Cyril Roger Brossard
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An article by TNN | Jan 2, 2013, 02.46 AM IST
PANAJI: The world needs to take the threat of climate change seriously and work towards mitigating the impact it will cause. This view was expressed by R K Pachauri, chairman of the United Nations' intergovernmental panel on climate change (IPCC), at a lecture in the city on Tuesday.
The IPCC, which has been under Pachauri's stewardship since 2002, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for its work on climate change.
Delivering the NIO foundation day lecture titled 'the challenge of climate change and implications for coastal cities', Pachauri-who is also the director general of The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri)-stated that "climate change is contributing to increasing floods and droughts. "He said developing countries were particularly vulnerable and disclosed that 95% of natural disaster-related deaths in the past few years have occurred in developing countries.
He stated that "continued emissions would lead to further warming over the 21{+s}{+t} century," while observing that the best estimate that had been arrived at was between 1.8 degrees Celsius and 4 degrees Celsius.
Pachauri noted that there had been a "70% increase in global greenhouse gas emissions due to human activities from 1970 and 2004 while carbon dioxide annual emissions had gone up by about 80% between the same time period."
"Atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide and methane in 2005 far exceeds the natural range over the last 6,50,000 years," he added.
He said that by 2050, freshwater availability was projected to decrease in many parts of the world particularly in Southeast Asia, in large river basins. He said "per capita water availability will drop from 1820 cubic metres in 2001 to 1140 cubic metres in 2050."
Cities such as Shanghai, Dhaka, Kolkata which are on megadeltas would be at greater risk of flooding. In wake of floods, disease is rampant, he warned.
He felt the "problem of climate change was due to failure of human society to move towards sustainable development," and said the world needs to "ensure that adaptations and mitigations go together...Time is of essence, have to mitigate as early as possible."
"Costs (of tackling climate change) will be higher, the longer we delay," he added.
Pachauri recommended better governance, effective early warning systems as some of the measure that should be implemented.
PANAJI: The world needs to take the threat of climate change seriously and work towards mitigating the impact it will cause. This view was expressed by R K Pachauri, chairman of the United Nations' intergovernmental panel on climate change (IPCC), at a lecture in the city on Tuesday.
The IPCC, which has been under Pachauri's stewardship since 2002, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for its work on climate change.
Delivering the NIO foundation day lecture titled 'the challenge of climate change and implications for coastal cities', Pachauri-who is also the director general of The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri)-stated that "climate change is contributing to increasing floods and droughts. "He said developing countries were particularly vulnerable and disclosed that 95% of natural disaster-related deaths in the past few years have occurred in developing countries.
He stated that "continued emissions would lead to further warming over the 21{+s}{+t} century," while observing that the best estimate that had been arrived at was between 1.8 degrees Celsius and 4 degrees Celsius.
Pachauri noted that there had been a "70% increase in global greenhouse gas emissions due to human activities from 1970 and 2004 while carbon dioxide annual emissions had gone up by about 80% between the same time period."
"Atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide and methane in 2005 far exceeds the natural range over the last 6,50,000 years," he added.
He said that by 2050, freshwater availability was projected to decrease in many parts of the world particularly in Southeast Asia, in large river basins. He said "per capita water availability will drop from 1820 cubic metres in 2001 to 1140 cubic metres in 2050."
Cities such as Shanghai, Dhaka, Kolkata which are on megadeltas would be at greater risk of flooding. In wake of floods, disease is rampant, he warned.
He felt the "problem of climate change was due to failure of human society to move towards sustainable development," and said the world needs to "ensure that adaptations and mitigations go together...Time is of essence, have to mitigate as early as possible."
"Costs (of tackling climate change) will be higher, the longer we delay," he added.
Pachauri recommended better governance, effective early warning systems as some of the measure that should be implemented.
