Glaciers at many Unesco World Heritage websites together with Yellowstone and Kilimanjaro National Park will doubtless vanish by 2050, the UN company warned Nov 3, urging leaders to act quick to save the remaining.
The warning adopted a examine of 18,600 glaciers at 50 World Heritage websites – protecting round 66,000sq km (25,000sq miles) – which discovered glaciers at a 3rd of the websites had been “condemned to disappear”.
The examine “exhibits these glaciers have been retreating at an accelerated charge since 2000 due to CO2 emissions, that are warming temperatures”, Unesco mentioned.
The glaciers had been dropping 58 billion tonnes of ice yearly, equal to the mixed annual water use of France and Spain, and had been accountable for almost 5% of noticed world sea-level rise, the company defined.
“Glaciers in a 3rd of the 50 World Heritage websites are condemned to disappear by 2050, no matter efforts to restrict temperature will increase,” Unesco mentioned.
“But it’s nonetheless doable to save the glaciers within the remaining two thirds of websites if the rise in temperatures doesn’t exceed 1.5°C in contrast to the pre-industrial interval.”
Countries have pledged to preserve world warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial ranges – a objective the world is set to miss on present emission developments.
“This report is a name to motion,” mentioned Unesco head Audrey Azoulay, forward of the COP27 local weather summit in Egypt that began Nov 7.
“Only a speedy discount in our CO2 emissions ranges can save glaciers and the distinctive biodiversity that relies on them. COP27 may have an important function to assist discover options to this subject.”
In Africa, glaciers in all World Heritage websites will very doubtless be gone by 2050, together with at Kilimanjaro National Park and Mount Kenya, Unesco warned.
In Europe, some glaciers within the Pyrenees and within the Dolomites can even most likely have vanished in three a long time’ time.
The identical goes for glaciers within the Yellowstone and Yosemite nationwide parks within the United States.
The melting of ice and snow is without doubt one of the 10 key threats from local weather change, an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report printed in February mentioned. – AFP
