11 Frightening Facts of Climate Change in 2017

Climate change is a reality that is becoming more and more frightening as the days pass by. As we see the melting Arctic ice, rising levels of sea and the most deadly impact of rising temperature, climate change is constantly pushing the earth into an unknown territory.

More and more countries are now taking lead to combat climate change and The Paris Agreement is nonetheless the strongest link of these measures. However, such measures are also being refused by many influential powers in the world and that being said, Donald Trump is the name that comes first to the mind. Since climate change is unavoidable its drastic effects have already taken hold in many climate events. Let’s have a look!

    1. After 1880, 2016 was reported as the hottest year on record. As the temperature is rising all around the globe, NASA and NOAA report a 0.99 degrees Celsius warmer climate in comparison to the mid 20th-century.
    2. There is no serious consideration of climate change as 97% researchers believe the existence of global warming and takes human activities as the sole reason for that. But climate change is still at the 3rd position after terrorism, poverty, and lack of drinking water as the YouGov research suggests.
    3. In 2017, the sheet of ice covering the Arctic sea has reached a record breaking low and reported to have shrunk by almost 4.1 percent since 1979, every decade. Alongside the glaciers are melting at much faster rate including the ranges of major mountains such as the Himalayas, Alps, and Rockies.
    4. In the past 2000 years, sea level is now rising at the fastest ever rate and the added water to these rising sea level is coming from the melting glaciers as well as the sea water expansion as this warms.

  1. Climate change is also leading to the refugee crisis. On an average, around 21.5 million people have already forcibly displaced due to climate change events since 2008. In the areas of continuous conflict, climate change nonetheless acts as the threat multiplier.
  2. Earth Overshoot Day is the event that is with regards to human consumption which will outstrip the resource production of the Earth. The event is coming up earlier each year. In comparison to 13 August in 2015, this year the event landed on the 2nd
  3. In last April, 2/3 of Great Barrier Reef in Australia was damaged due to coral bleaching. Due to rising water temperature, the algae within coral tissue immensely expelled and caused coral to lose its appearance permanently.
  4. The oceans are now 26% more acidic now – with ocean surface pH decreased by 0.1 – in comparison to the early days of industrial revolution.
  5. The amounts of people that are exposed to flooding every year are likely to triple and reach 54 million than 21 million by the year 2030. This would also increase the flooding economic cost from £65 billion to £340 billion.
  6. Than previously in human history, the greenhouse gases are getting concentrated in the atmosphere. There were around 400 parts/million concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere, first time, in the year 2015.
  7. As the volume of greenhouse gases we produce increase, a rise in earth’s temperature will be observed. The range expected to be observed by 2100 is from 2 degrees to almost 6 degrees.

It remains to be seen how readily countries, and us as individuals, are able to comprehend the extent of the damage climate change is causing and take a collaborative approach to rectifying the consequences.