Science & Technology

Global warming 'beyond point of no return'

By T.K. Randall
December 2, 2016 ·  178 comments

Are we now too late to stop global warming in its tracks ? Image Credit: CC BY-SA 2.0 Chris Lim The report, which was authored by an international team of researchers, draws upon data from several dozen field experiments conducted over the last two decades.

The biggest finding was that, up until now, scientists had failed to take in to account the fact that organisms in the soil have been producing carbon at an ever-increasing rate.

Global temperatures are now expected to rise by one degree Celsius by the year 2050 due to 55 billion tonnes of additional carbon being released in to the atmosphere over the coming decades.

"It's fair to say we have passed the point of no return on global warming and we can't reverse the effects, but certainly we can dampen them," said study author Dr Thomas Crowther, who has also branded President-elect Donald Trump's skepticism of the topic as 'catastrophic for humanity'."Climate change may be considerably more rapid than we thought it was."

At this stage it's difficult to determine exactly how rising temperatures will impact communities around the world however it is likely that the effects are going to be pretty devastating.

"These effects of climate change will certainly be felt disproportionately by poorer people, particularly the billions whose livelihoods are intrinsically linked to the land," said Dr. Crowther.

"But the impacts on sea-level rise, ocean currents and the health of natural ecosystems are equally devastating for a vast multitude of reasons."

Source: Independent | Comments (178)

Tags: Global Warming.Temperature, Climate