What would be the effects of a five degree world temperature rise?
We all hear all the news about global warming and climate change. Stories are in the press everyday, but what could we see if a 5 degree rise in temperatures worldwide were to actually take place? We hear the warnings. We are told we need to cut carbon emissions, but we rarely hear anything about what will happen if we don't take action. Here are some possibilities.
Five degrees would melt tons and tons of arctic ice and glaciers worldwide resulting in dramatic sea level rise. How about New Orleans, Venice, Saigon and large swathes of coastline flooded. New Orleans would be uninhabitable.
Five degrees has happened before. In the Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum event 55 million years ago, a massive methane release from our oceans triggered the global warming event. It was catastrophic as temperatures shot up worldwide. A massive sea life die off took place and deserts stretched all the way into Europe. Sea levels rose to 100 meters higher than today. There would be a wide dry belt that would stretch around the equatorial region.
A huge issue will be freshwater availability. Glaciers provide alot of the freshwater in Europe as they supply the major rivers. As the glaciers retreat the supply of freshwater melt will decrease rapidly and thus the water supply will dwindle.
Is 5 degrees global warming realistic? You'll find experts on both sides of the argument for sure. It is interesting to debate, but bottom line pollution and carbon emissions are world issues that need to be addressed.
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