LONDON: Global temperatures may be 4°C hotter by the mid-2050s if current greenhouse gas emissions trends continue, said a study published on Monday.
The study, by Britain’s Met Office Hadley Centre, echoed a UN report last week which found that climate changes were outpacing worst-case scenarios forecast in 2007 by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
“Our results are showing similar patterns (to the IPCC) but also show the possibility that more extreme changes can happen,” said Debbie Hemming, co-author of the research published at a climate change conference at Oxford University.
A global average increase of 4 degrees masked higher regional increases, including more than 15 degrees warmer temperatures in parts of the Arctic, and up to 10 degrees higher in western and southern Africa, Monday’s study found.
The study indicated rainfall may fall this century by a fifth or more in part of Africa, Central America, the Mediterranean, and coastal Australia, “potentially more extreme” than the IPCC’s findings in 2007
