Globe getting warmer, say UN scientists

This year has been the second warmest since 1860, extending a quarter-century pattern of accelerated global warming linked to greenhouse gas emissions, say United Nations scientists.

The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), a UN agency, said 1998 remained the hottest year on record, but this year surpassed last year as the next warmest.

The 10 warmest years had all occurred since 1987, nine of them since 1990.

"Clearly, for the past 25 or 26 years, the warming is accelerating," said Kenneth Davidson, director of WMO's world climate programme. "The rate of increase is unprecedented in the last 1000 years."

The organisation said a moderate El Nino system warming the tropical Pacific since mid-year was expected to last through April.

El Nino was smaller in magnitude than the 1997-98 event, which caused US$34 billion ($66.87 billion) in damage, but it had coincided with "climate anomalies" including droughts in Australia and southern Africa, as well as warmer conditions across Asia.

The WMO scientists said their report on the status of the global climate this year was based on observations to the end of last month from a network of land-based weather stations, ships and buoys.

Global surface temperatures had risen six-tenths of a degree Celsius since 1900, said the Geneva-based body.

Scientists say the world needs to slash emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases which trap heat in the atmosphere if it is to avoid disastrous floods, droughts and a rise in sea levels in coming decades.

Davidson called greenhouse gases "the major influence affecting the climate".

Hong Yan, WMO assistant secretary-general, went further. "If no very effective measures are taken for preventing further release of greenhouse gases, then the trend will continue," he said.

The United States, the largest producer of greenhouse gases, has rejected the Kyoto Protocol, which aims to cut emissions from developed countries by 2012 to 5.2 per cent below 1990 levels.

New Zealand is a signatory to the protocol.

The El Nino phenomenon is the warming of the central and eastern tropical Pacific, the world's largest ocean basin, every few years.

It can wreak havoc on weather patterns, but no two El Nino events are identical, scientists say.

"The drought in southern Africa appears strongly linked to El Nino," said Paul Llanso, of WMO's climate data and monitoring division.

"The drought in Ethiopia appears not to be."

US forecasters said last week that El Nino would bring a milder winter to the northern US while pounding parts of the south and east with more storms.

- REUTERS

National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research


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