Describe and discuss one potentially serious consequence of climate change for humans that is likely during the 21st century if present trends continue.The best answers will describe the implications of the change and why it would affect people negatively.
Tags: climate change, present trends, consequence, 21st centuryWhat Is a Serious Consequence of Climate Change for Humans?
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There are many implications but as requested, I’ll focus on just one; namely the rise in sea-levels.
Since the end of the last ice age sea-levels around the world have been more or less constant – changing by no more than 1mm a year. This has enabled coastal communities to become established without the threat of an encroaching sea.
With the onset of global warming has been a harp increase in the amount of ice that is melting all around the world. In the last 100 years half the glaciers have melted and each year half a trillion tons of ice from Greenland and Antarctica is melting. This is causing sea-levels to rise, at the moment by 1.5mm a year but they’re rising faster as the world warms up.
In addition to the melting ice, the seas and oceans are getting warmer and this is causing them to expand, this is adding a further 1.6mm to the annual rise in sea-levels. Add to this the 0.1mm a year rise from isostatic rebound (the springing back up of the Earth after the weight of ice that was once on it has melted).
This adds up to 3.2mm a year, this is the average rate in sea-level rise around the globe. In some places it is much more and in some places it’s less. It had been thought that by the end of this century the rate at which sea-level are rising could increase to about 12mm a year but the latest GRACE (Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment) findings suggest that the sea could rise a lot quicker.
Current estimates put the total sea-level rise at between 600mm and 1400mm by the year 2100.
We have already seen consequences of a rising sea-level. In Bangladesh some half a million people have had to leave their island home of Bhola as rising sea-levels have flooded the land. Some Pacific island communities have started evacuation or have evacuated completely (in some cases global warming is a contributor, not the sole cause).
Much agricultural land that once bordered the oceans has been lost through salination (salting) and often it’s not suitable for animals either because it’s become a boggy wasteland.
In the future things could get a lot more serious. Many towns and cities are built next to the coast and if the projected sea-level rise come to fruition then much of the eastern American seaboard from New York to Miami could be flooded or at serious risk from high tides and storm surges. To avoid flooding, these cities will need massive coastal defences, the cost of which will run into trillions of dollars.
Some countries such as the Maldives are very low-lying, the highest point in the country is just 2.4 metres above sea-level. Within 200 to 300 years the Maldives could disappear from the map altogether.
You’ll be screwed.
The warmer climate leading to things such as an increase in desertification and the spread of diseases and animals that thrive in warmer climates.
Have you seen the day after tomorrow?
War is probably one of the most serious and it’s one that has already begun. The main driver of these conflicts will be the protection of resources and their delivery, so you can see why I say that it’s already begun…
We (the US) obviously didn’t invade Iraq because they crashed planes into the WTC and Pentagon (since that was Al Queda who were being backed by the Taliban in Afghanistan). We also obviously didn’t get all bent out of shape over Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait because of anything other than OIL…
_
We have to endure more blathering from Al Gore.
Water supply variability. Many areas, such as California, get a major portion of their annual water delivery in the form of mountain snow, which conveniently stores itself on mountain slopes and melts slowly to provide river flow and mountain forest irrigation throughout much of the summer. When this precipitation falls as rain there are a number of adverse effects.
It takes about twice as much reservoir capacity to last through the summer. This is hugely expensive for places like California, it’s flat unaffordable may other places. Many good agricultural areas in the world are becoming marginal to unfarmable because of seasonal water lack.Flood control and erosion in the winter and spring becomes a much more difficult problem, as streams respond to individual rainfall events, rather than slow water release. Lack of high mountain moisture occurring earlier and earlier in the year means much greater forest fire hazard.
These are not future possibilities. They are happening now, and they are already costing major $$$.
Do not worry about it. We humans sooner or later will go the way of the dinosaurs. Last climatic change that killed 95% of all living things took about 40,000 years, and humans where not present. Wonder how that happened.
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