State of the Climate in Asia 2024
<p>The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing
Glacial Melt
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Massive Greenland surface ice cover melt picked up by satellites
Greenland's surface ice cover melted this month over a larger area than ever detected in more than 30 years of satellite observations, NASA said recently. According to measurements from three separate satellites analyzed by NASA and university scientists, an estimated 97 per cent of the ice sheet surface thawed at some point in mid July, the agency said in a statement. “This was so extraordinary that at first I questioned the result: was this real or was it due to data error?” said NASA's Son Nghiem.
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Japan joins int'l anti-soot and methane campaign
A coalition of countries and agencies seeking to curb Earth-warming pollutants like soot released by wood-fired ovens and methane from oil extraction, on Tuesday welcomed seven new members to its fold.
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Govt oversight needed in religious tourism
Environmentalists are demanding greater environmental management of religious tourism. The death of 98 pilgrims in the Amarnath Yatra has highlighted the need to ensure better man-management in these ecologically-fragile regions. Already, three lakh pilgrims have visited the Amarnath shrine while the number in 2011 was around 7.5 lakhs. Environmentalist Prof. Vikram Soni of the Jamia Milia University points out that such large numbers of yatris are unsustainable given the high altitude and the danger of landslides hitting this area which could result in heavy loss of life.
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“Indication of global warming”
A massive iceberg — twice the size of Manhattan — has broken off of a glacier in Greenland, according to NASA satellite imagery, in what could be the latest indication of global warming. The images released on Wednesday show the massive chunk of ice breaking off of the Petermann Glacier on the north-western coast of Greenland. The glacier produced a similar ice island twice as large in 2010.
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When the Brahmaputra flooded
Climate change effects are likely to continue to cause intense flood and drought in Assam. The recent unprecedented floods, accompanied by the erosion of the Brahmaputra, has brought the influencing factors
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Tibetan glaciers shrinking rapidly
The majority of glaciers on the Tibetan plateau and in the surrounding region are retreating rapidly, according to a study based on 30 years of satellite and field measurements.
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Climate change threatens Tibetan antelopes deliveries
Every summer, Tibetan antelopes in China's remote northwest follow a certain pattern of migration that is key to the endangered species' survival. Normally, around 30,000 pregnant gazelles migrate,
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Significant contribution to total mass from very small glaciers
A single large glacier can contain tens of millions of times the mass of a small glacier. Nevertheless, very small glaciers (with area ≤1 km2) are so numerous that their contribution to the world's total
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Different glacier status with atmospheric circulations in Tibetan Plateau and surroundings
The Tibetan Plateau and surroundings contain the largest number of glaciers outside the polar regions. These glaciers are at the headwaters of many prominent Asian rivers and are largely experiencing shrinkage,
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U.S. East Coast a "hot spot" for sea level rise: study
Sea levels from Cape Hatteras to Cape Cod are rising at a faster pace than anywhere on Earth, making coastal cities and wetlands in this densely-populated U.S. corridor possibly more vulnerable to flooding