FROM AN early onset of heatwaves across northern states to one of the worst floods in recent years in Assam and other northeastern states, India has experienced several record-breaking weather events so far this year. Though frightening, the year is by no means abnormal. "Since the middle of the twentieth century, India has witnessed...a rise in extreme temperature and rainfall events, droughts, and sea levels; and an increase in the intensity of severe cyclones, alongside other changes in the monsoon system," reads an assessment by the Union Ministry of Earth Sciences in June 2020.
If this is India's situation when the Earth is 1.1°C hotter than in the pre-industrial period, then imagine the scenario when the global temperature rises by 1.5oC. According to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Assessment Report 6 of Working Group I, the world is on track to breach this temperature guardrail in the next 18 years.
Down To Earth (DTE) has pieced together the latest information released by IPCC in 2021 to understand how the temperature and rainfall patterns in Indian states and Union Territories (UTS) will change in a 1.5°C warmer world. The findings are alarming. It underscores the need to get serious about the climate crisis and at the same time gives insights into what awaits each state or UT. This will help the governments in climate adaptability.
India could become 1.2°C warmer and receive almost 10 per cent more rainfall every year, suggests the analysis by DTE. Ladakh is likely to be the worst hit at 2.23°C warmer than pre-industrial levels. Annual temperatures mean may rise in five other Himalayan states-Jammu and Kashmir Himachal (1.76°C), Pradesh (1.73°C), Uttarakhand (1.62°C), Sikkim (1.55°C) and Arunachal Pradesh (1.47°C). The temperature rise is most likely to trigger the rapid melting of glaciers and precipitation change.
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