The 10 cities in the world that could be under water due to the climate crisis

Even if you can limit the global warming at +1.5 ºC, compared to pre-industrial times, the water level will continue to rise for centuries, flooding cities where 500 million people currently live, warns a study known on Tuesday.

With just half a degree more, 200 million people will be more vulnerable to storms, according to a study published in the journal Environmental Research Letters.

Asia, where nine of the ten most at risk megacities are located, would be the continent most impacted.

Cities most at risk of being underwater

[Fuente: Environmental Research Letters]

Most current estimates of sea level rise and threats to coastal population areas extend to the end of this century.

But this phenomenon will continue beyond 2100 due to the warming of the waters and the thaw, regardless of the speed in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

“About 5% of the world’s population that will be affected by high tides because of the carbon dioxide that already accumulates in the atmosphere by human activity “the lead author of the article, Ben Strauss, president and chief investigator of Climate Central, an independent organization of journalists and scientists, told AFP.

The current concentration of CO2 is already 50% higher than that of 1800, and since then the average temperature of the Earth’s surface has increased by 1.1 ° C.

For Strauss, this is already enough so that, although this effect occurs in two or ten centuries.

The limit of +1.5 ºC that was reached in the Paris Agreement, and that countries around the world will try to maintain at the COP26 summit in Glasgow (Scotland) next month, would provoke

“In Glasgow, and until the end of this decade, it is in our power to help or betray the hundred generations to come,” said Strauss.

With information from AFP

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