The average global temperature is likely to rise between 4.1 and 8.1 degrees Fahrenheit (or between 2.3 and 4.5 degrees Celsius) if current rates of fossil fuel use and deforestation continue, the Washington Post reported Wednesday, citing a new study.
The projection in an article published in Reviews of Geophysics magazine is narrower than that of a 1979 report, which estimated a range between 2.7 and 8.1 degrees Fahrenheit (or 1.5 and 4.5 degrees Celsius). The new study suggests that the planet probably won’t heat up at the low end of the estimates.
Research indicates a 95 percent chance that if carbon dioxide production, which is projected for the next 50 years, is doubled, the earth would heat up more than 3.6 degrees compared to pre-industrial temperatures, beyond the point of The one that climatologists say the effects, such as significant sea level rise and heat waves will occur.
The researchers noted that abrupt cuts in emissions in the near future could avoid such a scenario, but that if carbon dioxide levels double, the Earth has a 6 to 18 percent chance of increasing beyond the upper limit of 8.1 degrees of the study, the Post reported. .
Twenty-five researchers in the four-year study analyzed data including instrument records, paleoclimatic records used to assess prehistoric temperatures, and satellite data.
“[I]It now seems extremely unlikely that climate sensitivity could be low enough to prevent substantial climate change (well above 2 ° C warming) in a future high emission scenario. We still cannot rule out that the sensitivity could be above 4.5 ° C by doubling the levels of carbon dioxide, although this is not probable, ”states the study summary. “Ongoing research is needed to further reduce uncertainty and we identified some of the most promising possibilities in this regard.”
Co-author Kate Marvel, a physicist at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Columbia University, told the Post “basically what we are saying here is that there really is no evidence of any kind of natural response, any kind of great stabilizer feedback, which in the absence of human actions, will save us from climate change. “
“The main determinant of future climate is human actions,” he added.
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