Business-as-usual will lead to super and ultra-extreme heatwaves in the Middle East and North Africa
| Autor: | Yiannis Proestos, Mansour Almazroui, Athanasios Ntoumos, Levent Kurnaz, George Zittis, Grigory Nikulin, Fatima Driouech, Georgiy L. Stenchikov, Tugba Ozturk, Panos Hadjinicolaou, Rashyd Zaaboul, Jos Lelieveld, Edoardo Bucchignani, Khalid El Rhaz |
|---|---|
| Přispěvatelé: | Işık Üniversitesi, Fen Edebiyat Fakültesi, Fizik Bölümü, Işık University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Physics, Öztürk, Tuğba |
| Rok vydání: | 2021 |
| Předmět: |
Atmospheric Science
Climate Research 010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences Summer heat Population 0207 environmental engineering North africa 02 engineering and technology 01 natural sciences Business as usual Klimatforskning Meteorology. Climatology Environmental Chemistry GE1-350 020701 environmental engineering education 0105 earth and related environmental sciences Global and Planetary Change education.field_of_study Middle East Lead (sea ice) Heat wave Environmental sciences Geography Climatology QC851-999 Downscaling |
| Zdroj: | npj Climate and Atmospheric Science npj Climate and Atmospheric Science, Vol 4, Iss 1, Pp 1-9 (2021) |
| ISSN: | 2397-3722 |
| DOI: | 10.1038/s41612-021-00178-7 |
| Popis: | Global climate projections suggest a significant intensification of summer heat extremes in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). To assess regional impacts, and underpin mitigation and adaptation measures, robust information is required from climate downscaling studies, which has been lacking for the region. Here, we project future hot spells by using the Heat Wave Magnitude Index and a comprehensive ensemble of regional climate projections for MENA. Our results, for a business-as-usual pathway, indicate that in the second half of this century unprecedented super- and ultra-extreme heatwave conditions will emerge. These events involve excessively high temperatures (up to 56 degrees C and higher) and will be of extended duration (several weeks), being potentially life-threatening for humans. By the end of the century, about half of the MENA population (approximately 600 million) could be exposed to annually recurring super- and ultra-extreme heatwaves. It is expected that the vast majority of the exposed population (>90%) will live in urban centers, who would need to cope with these societally disruptive weather conditions. This research was supported by the EMME-CARE project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program, under Grant Agreement No. 856612, as well as matching co-funding by the Government of the Republic of Cyprus. It was co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund and the Republic of Cyprus through the Research Innovation Foundation CELSIUS Project EXCELLENCE/1216/0039. Publisher's Version |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
|