Greenhouse Gases, including CO₂, Nitrous Oxide, Methane, and others.

Causes of Global Warming

A variety of reasons causes Global Warming. Some of which can be controlled personally by individuals but others are only expected to be solved by communities and the world leaders and activists at the global level.

Many scientists believe the main four reasons for Global Warming, according to recent studies, are:

Greenhouse gases

Deforestation

Per capita carbon emissions

Global Warming is certainly an alarming situation, which is causing a significant impact on life existence. Extreme Global Warming is resulting in natural calamities, which is quite evident happening around. One of the reasons behind Global Warming is the extreme release of greenhouse gases stuck on the earth surface, resulting in the temperature increase.

Similarly, volcanoes are also leading to Global Warming because they spew too much CO₂ in the air. One of the significant causes behind Global Warming is the increase in the population. This increase in the population also results in air pollution. Automobiles release a lot of CO₂, which remains stuck in the earth.

This increase in the population is also leading to deforestation, which further results in Global Warming. More and more trees are being cut, increasing the concentration of CO₂.

The greenhouse is the natural process where the sunlight passes through the area, thus warming the earth's surface. The earth surface releases energy in the form of heat in the atmosphere maintaining the balance with the incoming energy. Global Warming depletes the ozone layer leading to the doom's day.

There is a clear indication that the increase in Global Warming will lead to the complete extinction of life from the earth surface.

Solution for Global Warming

Global Warming can not be blamed on individuals; however, it can be tackled and maintained from worsening starting at the individual level. Of course, industries and multinational conglomerates have higher carbon emissions levels than an average citizen. Still, activism and community effort are the only feasible ways to control the worsening state of Global Warming.

Additionally, at the state or government level, world leaders need to create concrete plans and step programmes to ensure that no further harm is being caused to the environment in general. 

Although we are almost late in slowing down the Global Warming rate, it is crucial to find the right solution. From individuals to governments, everyone has to work upon a solution for Global Warming. Controlling pollution, population and use of natural resources are some of the factors to consider. Switching over to the electric and hybrid car is the best way to bring down the carbon dioxide.

As a citizen, it is best to switch over to the hybrid car and to use public transport. This will reduce pollution and congestion. Another significant contribution you can make is to minimize the use of plastic. Plastic is the primary cause of Global Warming taking years to recycle.

Deforestation is another thing to consider that will help in controlling Global Warming. Planting of more trees should be encouraged to make the environment go green.

Industrialization should be under certain norms. The building of industries should be banned in green zones affecting plants and species. Hefty penalties should be levied on such sectors contributing towards Global Warming.

Effects of Global Warming

Global Warming is a real problem that many want to prove as a hoax for their political benefit. However, as aware citizens of the world, we must make sure only the truth is presented in the media.

Various parts of the environment, both flora and fauna, are directly adversely affected by the damages caused by Global Warming. Wildlife being in danger is ultimately a serious threat to the survival of humanity as we know it and its future.

The effect of Global Warming is widely seen in this decade. Glacier retreat and arctic shrinkage are the two common phenomena seen. Glaciers are melting in a fast way. These are pure examples of climate change.

Rise in sea level is another significant effect of Global Warming. This sea-level rise is leading to floods in low-lying areas. Extreme weather conditions are witnessed in many countries. Unseasonal rainfall, extreme heat and cold, wildfires and others are common every year. The number of these cases is increasing. This will indeed imbalance the ecosystem bringing the result of the extinction of species.

Similarly, marine life is also widely getting affected due to the increase in Global Warming. This is resulting in the death of marine species and other issues. Moreover, changes are expected in coral reefs, which are going to face the end in coming years.

These effects will take a steep rise in coming years, bringing the expansion of species to a halt. Moreover, humans too will witness the negative impact of Global Warming in the end.

FAQs on Global Warming Essay

1. What Global Warming will Cause?

Global warming will have a massive impact on our earth in the end. Flood, extreme weather conditions, famine, wildfire and many more will be the result. There will be hotter days, which will also increase the wildfire and famine. In the past years, many meteorological bureaus have added purple and magenta to the forecast.

Another impact of global warming will be rising sea levels. Increased ocean temperatures will lead to the melting of glaciers and ice caps. Increase in the sea level will lead to floods in many low-lying areas.

The overall ecosystem of nature will be an imbalance. This will affect nature in the long-term.

2. Why Does Global Warming Happen?

There are many reasons for the cause of global warming. There are certain gases in the atmosphere called greenhouse gases. The energy then radiates from the surface; the greenhouse gases trap longwave radiation. We humans have added to the atmospheric blanket of greenhouse affecting the living species. Warming of air, oceans, and land is how global warming happens.

El Niño is nearing its end. Does that mean global temperatures will cool down in 2024?

March was the 10th month in a row with record-breaking temperatures.

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Last year, the planet experienced its hottest year on record. While it wasn't entirely a surprise that 2023 could top the previous hottest year — 2016 — in light of ongoing greenhouse gas emissions, what did come as a surprise was by how much .

One of the contributing factors to that extreme warmth was El Niño, a natural, cyclical warming in a region of the Pacific Ocean that, coupled with the atmosphere, can cause global temperatures to rise. Last year, it began in June.

Typically, the global atmosphere responds to El Niño in the subsequent year, which begs the question: Could 2024 be even hotter than 2023?

"Basing it on the El Niño at the beginning of the year, and then seeing how things are working out this year, it suggests that 2024 is going to be almost the same as 2023," said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.

But there are a lot of other things to take into account, he said.

For example, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), El Niño is coming to an end, and ocean conditions are starting to move to a neutral phase, with a 60 per cent chance that they will go into a cooling phase, called La Niña.

La Niña tends to have the opposite effect on global temperatures from El Niño, but that doesn't mean that the planet will suddenly go into a period of cooler-than-normal temperatures.

Emissions contributed to a hotter 2023

El Niño and La Niña are part of a recurring climate pattern called the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, or ENSO, that occurs roughly every seven to 10 years,

This pattern is a relatively new discovery, going back only about 60 years, so scientists don't have a lot of historical data. But they do know that not all ENSO events are equal. El Niños can be mild, strong or, as we saw in 2015-2016, extremely strong, referred to as a "super" El Niño.

Even though 2023 was not a "super" El Niño year, it ended up being hotter than 2016, and that's in part because in the eight years between the two El Niños, global temperatures have continued to climb as a result of greenhouse gases continuing to be pumped into the atmosphere.

Is El Niño responsible for Montreal's exceptionally warm winter?

As well, the atmosphere is playing catch-up with already-released greenhouse gases from decades ago.

"It's almost like getting a head start in a race," said Karin Gleason, a climate scientist with NOAA. "2023 had a head start to 2015, because it was already in a different warmer neighborhood."

Other factors that may have contributed to 2023's hotter temperatures were the  abnormally hot ocean temperatures  and a  reduction in aerosols that would normally reflect the sun's radiation back into space. 

April could be last consecutive record-breaking month

What was strange about 2023, say climate scientists, was that the temperatures went off the scale beginning in June and just kept on going. This past March was the tenth consecutive month to have record-breaking temperatures, even if it was just by the smallest of margins.

"April temperatures are still above the rest of the record," Gleason said. "That's kind of like our first guess as to how the month might end ... In March, global temperature was a 100th of a degree Celsius above 2016. So we were kind of like, maybe this is the last month [of] consecutive months for a global record."

Even if La Niña does play out in its typical fashion, global temperatures are so hight that it may not have that much of an effect this year. Keep in mind that the hottest temperature in Canada occurred during a La Niña — in 2021.

"Even with a cooling as we might anticipate with going into a neutral phase, and then maybe entering La Niña towards the latter half of the year, it could easily still be warmer than 2016 in the first half of the year and [than] 2023 in the second half," Gleason said.

Alvaro Silva, a climate scientist with the World Meteorological Organization says that although there is some natural variability that results in some years being cooler than previous ones, the long-term trend continues to be a warming one.

"We have this background climbing that we cannot forget," he said. "We see each decade is warmer than [the] previous one."

2023 may have been a blip

At the moment, 2024 temperatures are looking to be more in line with that upward trend that climatologists are used to seeing.

"They're actually what we expect, following on from an El Niño that peaked in December," Schmidt said. "Everything is now looking much more like the old pattern that we were relying on. My intuition is that a 2023 is looking more and more like a blip."

Coral reefs experiencing mass bleaching event

Last week, Berkeley Earth, a non-profit, independent climate analysis organization, released its March 2024 update and forecast that 2024 had a 59 per cent chance of being the warmest year on record and a 41 per cent chance it would come in at second place.

• 'We are losing the Amazon rainforest': Record number of wildfires in parts of Brazil
• Analysis The oceans are talking to us, and it's not a pleasant conversation

"So far, we have already seen temperature records in different regions in South America in Africa and Asia," Silva said. "So this it is already taking place in different regions and will likely continue."

And with Canada's wildfire season already facing an early start , Canada, too, could be in for another challenging summer.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Senior reporter, science

Based in Toronto, Nicole covers all things science for CBC News. As an amateur astronomer, Nicole can be found looking up at the night sky appreciating the marvels of our universe. She is the editor of the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada and the author of several books. In 2021, she won the Kavli Science Journalism Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science for a Quirks and Quarks audio special on the history and future of Black people in science. You can send her story ideas at [email protected].

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Earth Day 2024: What's the difference between global warming, climate change? What to know

With the celebration of Earth Day and the need to conserve planetary health , it poses some questions about global warming and climate change. 

Though they’re both related, they're not the same, and it’s important to know the difference.

According to climate.gov , global warming refers only to the Earth’s rising surface temperature, while climate change includes warming and the “side effects” of warming.

Let’s think of them as an illness the Earth has. What are the symptoms of global warming and climate change?

What is global warming?

Global warming refers to the rise in global temperatures due mainly to rapidly increasing concentrations of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. Global warming affects anything from ocean patterns to air temperature and arctic ice.

When scientists mention global warming, it’s not always a natural thing caused by Earth.

Currently, the leading cause of it is human activity because we burn coal, oil, and gas, creating greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and various synthetic chemicals.

Signs of global warming include:

• Diminishing arctic sea ice extent
• Rising ocean heat
• Increasing air temperatures over oceans and land
• Global sea level rise
• Escalating humidity
• Temperature increase in lower atmosphere
• Reduced snow cover and earlier melting
• Melting glaciers 

There's still hope: For Earth Day 2024, experts are spreading optimism – not doom. Here's why.

What is climate change?

Climate change refers to the increasing changes in the measures of climate over a long period of time – including precipitation, temperature, and wind patterns. 

Climate change is both natural and human-caused. Besides burning fossil fuels, humans emit aerosol pollution—the tiny particles that reflect sunlight and cool the climate—into the atmosphere. We also impact climate change by transforming the Earth's landscape, such as turning carbon-storing forests into farmland. 

Climate change has been around for as long as Earth’s history — the Earth’s average temperature has always fluctuated. This includes the Earth’s longer periods of both cold temperatures, or ice ages, and warm temperatures, or interglacials, on 100,000-year cycles for at least the last million years.

Climate change can affect everything, from humans, ecosystems, wildlife, and agriculture.

Examples of climate change include:

• Longer-lasting droughts
• More intense wildfires
• Stronger storms
• Sea level rise
• Ecosystem stressors
• Reduced soil health leading to food shortages
• Displacement, creating refugees
• Illness and death

The World Health Organization says that in the near future, between 2030 and 2050, an additional 250,000 deaths per year could happen from malnutrition, insect-borne diseases and heat stress caused by climate change. Millions of people are expected to be displaced in various countries by 2050.

How to help reduce both global warming and climate change

Today is Earth Day, so of course, we think about how we can lessen the symptoms of both global warming and climate change and keep our planet healthy.

According to the United Nations , here's how we can help our planet be healthy.

• Save energy at home
• Change your home's source of energy
• Walk, bike or take public transport
• Switch to an electric vehicle
• Consider your travel and take fewer flights
• Reduce, reuse, repair and recycle
• Eat more vegetables
• Throw away less food
• Plant native species
• Clean up your environment
• Shop from sustainable and ethical brands and companies

Are those steps climate change cure-alls?

Probably. Maybe not. Who knows?

No matter the answer, it's important to be aware of how us humans contribute to harming the planet, and we can maintain planetary health together.

Europe is the fastest-warming continent, at…

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Europe is the fastest-warming continent, at nearly twice the average global rate, report says

FILE – Burnt trees and a car after yesterday’s fire in Mandra, west of Athens, on Wednesday, July 19, 2023. Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, April 22, 2024, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis, File)

FILE – A lake of meltwater has formed on the tongue of the Rhone Glacier near Goms, Switzerland, on June 13, 2023. Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, April 22, 2024, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader, File)

FILE – People relax in the Retiro park in Madrid, Spain, Wednesday, March 20, 2024. Copernicus has reported that March marked the 10th straight month of record monthly temperatures. Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, April 22, 2024, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity. (AP Photo/Paul White, File)

FILE – A narrow boat sits in the floods of the river Thames in Oxford, England, Sunday, Jan. 7, 2024. Britain was hit by heavy rainfall last week following storm Henk, which led to flooding in parts of the UK. Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, April 22, 2024, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)

NAPLES, Italy (AP) — Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity.

The U.N.’s World Meteorological Organization and the European Union’s climate agency, Copernicus, said in a joint report that the continent has the opportunity to develop targeted strategies to speed up the transition to renewable resources like wind, solar and hydroelectric power in response to the effects of climate change.

The continent generated 43% of its electricity from renewable resources last year, up from 36% the year before, the agencies say in their European State of the Climate report for last year. More energy in Europe was generated from renewables than from fossil fuels for the second year running.

The latest five-year averages show that temperatures in Europe are now running 2.3 degrees Celsius (4.1 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, compared to 1.3 degrees Celsius higher globally, the report says — just shy of the targets under the 2015 Paris climate accord to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

“Europe saw yet another year of increasing temperatures and intensifying climate extremes — including heat stress with record temperatures, wildfires, heat waves, glacier ice loss and lack of snowfall,” said Elisabeth Hamdouch, the deputy head of unit for Copernicus at the EU’s executive commission.

The report serves up a continental complement for WMO’s flagship state of the global climate report, which has been published annually for three decades, and this year came with a “red alert” warning that the world isn’t doing enough to fight the consequences of global warming.

Copernicus has reported that March marked the 10th straight month of record monthly temperatures. The average sea-surface temperature for the ocean across Europe hit its highest annual level in 2023, the Europe report said.

The European report focuses this year on the impact of high temperatures on human health, noting that deaths related to heat have risen across the continent. It said more than 150 lives were lost directly last year in connection with storms, floods and wildfires.

The cost of weather- and climate-related economic losses in 2023 were estimated at more than 13.4 billion euros (about $14.3 billion).

“Hundreds of thousands of people were affected by extreme climate events in 2023, which have been responsible for large losses at continental level, estimated to be at least in the tens of billions of euros,” said Copernicus director Carlo Buontempo.

Extreme weather fanned heat waves, wildfires, droughts and flooding, the report said. High temperatures have contributed to a loss of glacier ice on the continent, including in the Alps — which have lost about 10% of their remaining glacier ice over the last two years .

Still, the report’s authors pointed to some exceptions, such as how temperatures were below average in Scandinavia and Iceland even if the mercury was higher than average across much of the continent as a whole.

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Europe is the fastest-warming continent, at nearly twice the average global rate, report says

NAPLES, Italy — Europe is the fastest-warming continent and its temperatures are rising at roughly twice the global average, two top climate monitoring organizations reported Monday, warning of the consequences for human health, glacier melt and economic activity.

The U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization and the European Union's climate agency, Copernicus, said in a joint report that the continent has the opportunity to develop targeted strategies to speed up the transition to renewable resources like wind, solar and hydroelectric power in response to the effects of climate change.

The continent generated 43% of its electricity from renewable resources last year, up from 36% the year before, the agencies say in their European State of the Climate report for last year. More energy in Europe was generated from renewables than from fossil fuels for the second year running.

The latest five-year averages show that temperatures in Europe are now running 2.3 degrees Celsius (4.1 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, compared to 1.3 degrees Celsius higher globally, the report says — just shy of the targets under the 2015 Paris climate accord to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

“Europe saw yet another year of increasing temperatures and intensifying climate extremes — including heat stress with record temperatures, wildfires, heat waves, glacier ice loss and lack of snowfall,” said Elisabeth Hamdouch, the deputy head of unit for Copernicus at the EU’s executive commission.

The report serves up a continental complement for WMO's flagship state of the global climate report, which has been published annually for three decades, and this year came with a “red alert” warning that the world isn't doing enough to fight the consequences of global warming.

Copernicus has reported that March marked the 10th straight month of record monthly temperatures. The average sea-surface temperature for the ocean across Europe hit its highest annual level in 2023, the Europe report said.

The European report focuses this year on the impact of high temperatures on human health, noting that deaths related to heat have risen across the continent. It said more than 150 lives were lost directly last year in connection with storms, floods and wildfires.

The cost of weather- and climate-related economic losses in 2023 were estimated at more than 13.4 billion euros (about $14.3 billion).

“Hundreds of thousands of people were affected by extreme climate events in 2023, which have been responsible for large losses at continental level, estimated to be at least in the tens of billions of euros,” said Copernicus director Carlo Buontempo.

Extreme weather fanned heat waves, wildfires, droughts and flooding, the report said. High temperatures have contributed to a loss of glacier ice on the continent, including in the Alps — which have lost about 10% of their remaining glacier ice over the last two years .

Still, the report’s authors pointed to some exceptions, such as how temperatures were below average in Scandinavia and Iceland even if the mercury was higher than average across much of the continent as a whole.

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Can Forests Be More Profitable Than Beef?

Cattle ranches have ruled the Amazon for decades. Now, new companies are selling something else: the ability of trees to lock away planet-warming carbon.

Forest restoration workers planted native Amazonian seedlings on degraded pastureland in Mãe do Rio, Brazil. Credit...

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By Manuela Andreoni

Photographs by Victor Moriyama

Manuela Andreoni visited restoration projects and ranches in the northern Amazon to understand how local economies there are changing.

• May 2, 2024

The residents of Maracaçumé, an impoverished town on the edge of the Amazon rainforest, are mystified by the company that recently bought the biggest ranch in the region. How can it possibly make money by planting trees, which executives say they’ll never cut down, on pastureland where cattle have been grazing for decades?

“We are killing pasture that a lot of farmers need,” said Josias Araújo, a former cowboy who now works in reforestation, as he stood on a patch of soil he was helping to fertilize. “It’s all strange.”

The new company, which is also Mr. Araújo’s new employer, is a forest restoration business called Re.green. Its aim, along with a handful of other companies, is to create a whole new industry that can make standing trees, which store planet-warming carbon, more lucrative than the world’s biggest driver of deforestation: cattle ranching.

It’s the holy grail of the forest economy. And now, it might be within reach.

The stakes are high. About a fifth of the great rainforest is already gone. And scientist warn that rising global temperatures could push the entire ecosystem, a trove of biodiversity and a crucial regulator of the world’s climate, to collapse in the coming decades unless deforestation is halted and an area the size Germany is restored .

Re.green plans to restore native trees in deforested areas and sell credits that correspond to the carbon they lock away. Those trees will be protected, not logged. Then, businesses will use those credits to offset their own greenhouse gases in emissions accounting.

The bet hinges on the success of a system that’s being built from scratch and comes with some big challenges. Measuring the carbon held in trees and soil is complex. And, many conservationists worry that carbon credits could easily be abused by companies that want to appear environmentally conscious while sticking with fossil fuels.

Still, reforestation projects have created a buzz in the northern Amazon, where companies are rushing to buy up big plots of land with restoration potential.

“You know that people who handle cattle don’t care much about this reforestation stuff,” said Anderson Pina Farias, a rancher whose farm is almost completely deforested. But, he added, “if selling carbon is better than ranching, we can change businesses.”

Challenging an Empire

A backlash from nature seems to be helping the restoration companies win hearts and minds in a region where ranching culture runs deep.

Jose Villeigagnon Rabelo, the mayor of Mãe do Rio, a city in the northeastern part of the Amazon, is worried. A brutal drought fueled by climate change and deforestation has recently dried out much of the grass that ranchers there use as feed. And, after decades of pounding by hooves, millions of acres across the region have become so degraded they can’t nourish much of anything.

“The cattle are starving,” Mr. Rabelo said sitting in his office, with wooden paneling and benches made of angelim-vermelho, a tree that’s become hard to find in the region. “We’ve never had a summer like this.”

The crisis has prompted ranchers to dedicated bigger and bigger parts of their farms to feed ever-shrinking numbers of cattle. Now, fewer than half of the ranches registered with the city have any cattle on them.

But around a year ago, restoration company called Mombak started a 7,500-acre project on one of the region’s biggest ranches. Mr. Rabelo says he is hopeful the new industry will offer the community a lifeline.

The idea is simple: A credit for each ton of carbon that the trees pull out of the atmosphere can be sold to companies that want to compensate for their own pollution.

Environmental disruptions, combined with growing interest in carbon credits, have created an opening to challenge the beef empire’s hold on vast stretches of the rainforest, experts say. According to a 2023 report by BloombergNEF , carbon markets could be valued at $1 trillion by 2037, double what the global beef market is worth now.

Growing a large, biodiverse forest on degraded land can cost tens of millions of dollars. For years, forestry projects had to rely on multiple revenue streams, including sustainable timber harvesting, to restore soil and grow different types of natives trees.

But companies looking to burnish their climate credentials are increasingly willing to spend more to fund projects they deem to be high quality. It’s why companies like Mombak and Re.green are now developing a business model that relies almost solely on carbon credits, with little or no logging.

Microsoft has bought a major project from Mombak, and Re.green says it expects to announce buyers soon. The two companies have raised some $200 million from investors — including large pension funds, the Brazilian Development Bank and global asset managers — to reforest hundreds of thousands of acres by the end of the decade.

“Scaling all of the other carbon removal sectors, it’s just going to move too slow,” said Brian Marrs, Microsoft’s senior director of energy and carbon. “I don’t think there’s a solution to carbon removal without global forestry included.”

Part of the strategy of companies like Mombak and Re.green is to help farmers improve land and intensify cattle ranching in some degraded areas while restoring forests on others. On average, Amazon ranches support one animal on every two acres. That could rise to three animals with little investment, researchers say .

Most projects employ a few dozen local people to plant trees, fertilize the soil and stand lookout for fires. The companies are also funding and training local businesses to provide much-needed native seeds and seedlings.

In some projects, as the forests grow local communities can also make a living from collecting and processing Brazil nuts, andiroba oil and other forest products they can sell to food, beauty and pharmaceutical companies.

When a standing forest becomes an answer to people’s range of needs, that becomes a powerful reason for communities to protect it, said Luiza Maia de Castro, an economist who is managing community relations for Re.green. Right now, razing trees is a perfectly acceptable livelihood in most of the Amazon.

“To break that cycle,” she said, “you have to change how people make a living.”

‘Real Questions’ About a New Model

The efforts still face big challenges. The supply of seeds for native trees is a bottleneck, and finding farms to buy in regions where land tenure is chaotic can take months of research.

Perhaps more important, the trajectory of carbon credit prices depends on whether the world can agree on what a high-quality credit looks like. The carbon markets have been repeatedly rattled by academic and media investigations that revealed dozens of projects had overstated their emissions impact, for instance, by “protecting” forests that were never in danger of being cut down.

But reforestation projects store carbon by growing trees on degraded land, a more straightforward system.

Some experts caution that displaced cattle could simply continue to drive deforestation elsewhere and that wildfires could erase the benefits of trees that took decades to grow.

“It sounds like carbon finance can make a difference,” said Barbara Haya, the director of the Berkeley Carbon Trading Project, which has investigated a number of carbon forestry projects. But she said there were also real questions about accounting methods.

On top of that, she added, “it’s problematic to trade forest carbon for fossil fuel emissions.” That’s partly because buying carbon credits might prove less costly than transitioning a business away from dirty sources of energy, the thing that scientists say the world must ultimately do to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

The companies say they have addressed concerns by setting up firefighting teams, making sure their projects don’t affect cattle supply and adopting a methodology that allows for changing circumstances like new government land policies.

And, remaking a forest isn’t only about the carbon math. It takes a lot more than planting trees. To get it right, scientists working in restoration have to study how each plant fits into a complex ecosystem.

Walking in the forest that remains in Re.green’s farm in Maracaçumé, Ricardo Rodrigues, a professor at the University of São Paulo and a co-founder of Re.green, didn’t stop by the samaúma tree, an Amazonian giant that can live hundreds of years and grow over 200 feet tall, or by the peroba, which is prized in the timber industry.

Instead, he grabbed a vine called a monkey ladder, which was about 10 feet long and perhaps a foot in diameter, that was hanging from a branch.

“For it to grow to this size, it takes decades,” he said. But the forest needs it, he added, because it holds a lot of water, producing flowers and fruit during drier seasons. “It maintains pollinators when trees can’t.”

Creating the conditions for vines, bromeliads and orchids to grow is a part the challenge, too, Mr. Rodrigues said. It’s how you make sure the forest will remain a forest after humans stop helping it along.

Right now, the idea is to get both humans and nature to work together. Techniques vary, depending on how far each parcel of land is from the existing forests. The nearest new plots benefit from the forest’s regenerative powers.

In Mãe do Rio, reforestation workers have been planting 1,000 seedlings a day, working alongside tractors that make trenches on the soil. Drones are documenting their progress.

Six months after the first round of planting, the team was ready to measure the 44 trees in one sample plot. Luiz Carlos Batista Lobato, a botanist who specializes in tree censuses, walked across the plot to document three trees that had died, many that were taller than him and one that was more than two inches thick.

In a few years, Mr. Batista Lobato said, monkeys and armadillos would come to eat the fruits of different trees and birds would feast on the açaí berries, dispersing their seeds as they move around the forest.

“That’s the cycle,” he said.

Watching the trees start to grow helped to dispel some of the skepticism that farmers across the region still have. Back in Maracaçumé, Djalma Soares, a rancher who works on land next to the Re.green project, said that, though he still loves his cattle, he can’t deny that the idea of bringing the forest back to life is “beautiful.”

Mr. Soares said he never had the privilege of studying all the other things he could do with his farm beyond raising cattle. But, still, he feels the unrelenting heat. Seeing his neighbors work to address that, he said, is inspiring.

“We end up feeling like following the same path,” he added, as he watched the sun set on a vast pasture. “We see that it’s the future.”

Manuela Andreoni is a Times climate and environmental reporter and a writer for the Climate Forward newsletter. More about Manuela Andreoni

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