«The stakes are too high»
Scientists warn that a climate catastrophe in the style of the famous apocalyptic film «The Day After Tomorrow» could happen at any time within the next 6,000 years. Researchers admit that it is almost impossible to predict the exact timing of climate tipping points.
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The movie The Day After Tomorrow, writes the Daily Mail, has made us all fear catastrophic and abrupt climate change. But according to research, we probably won’t face apocalyptic weather events the day after tomorrow.
The fact is that researchers say that predicting the timing of climate change is almost impossible, but a global catastrophe could happen at any time in the next 6,000 years.
The team from the Technical University of Munich and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research cited the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) as an example. This system, the Daily Mail explains, circulates water from north to south and back again in a long loop in the Atlantic Ocean, transporting warm water from the tropics northwards.
Climate models suggest that this circulation will weaken in this century due to increased greenhouse gas emissions and melting ice. If the system collapses, the Northern Hemisphere will become colder, leading to a sharp drop in temperatures in Europe, writes the Daily Mail. Rainy seasons in the Amazon rainforest will be replaced by dry seasons, and sea levels in coastal cities will rise even faster.
Previous forecasts, based on historical data, suggest that a collapse could occur between 2025 and 2095. However, the new study has found that the uncertainties are so great that these forecasts cannot be considered reliable.
Using different data sets and analyses, the researchers concluded that the tipping point for the AMOC was between 2050 and 8065 — a 6,000-year window that the researchers say is not particularly useful.
In a paper published in the journal Science Advances, they said that the timing of other climate tipping points, such as the melting of the polar ice sheets or the disappearance of tropical forests, is also too uncertain. This, writes the Daily Mail, is because too much is still unknown about the physical mechanisms underlying climate change, the lack of direct observations of the climate system and incomplete historical data.
Lead author Maya Ben-Yami emphasizes: «There are things we still can't predict, and we need to invest in better data and a deeper understanding of the systems in question. The stakes are too high to rely on shaky forecasts.»
While the study shows that we cannot reliably predict tipping events, the possibility of such events cannot be ruled out either, the team warns. The researchers also stressed that statistical methods are still very good at identifying which parts of the climate have become more unstable.
«We still need to do everything we can to reduce our impact on the climate, primarily by reducing greenhouse gas emissions,» said study co-author Niklas Boer. «Even if we can't predict the timing of the tipping point, the likelihood that key components of the Earth system will tip over still increases with every tenth of a degree of warming.»
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