Sea levels could rise TWO METRES in 80 years claims expert
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The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is the most up-to-date report on the climate system and climate change, and it suggests that some of the UK’s favourite holiday destinations in Spain are at risk of being wiped out. Spain and the Mediterranean are predicted to be the most at risk of the many environmental threats that occur as a result of climate change, in particular rising sea levels. Here are the 12 Spanish tourist hotspots that could be underwater by the year 2100.
Climate change is no joke, and many island nations will be totally submerged in the near future due to devastating rising sea levels.
About 200 million people will live below the sea level line by 2100, and millions more will be affected by annual flooding all because of climate change.
Asian countries such as China, Bangladesh, India, Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Japan will be hugely affected by the destructive changes, but Europe isn’t safe either.
It was previously thought that the Netherlands would be the most affected area in Europe, but the latest United Nations report states that Spain is in trouble too.
More than 8,000 kilometres of the Spanish coastline could be lost to the sea in the next 80 years.
This includes not only the beaches on the coastline that will be affected but whole bay towns and cities as well as spots in the Canary and Balaeric Islands could disappear.
On top of rising sea levels, in decades to come Spain and its Islands could face desertification, droughts, extreme temperatures.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) says the “dominant role of humans in driving recent climate change is clear”.
The increase of the concentration of the major greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, from burning fossil fuels, using aerosols, land use and other sources are the main problems.
While climate models have improved and continue to do so, global surface temperature and the shrinking of sea ice in the Arctic is expected to continue with “little difference between high and low emission scenarios over the next 20 years”.
Reducing emissions of carbon dioxide, which is the most important greenhouse gas emitted by human activities, would slow down the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration.
However, we’ll only see concentrations start to decrease when net emissions approach zero and most or all of it is being removed by natural and human processes.
The 12 Spanish tourist hotspots that could be underwater by 2100
NASA’s interactive map, which you can find here, shows exactly which areas in Spain are most at risk.
The projections are mainly worked out using data collected by satellites and instruments on the ground, computer analysis and simulations.
The highest predicted sea-level rise in Spain will be seen in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the capital of Tenerife in the Canary Islands, with levels expected to rise by 81cm in the next 80 years.
Popular tourist cities Cadiz and Barcelona are the second highest at-risk areas, both predicted to see a 75cm sea-level rise.
The changes can already be spotted in Barcelona, where six to 10 metres of sand are lost to the impacts of global warming on a yearly basis.
Other cities in Spain at risk of being submerged by increasing sea levels are:
- Valencia (+71cm sea rise level)
- Málaga (+61cm)
- Almería (+60cm)
- Alicante (+58cm)
- Palma de Mallorca (+66cm)
- Santander (+72cm)
- Gijón (+66cm)
- A Coruña (+73cm)
- Vigo (+71cm).
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