Japan Reports Warmest Spring On Record

TOKYO, June 1: Japan experienced its warmest spring on record this year, the national weather agency said Thursday, as greenhouse gasses and El Nino send temperatures soaring worldwide.

Temperatures across March, April and May were 1.59 degrees Celsius (34.9 Fahrenheit) higher than average, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

That made it the hottest spring since the agency started taking comparable measurements in 1898.

"Global warming has made such record-level temperatures more frequent, and they are expected to become even more common in the future as global warming progresses," it said.

Average sea-surface temperatures for waters around Japan in the same months were tied for the third-highest recorded since 1982, the agency added.

The United Nations said last month it was near-certain that 2023-2027 would be the warmest five-year period ever recorded.

This is partly due to a growing likelihood that the weather phenomenon El Nino will develop in the coming months, fuelling higher global temperatures.

El Nino -- a naturally occurring climate pattern typically associated with increased heat worldwide, as well as drought in some parts of the world and heavy rains elsewhere -- last occurred in 2018-19.

There is also a two-thirds chance that at least one of the next five years will see global temperatures exceed the more ambitious target set out in the Paris accords on limiting climate change, according to the UN's World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

The 2015 Paris Agreement saw countries agree to cap global warming at "well below" two degrees Celsius above average levels measured between 1850 and 1900 -- and 1.5C if possible.

The global mean temperature in 2022 was 1.15C above the 1850-1900 average.

Much of South and Southeast Asia has sweltered through spring heatwaves as global warming exacerbates adverse weather.

Records are being hit around the region, and on Monday, Shanghai logged its hottest May day in more than 100 years, shattering the previous high by a full degree.

Scientists say climate change is intensifying the risk of heavy rain in Japan and elsewhere, because a warmer atmosphere holds more water.

Strong rain in 2021 triggered a devastating landslide in the central resort town of Atami that killed 27 people.

And in 2018, floods and landslides killed more than 200 people in western Japan during the country's annual rainy season.

Japan is the current president of the G7, which this year pledged to accelerate the phase-out of planet-heating fossil fuels.

However, the group of leading economies failed to agree to any new deadlines on ending polluting power sources such as coal.

As Heatwaves Bake South Asia, Study Says Temperature Reached 'Extremely Dangerous' Level

LONDON, May 23: Countries in South and Southeast Asia baked in record-breaking heatwaves in April with the temperature rising well above 40 degrees Celsius. While temperature in Bangladesh reached its highest level in 50 years, Thailand registered a record 45 degrees Celsius and Laos exceeded 42 degrees Celsius.

Such heatwaves were made "30 times more likely" as a result of human-induced climate change, an international team of scientists said on Wednesday. They also said that many cities in India may face maximum temperature 7-8 degrees hotter than the current levels.

The grim predictions have been made in a report called Rapid Attribution Analysis released by World Weather Attribution group.

The team of scientists that created the report studied heat and humidity levels in Southeast Asian countries and concluded that they were at least 2 degrees Celsius hotter as a result of underlying climate change, which has seen average global temperatures rise 1.2 degrees Celsius since 1900.

"The estimated heat index values exceeded the threshold considered as "dangerous" (41 degrees Celsius) over the large parts of the South Asian regions studied. In a few areas, it neared the range of "extremely dangerous" values (above 54 degrees Celsius) under which the body temperature is difficult to be maintained," the study said.

Researchers further said in the study that their observations show a strong increase in likelihood and intensity of April humid heat events similar to that of 2023.

"The combined results give an increase in the likelihood of such an event to occur of at least a factor of 30 over India and Bangladesh due to human-induced climate change. At the same time, a heatwave with a chance of occurrence of 20% (1 in 5 years) in any given year over India and Bangladesh is now about 2 degrees Celsius hotter in heat index than it would be in a climate not warmed by human activities," the report said.

These trends will continue with further warming, the report said, adding that this humid heat event could be expected every 1-2 years.

More Than Half Of World's Large Lakes Are Drying Up: Study

LONDON, May 9: More than half of the world's large lakes and reservoirs have shrunk since the early 1990s, chiefly because of climate change, intensifying concerns about water for agriculture, hydropower and human consumption, a study published on Thursday found.

A team of international researchers reported that some of the world's most important freshwater sources - from the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia to South America's Lake Titicaca - lost water at a cumulative rate of around 22 gigatonnes per year for nearly three decades. That's about 17 times the volume of Lake Mead, the United States' largest reservoir.

Fangfang Yao, a surface hydrologist at the University of Virginia who led the study in the journal Science, said 56% of the decline in natural lakes was driven by climate warming and human consumption, with warming "the larger share of that".

Climate scientists generally think that the world's arid areas will become drier under climate change, and wet areas will get wetter, but the study found significant water loss even in humid regions. "This should not be overlooked," Yao said.

Scientists assessed almost 2,000 large lakes using satellite measurements combined with climate and hydrological models.

They found that unsustainable human use, changes in rainfall and run-off, sedimentation, and rising temperatures have driven lake levels down globally, with 53% of lakes showing a decline from 1992 to 2020.

Neary 2 billion people, who live in a drying lake basin, are directly affected and many regions have faced shortages in recent years.

Scientists and campaigners have long said it is necessary to prevent global warming beyond 1.5 degrees Celisus (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) to avoid the most catastrophic consequences of climate change. The world is currently warming at a rate of around 1.1C (1.9F).

Thursday's study found unsustainable human use dried up lakes, such as the Aral Sea in Central Asia and the Dead Sea in the Middle East, while lakes in Afghanistan, Egypt and Mongolia were hit by rising temperatures, which can increase water loss to the atmosphere.

Water levels rose in a quarter of the lakes, often as a result of dam construction in remote areas such as the Inner Tibetan Plateau.

UN Reports 'Off The Charts' Melting Of Glaciers

GENEVA, April 23: The world's glaciers melted at dramatic speed last year and saving them is effectively a lost cause, the United Nations reported Friday, as climate change indicators once again hit record highs.

The last eight years have been the warmest ever recorded, while concentrations of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide hit new peaks, the UN's World Meteorological Organization said.

"Antarctic sea ice fell to its lowest extent on record and the melting of some European glaciers was, literally, off the charts," the WMO said as it launched its annual climate overview.

Sea levels are also at a record high, having risen by an average of 4.62 millimetres per year between 2013 and 2022 -- double the annual rate between 1993 and 2002.

Record high temperatures were also recorded in the oceans -- where around 90 percent of the heat trapped on Earth by greenhouse gases ends up.

The 2015 Paris Agreement saw countries agree to cap global warming at "well below" two degrees Celsius above average levels measured between 1850 and 1900 -- and 1.5C if possible.

The global mean temperature in 2022 was 1.15C above the 1850-1900 average, the WMO report said.

Record global mean temperatures over the past eight years came despite the cooling impact of a drawn-out La Nina weather phenomenon that stretched over nearly half that period.

The report said greenhouse gas concentrations reached new highs in 2021.

The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) reached 415.7 parts per million globally, or 149 percent of the pre-industrial (1750) level, while methane reached 262 percent and nitrous oxide hit 124 percent.

Data indicate they continued to increase in 2022.

WMO chief Petteri Taalas told a press conference that extreme weather caused by greenhouse gas emissions "may continue until the 2060s, independent of our success in in climate mitigation"

"We have already emitted so much, especially CO2 in the atmosphere that this kind of phasing out of the negative trend takes several decades."

The world's 40-odd reference glaciers -- those for which long-term observations exist -- saw an average thickness loss of more than 1.3 metres between October 2021 and October 2022 -- a loss much larger than the average over the last decade.

The cumulative thickness loss since 1970 amounts to almost 30 metres.

In Europe, the Alps smashed records for glacier melt due to a combination of little winter snow, an intrusion of Saharan dust in March 2022 and heatwaves between May and early September.

"We have already lost the melting of the glaciers game, because we already have such a high concentration of CO2," said Taalas.

In the Swiss Alps, "last summer we lost 6.2 percent of the glacier mass, which is the highest amount since records started".

"This is serious," he said, explaining that the disappearance of the glaciers would limit freshwater supplies for humans and for agriculture, and also harm transport links if rivers become less navigable, calling it "a big risk for the future".

"Many of these mountain glaciers will disappear, and also the shrinking of the Antarctic and Greenland glaciers will continue for a long-term basis -- unless we create a means to remove CO2 from the atmosphere," he said.

Despite the report's bad news, Taalas said there was cause for some optimism.

The means to battle climate change were becoming more affordable, he said, with green energy becoming cheaper than fossil fuels, while the world is developing better mitigation methods.

The planet is no longer heading towards 3-5 C warming, as forecast in 2014, but was now on track for 2.5-3 C warming, he said.

"In the best case, we would still be able to reach 1.5 C warming, which would be best for the welfare of mankind, the biosphere and the global economy," said the WMO secretary-general.

Taalas said 32 countries had reduced their emissions and their economies still grew.

"There is no more automatic link between economic growth and emissions growth," he said.

In stark contrast to the world leaders of 10 years ago, now "practically all of them are talking about climate change as a serious problem and countries have started acting", he said.

Earth Had Second-Warmest March On Record

PARIS, April 6: Earth had its second-warmest March on record with Antarctic sea ice shrinking to its second-lowest extent, the EU's climate monitoring agency said on Thursday.

"The month was jointly the second warmest March globally," said a report from the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The report is based on computer-generated analyses using billions of measurements from satellites, ships, aircraft and weather stations around the world.

It said temperatures were above average over southern and central Europe and below average over most of northern Europe.

They were far warmer than average over much of North Africa, southwestern Russia, Asia, northeastern North America, South America including drought-stricken Argentina, Australia and coastal Antarctica.

Conversely, it was much colder than average over western and central North America, the agency said.

Global warming is causing sea ice to decline and sea levels to rise, raising warnings that dangerous tipping points could be reached.

Copernicus said Antarctic sea ice extent was the second lowest for March in the 45-year satellite data record, at 28 percent below average.

It had reached the smallest area on record in February for the second year in a row, continuing a decade-long decline.

In the north meanwhile, Arctic sea ice extent was four percent below average and joint fourth lowest for March on record, though concentrations were above average in the Greenland Sea.

As temperatures rise globally because of human-caused climate change, Copernicus data show the past eight years were the eight warmest on record.

A UN report warned in March that those record-breaking temperatures would figure among the coolest within three or four decades as global temperatures climb, even if planet-warming emissions drop quickly.