A group of scientists from the United States, having analyzed the satellite observation data for 38 years, found that anthropogenic global warming can lead to an increase in the frequency and strength of natural disasters in the east of Russia and in Mongolia. Their research is published in the journal Science.
The authors of the new work studied several theoretical models describing the state of the climate before and after the industrial revolution. Researchers have revealed characteristic patterns of seasonal temperature fluctuations, depending on natural causes. Then they compared these patterns with the data of satellite temperature measurements in the troposphere from 1979 to 2016, having studied the difference between the minimum and maximum temperatures of each year.
As a result, they found that the strongest contrast between winter and summer exists in the mid latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. In the tropics, this difference is much smaller, and the most modest fluctuations are characteristic of the Antarctic. In addition, the difference between winter and summer temperatures in some areas of the Northern Hemisphere was significantly larger than the models assumed. The strongest differences were noticed on the territory of Mongolia and the eastern regions of Russia.
According to scientists, such a sharp warming can not be explained by natural factors. The gap between summer and winter is growing due to the greenhouse effect caused by people’s activities. Scientists believe that these processes can lead to an increase in the frequency and strength of natural disasters.
Since the beginning of the XX century, the average air temperature has increased by 0.74 degrees Celsius, about two-thirds fall on the period after 1980. Each of the last three decades was warmer than the previous one, the air temperature was higher than in any previous decade, since 1850. The likely magnitude of the possible temperature increase throughout the 21st century based on climate models will be 1.1-2.9 degrees Celsius for a minimal scenario of emissions into the atmosphere, and 2.4-6.4 degrees Celsius for maximum.
