ALARM BELLS FOR A GRIM CLIMATE

ALARM BELLS FOR A GRIM CLIMATE

                                                                                                               Nikunja Bihari Sahu

       The summer this year has been exceptionally hard and harsh with temperatures soaring to 50 degrees Celsius  in most parts of north-western India including the capital city of Delhi breaking all previous temperature records. The weather station in Delhi's Mungeshpur area recorded India's hottest-ever day with 52.3 degree Celsius last Wednesday.  Most parts of northern and central India are now reeling under intense heatwave conditions unprecedented by any count. This time around the year, the temperature is expected to increase by a little in northern parts of India as the Sun moves from the equator towards the Tropic of Cancer. However, the current temperature trend baffles all known geographical and climatic interpretations.

      This has brought about untold hardship and miseries to people and animals in various places and resulted in severe water crisis in most parts of the country. The water level in most reservoirs of India has alarmingly decreased owing to rapid evaporation leading to their declined storage capacity. Electricity demands have been surging due to the spiraling use of cooling devices leading to excess burning of coals in most coal-fire based thermal power plants compounding the effect.  Prices of vegetables and grains have also gone up due to their lower production in the dry conditions. Wildfires have also been triggered in states like Uttarakhand, Odisha and Jharkhand due to the rising temperature and low humidity level of air. Heatwave related deaths are  pouring in from different parts of the country.

     This unusual rise of temperature is not just Delhi or India’s problem, the whole world, in fact, is sizzling with an immense heat unknown and unheard before. Last year , extreme and prolonged heat wave conditions swept across the whole world starting from Japan in the east to the USA and Canada in the west encompassing  Southern Europe, and North Africa breaking all previous temperature records. For example, the United Kingdom crossed 40 degree Celsius for the first time ever in July 2022. A small town in China’s northwest recorded 52 degree Celsius last year, the highest ever for that country. In 2021, Sicily in Italy recorded 48.8 degree Celsius, the highest for Europe ever. The highest ever temperature recorded anywhere on Earth was 56.7 degree Celsius in a place called Death Valley in the desert of California, United States in 1913.

      According to one report, 40% parts of the world saw their highest daily temperatures on record in the 10 years from 2013 to 2023 that included Antarctica. The highest temperature in India was recorded in Phalodi in Rajasthan during the period.

      According to the Copernicus Climate Change Service, an agency of the European Commission, the average global temperature in March 2024 has been higher by 0.7 deg C as compared to the period 1991 to 2020 in March. The one year period between May 2023 and April 2024 was warmer than any previous 12-month period, about 1.61 degrees Celsius higher than the pre-industrial (1850-1900) average.

     Coming to the Odisha context, the number of heatwave days in April this year is more than the previous 9 years since 2016. As for the whole country, while last year saw only 40 heatwave days, there were 117 heatwave days this year during the same period, a whopping 3 times rise.

       There is no doubt that the world has been steadily  warming since the Industrial revolution of the late eighteenth century due to large-scale emissions mostly from industrialization and urbanization and due to other factors such as deforestation and desertification. While Carbon dioxide, a key greenhouse gas, increased dramatically in our atmosphere by 11% since the Industrial revolution, Methane, another potential greenhouse gas, accounts for a whopping 149% rise. Further, the monsoon system, a major cooling factor in the weather of the subcontinent and the backbone of the country's agriculture, has become weak in its moisture content and irregularity in onset. According to one report, nearly 31 lakh trees were cut down for construction and development of public infrastructure projects across India in 2020-21 and the number of new plantations replenished in the aftermath was  miniscule by nature.

     The Earth is the only planet in the habitable zone of the parent star Sun to possess life with an average temperature of 15 degrees C. On the other hand, the neighbouring planet Venus and similar in size to our Earth is a hell for life with an average temperature of 463 degrees C.

    The brutal temperatures in Delhi and the adjoining region have set the alarm bells ringing. Time has now come for humanity to think and take actions to mitigate the consequences of the furies of nature and to keep the human race going.

 

 

                                                                                                                                    Nikunja Bihari Sahu

Education Officer

Regional Science Centre

Shyamla Hills

Bhopal

 To read the same article published in the Orissa Post dated 4.06.24, please click the following link :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YgsNZBCJ6JPsEAEUqg9oAtyOK7UFGH_v/view?usp=sharing