Half of All Wildlife Could Disappear from the Amazon, Galapagos and Madagascar Due to Climate Change

As much as half of wildlife and 60% of plants in the world’s richest forests could be at risk of extinction in the next century if stronger efforts aren’t taken to combat climate change, according to a new report on the risks of rising global temperatures. The landmark study was conducted by the World Wildlife Fund, University of East Anglia, and the James Cook University, and published on Tuesday in the journal Climatic Change. It warns that rising temperatures and associated phenomena, including extreme storms, erratic rainfall patterns, and prolonged droughts, could have disastrous effects on some of the world’s most biodiverse areas, including the Amazon river basin, Galapagos islands, southwestern Australia, and coasts of Europe and the Caribbean. “Hotter days, longer periods of drought, and more intense storms are becoming the new normal, and species around the world are already feeling the effects,” said Nikhil Advani, lead climate specialist at WWF. The study examined the impact of climate change on nearly 80,000 species of plants and animals species in 35 of the world’s most diverse areas. They tested for three scenarios: a 2°C rise in global temperatures, the upper threshold of the Paris Climate Agreement, a 3.2°C increase that the U.N. warns is now the estimated forecast for the end of the century, and a 4.5°C increase, if carbon emissions remain unchanged from current rates. The study found that if global temperatu...
Source: TIME: Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Uncategorized climate change onetime overnight Source Type: news