Heat Waves Will Get More Intense, Longer And More Frequent
Climatologist Robert Vautard warns that by 2050 we will reach 50 ℃ during heat waves, with unforeseeable consequences.
It is a topic of elevator conversation. It’s terribly hot, it’s damn climate change. But thought does not lead us to change our lives to prevent the warming of the atmosphere.
It may be that we like the heat or that we don’t really take our own words seriously. Deep down we want to convince ourselves that it has always been hot in summer and that the weather is a mystery … If not, our passivity cannot be understood.
We will reach 50º C during heat waves
Maybe we need to hear strong voices. Like Greta Thunberg’s. Or like that of the climatologist Robert Vautard, who stated in the newspaper Le Monde that heat waves in Europe can reach 50º C within a few years.
See how you feel today with a temperature around 30 degrees and think how you will feel when you are halfway to the boil.
Robert Vautard is a researcher at the Laboratory of Environmental Sciences of the Pierre Simon-Laplace Institute, specializing in extreme weather events. Explain that heat waves will repeat themselves. It is easy to predict because for 30 years they have been increasingly intense, longer and more frequent. Nothing suggests that the trend will not continue in the coming decades.
According to Vautard, when the average temperature of the planet has increased by about 2ºC by 2050, summers will be much hotter. In the middle of this 21st century, in Barcelona, Madrid, Zaragoza, Bilbao, Valencia or Seville, thermometers may reach 50º C, with higher peaks in certain places. In addition, summer will start earlier and end later, it will span from May to October.
Heat, crisis, future
These temperatures, combined with the humidity of the coastline, can produce an unbearable sensation. Spain will most likely cease to be an attractive destination for tourists. Thus, the climate emergency will be compounded by the economic crisis and the suspicion that the future is slipping from our hands.
On the other hand, the increase in temperature will be accompanied by health problems: dehydration, hyperthermia, cardiovascular disorders, respiratory diseases, anxiety …
Reduce your emissions
By now you may be wondering what can be done to avoid this scenario. According to Vautard, the basic measure is to significantly reduce our emissions of gases that favor global warming, especially CO 2 , produced by burning fossil fuels. Nothing is going to prevent temperatures from rising in the coming years, the goal is to change the trend so that at the end of the century we can tell about it.
Think about it every time you step on the gas or get on a plane. Or when you consume an unnecessary product whose production has represented the emission of kilos of CO 2 into the atmosphere. Or when you choose an unsustainable product with alternatives.
