Thanks to El Niño and global warming working in conjunction, 2015 will be the hottest year on record so far. Until, that is, next year, which is predicted to be even hotter, according to Reuters.
The World Meteorological Organization released a statement about global warming on Wednesday, detailing that the rise in temperature could reach as high as six degrees Celsius or more if we do nothing about the global warming situation as it currently stands. Director of the World Meteorological Organization, or WMO, Michel Jarraud stated “…the more we wait for action, the more difficult it will be,” in reference to reversing the rise in temperatures.
While some people on the east coast have been celebrating how mild the month of November has been relative to last year, the truth is that these milder temperatures do not bode well for our future or for global warming. According to Jarraud, we must take action immediately if we want to see any results within the next hundred or so years.
The average surface temperature of the earth is, according to the WMO, likely to reach a “symbolic and significant milestone” of exactly one degree Celsius above what the earth’s average surface temperature was in the pre-industrial era, around 1880 – 1899. The average surface temperature now is also approximately 0.73 of a degree Celsius above the average around 1961 – 1990.
For the past 30 years, greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere have reached a new record with the passing of every year. Though 2015 was admittedly affected by El Niño quite significantly, 2016 is expected to be even more significantly affected, meaning higher temperatures and possible even more greenhouse gases contributing to global warming.
Global warming has been hitting the news by storm (no pun intended) as of late, with the end of 2015 bringing some shocking new stats about the earth’s rising temperatures to the plate. There was also the release of the documentary called Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret, which details how large agriculture is destroying our planet. The documentary implies that the biggest step we can take to reduce greenhouse gases is to stop eating meat. By becoming vegetarians, and eventually vegans, the gases released from cows will stop contributing to the disappearing ozone layer, among other factors that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Some people still refuse to believe that these predictions are true, claiming that the science behind them is flawed. However, according to Paul Williams, a climate scientist at the University of Reading, “All the thermometer readings, satellite observations, tree rings, ice cores and sea-level records would have to be wrong.” It looks like we’ll have to start trusting nature before we can trust ourselves to fix the planet.