{"id":2801,"date":"2021-02-15T04:01:49","date_gmt":"2021-02-14T17:01:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/?p=2801"},"modified":"2021-02-15T04:01:49","modified_gmt":"2021-02-14T17:01:49","slug":"himalayan-meltdown-hindu-kush-himalayan-region-warming-faster-than-global-average-part-19-in-everywhere-is-warming-twice-as-fast-as-everywhere-else-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/?p=2801","title":{"rendered":"Himalayan meltdown: Hindu Kush Himalayan region warming faster than global average. Part 19 in everywhere is warming twice as fast as everywhere else."},"content":{"rendered":"

https:\/\/www.downtoearth.org.in\/news\/climate-change\/himalayan-meltdown-hindu-kush-himalayan-region-warming-faster-than-global-average-63078<\/a><\/p>\n

Capping global warming at 1.5\u00b0C will still mean a higher rate for the region through this century<\/p>\n

The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region \u2014 spread over 3,500 square kilometres across eight countries including India, Nepal and China \u2014 is warming faster than the global average. It would continue to warm through this century even if the world is able to limit global warming at the agreed 1.5 degrees Celsius, says the Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment, the first-ever assessment of impacts of climate change on the ecologically important but fragile region.<\/p>\n

On February 4, 2019, the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) \u2013 a regional intergovernmental body \u2013 released the assessment. More than 300 researchers participated in the study who took over four years to bring out the first report.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the future, even if global warming is kept to 1.5 degrees C, warming in the HKH region is likely be at least 0.3 degrees C higher, and in the northwest Himalaya and Karakoram at least 0.7 degrees C higher,\u201d says the assessment report.<\/p>\n

As it has been the case with climate change, the per capita fossil fuel carbon dioxide emission from the HKH countries is one-sixth of the global average though it is disproportionately impacted.<\/p>\n

The HKH region \u2014 part of the Third Pole due to its largest permanent snow cover after the North and South poles \u2014 sustains the livelihoods of 240 million people living in the mountains and hills. It also houses the origin of 10 river basins that include the Ganga, Brahmaputra and the Mekong. Some 1.5 billion people depend on these basins for sustenance.<\/p>\n

Usually identified with its extreme cold climate, the region is already showing disruptive signs of changes diametrically opposite to it.<\/p>\n

In the last 60 years, extreme cold events have become lesser while extreme warm weather events have become more pronounced. Both minimum and maximum temperatures are also changing: they are moving north, indicating overall warming.<\/p>\n

Every decade HKH loses one cold night and half a cold day. While warm nights have increased by 1.7 per decade, the region gets 1.2 warm days every decade.<\/p>\n

Alarmingly, changes in surface temperature (relative to 1976-2005) in this Himalayan region are higher than the global average, and even the South Asian region. \u201cThe projected changes in the surface mean temperature over the HKH region are larger compared to the global mean change by the end of the 21st century,\u201d says the report. In what it terms as the \u201cmoderate scenario\u201d, by the end of the century the temperature rise would be 2.5+\/- 1.5 degree centigrade. In another \u201cextreme\u201d scenario, it would be 5.5+\/- 1.5 degrees centigrade.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the climate of the region has changed significantly in the past, it is projected to change more dramatically in the near future.\u201d In 1998-2014, when the global warming slowed down, this region continued to warm.<\/p>\n

In the 20th<\/sup>\u00a0century, the HKH region oscillated between warming and cooling phases. In the first 40 years, it reported warming to be followed by a cooling phase in 1940-1970. However, since 1970 it has been warming, and as assessed it would continue to be through the current century. However, warming may be good news for agriculture. \u201cThe length of the growing season has increased by 4.25 days per decade \u2014 a positive change for agriculture,\u201d says the assessment.<\/p>\n

Warming in HKH region has ramifications for the global climate. This region is a heat source in summer and a heat sink in winter. Along with the Tibetan Plateau, this influences the Indian summer monsoon. So, any changes in this region would have a bearing on the monsoon itself that already shows signs of changes in spread and distribution.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuch large warming could trigger a multitude of biophysical and socio-economic impacts, such as biodiversity loss, increased glacial melting, and less predictable water availability\u2014all of which will impact livelihoods and well-being in the HKH,\u201d warns the assessment report.<\/p>\n

Faster snow and glacier melting due to warming is already manifesting in formation of glacial lakes. Glacial lake outburst floods (GLOF) are becoming frequent and causing huge casualties and loss to local infrastructures.\u00a0The ICIMOD survey in 1999 and 2005 found 8,790 glacial lakes covering a total of 801.83 square km in HKH; out of these 203 lakes have potential to cause GLOF.<\/p>\n

Glaciers in HKH have been retreating faster, and consistently causing greater water flows in rivers. In Tibetan Plateau, river run off has increased by 5.5 per cent. Most of the lakes in high altitudes have also reported water level rise by 0.2 m\/year besides their surface areas expanding.<\/p>\n

Climate change worse everywhere than everywhere else<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

https:\/\/www.downtoearth.org.in\/news\/climate-change\/himalayan-meltdown-hindu-kush-himalayan-region-warming-faster-than-global-average-63078 Capping global warming at 1.5\u00b0C will still mean a higher rate for the region through this century The Hindu […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[737,462,836,61,927,929,54,930,928,65,62],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2801"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2802,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801\/revisions\/2802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realclimaterecords.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}