WMO Climate Change Perspectives for South Asia - SAR-CLIMATE

Climate Change and Early Warnings with Prof. Petteri Taalas, WMO

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Prof. Petteri Taalas speaking with ADPC at the 26th Conference of Parties in Glasgow, United Kingdom (Photo by ADPC)

Prof. Petteri Taalas is Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

How does the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) view the current climate situation?

We are currently not on track towards achieving the 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius global temperature goal – we are rather moving towards the 2.5 to 3 degrees Celsius range by the end of this century.

WMO has published a couple of scientific reports which demonstrate that we are seeing negative development when it comes to emissions of greenhouse gases.

Despite lockdowns, carbon dioxide concentration was growing at a rate of 2.5 parts per million in 2020 and there was a drop in emissions by 5.6% in 2020 as well. The same is true for methane and nitrous oxide, which are part of the main greenhouse gases.

Furthermore, we have seen a boost in the melting of glaciers, and that’s bad news when it comes to water availability – populations are going to suffer water shortages because of that in the coming decades.

We have also seen a boost in sea-level rise. It used to be about 2 millimeters per year around 20 years ago, but recently, we are observing around 4.4 millimeters per year.

We have seen lots of extreme climate events worldwide and some of them would not have been possible without the impact of climate change.

For example, the flooding in Germany and heatwaves in Canada and the western USA are quite unusual and temperature records are being broken in Siberia and Italy because of climate change.

So far, we’ve seen around 1-1.2 degrees Celsius warming, and in the coming 20 years, it is likely that we will reach the lower limit of the Paris Agreement of 1.5 degrees.

There’s a certain urgency, and with the facts we are providing, we are motivating heads of state and negotiators to proceed with climate mitigation.

For us, adaptation is also highly important – we have to keep adapting to these changes because the current negative trend in weather patterns will continue until the 2060s.

We already have such a high concentration of carbon dioxide that, for example, the melting of glaciers and sea-level rise will continue for the next hundreds of years.

How can Asia overcome its challenges to reach the last mile by using early warning systems?

We have some fairly advanced countries in Asia. In Japan, for example, which we regard as a ‘department store of disasters’, has created some innovate solutions for handling them. Once a high-impact weather event occurs, national broadcasters, Parliament, and all actors know what they have to do to minimize the impacts of these events.

But Japan has also learned through events like the Fukushima catastrophe, which led to the improvement of their early warning services. Everything depends on the development stage of a country – in less developed countries, these services may not be so advanced and that creates higher vulnerabilities for the population and could result in higher human and economic losses.

WMO is helping share knowledge and best practices from our most advanced members to those who need the most assistance and we have seen some positive developments.

Viet Nam, for example, has been actively investing in their basic observing systems and their early warning services and they can nowadays cope with the impacts of typhoons and heavy rains in a much better fashion than before. The whole machinery from early warnings to concrete action at the authority and businesses levels are functioning much better.

We have also been able to actually minimize the number of casualties. In the 1970s, there were millions of people worldwide who died because of these events, but today, these numbers are significantly dropping thanks to early warning systems. But not all of the countries have proper services yet and this work needs to be continued.

What should the focus of South Asian governments be to adapt to these events?

Besides climate mitigation, which is of course a high priority, we should also pay attention to climate adaptation. One very powerful way to adapt to climate change is to invest in early warning systems – these are also economically viable investments as you typically get your money back in protection from loss of lives and economic damages.

To reach the 1.5 degrees target and net zero carbon emissions, what should South Asian countries focus on?

One of the biggest challenges is to get rid of use of fossil fuels, so we have to convert our energy fleet from coal-fired to renewable sources. Solar and wind power has high potential and we also have to build more nuclear power plants to be successful here.

We also have to convert our transport systems to run on electricity, biofuels and hydrogen-based technologies in the longer run, address methane emission from rice paddies, and limit deforestation (specifically rainforests) as a result of farmlands and meat production among other things.

We have seen lots of extreme climate events worldwide and some of them would not have been possible without the impact of climate change.

We have all the technological means to be successful and we also have the economic means to be successful. Governments and private sector investors have to set the framework solve this problem. Mitigation is beneficial both from a human and economic perspective, which is a good thing to do instead of living with the negative consequences of climate change.

Prof. Taalas spoke with ADPC at the 26th Conference of Parties (COP-26) in Glasgow, United Kingdom.

About Post Author

homolata

homolata.borah@adpc.net

http://www.adpc.net

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