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STORY: GENEVA / WMO CLIMATE PREDICTIONS
TRT: 2:23
SOURCE: UNTV CH
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH/ NATS
DATELINE: 17 MAY 2023, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Wide shot, UN flag alley UN Geneva
2. Wide shot, podium, speakers, conference room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Petteri Taalas, Secretary-General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
“There is a 66 percent chance that we would exceed 1.5 degrees during the coming five years.”
4. Close up, cameraman, monitors
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Petteri Taalas, Secretary-General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
“We will see the warmest year on record during the coming five years once this La Niña phase is over. These kinds of variations are a combination of these specific surface temperature variations and the impacts of climate change.”
6. Med shot, cameraman
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Petteri Taalas, Secretary-General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
“The most dramatic changes we expect to happen is in the Arctic where we have already seen more than double the global warming taking place, and during the coming five years, the estimation is that Arctic temperatures would be three times the global average, so we will see more dramatic impacts there.”
8. Wide shot, journalists, cameras, technicians
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Petteri Taalas, Secretary-General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
“Climate change is proceeding, and once we extract this impact of natural variability caused by the El Niño variability, it is once again demonstrating we are moving in the wrong direction when it comes to increases of temperatures and also when it comes to changes in the global precipitation patterns.”
10. Med shot, speakers on monitors, camera
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Leon Hermanson, climate scientist, Met Office:
“We need to emit as few as possible of any greenhouse gases in any emissions that we manage to cut will reduce the warming and will reduce these big impacts we have been talking about. So, it will be sad the day we pass 1.5, but it’s not a reason to give up; we have to continue working out how we can reduce emissions of greenhouse gases as much as possible even after that.”
12. Wide shot, technicians, journalists
13. Close up, laptop
14. Med shot, cameras, technicians
According to the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO), there is a 98 percent chance that at least one in the next five years will beat the temperature record set in 2016.
Global temperatures are set to reach new records in the next five years (2023-2027) and will be more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels for at least one of the next five years, WMO said on Wednesday (17 May).
“There is a 66 percent chance that we would exceed 1.5 degrees during the coming five years,” said Petteri Taalas, WMO Secretary-General, talking to media at the United Nations in Geneva.
And there is a 98 percent likelihood that at least one of the next five years, and the five-year period, will be the warmest on record.
“We will see the warmest year on record during the coming five years once this La Niña phase is over,” predicted WMO’s Secretary-General.
“These kinds of variations are a combination of these specific surface temperature variations and the impacts of climate change.”
Scientists expect a temporary warming effect from the naturally occurring El Niño and climate change to develop in the coming months.
The cooling influence of La Niña over much of the past three years ended in March 2023.
“Climate change is proceeding, and once we extract this impact of natural variability caused by the El Niño variability, it is once again demonstrating we are moving in the wrong direction when it comes to increases of temperatures and also when it comes to changes in the global precipitation patterns,” said Taalas.
In addition to increasing global temperatures, human-induced greenhouse gases lead to more ocean heating and acidification, sea ice and glacier melt, sea level rise, and more extreme weather.
All this will have far-reaching repercussions for health, food security, water management, and the environment, said WMO.
According to the UN agency’s latest climate report, Arctic warming is disproportionality high. Compared to the 1991-2020 average, the temperature anomaly is predicted to be more than three times as large as the global mean anomaly when averaging over the next five northern hemisphere extended winters.
“The most dramatic changes we expect to happen is in the Arctic where we have already seen more than double the global warming taking place, and during the coming five years, the estimation is that Arctic temperatures would be three times the global average, so we will see more dramatic impacts there,” said Taalas.
On a more pragmatic and encouraging note, Leon Hermanson, a climate scientist from the UK Met Office, insisted that cutting greenhouse gas emissions “will reduce the warming and will reduce these big impacts…it will be sad the day we pass 1.5(C), but it’s not a reason to give up, we have to continue working out how we can reduce emissions of greenhouse gases as much as possible even after that.”
