FLORIDA, USA — Climate change is about to get worse, a new global science report says. And, its impacts have caused "potentially irreversible" changes to Florida.
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report said Monday that while climate change is already making extreme weather more deadly, it is likely going to make the world sicker, hungrier, poorer, gloomier and way more dangerous in the next 18 years with an "unavoidable" increase in risks.
The report says if human-caused global warming isn’t limited to just another couple tenths of a degree, an Earth now struck regularly by deadly heat, fires, floods and drought in future decades will degrade in 127 ways with some being “potentially irreversible.”
And Florida was at the forefront of examples used to show what those "irreversible" changes could look like for both the environment and people living in the area. This includes economic and financial impacts.
"In Florida, by 2100, an estimated $24–55 billion may be lost in recreational use and value derived by people knowing the reef exists and is healthy," the report stated, referencing the dire straights coral reefs are facing.
A fact sheet put out by the IPCC says "even if global warming is limited to 1.5°C (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), human life, safety, and livelihoods across North America, especially in coastal areas will be placed at risk from sea-level rise (SLR), severe storms, and hurricanes."
A recent report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other federal agencies project up to 18 inches of sea-level rise by 2050 for parts of the Florida coastline.
“The cumulative scientific evidence is unequivocal: Climate change is a threat to human well-being and planetary health,” says the report designed to guide world leaders in their efforts to curb climate change. Delaying cuts in heat-trapping carbon emissions and waiting on adapting to warming's impacts, it warns, “will miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.”
Because the world is already 2 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than pre-industrial time, and emissions are still rising, the vast majority of future scenarios show temperatures are on track to surpass that mark by the 2030s.
Monday’s report says that if that overshoot happens, “then many human and natural systems will face additional severe risks... some will be irreversible, even if global warming is reduced."
With every tenth of a degree of warming, many more people die from heat stress, heart and lung problems from heat and air pollution, infectious diseases, illnesses from mosquitoes and starvation, the report's authors say.
However, some of these risks can still be prevented or lessened with prompt action.