Climate
change leaves many plants and animals only a few decades to adjust. A study
warns that losses of living space will afflict plants and animals worldwide,
raising extinction worries.
Global
warming will destroy more than half of the habitats of most plants and a third
of animals by 2080, biologists conclude, unless steps are taken to limit
greenhouse gases.
Over the
past century, average global surface temperatures have increased about 1.4
degrees Fahrenheit, according to the National Academy of Sciences. This global
warming is largely due to burning fossil fuels, such as coal, oil and natural
gas, which retain heat and warm the atmosphere. Temperatures worldwide are
expected to rise roughly 7 degrees by 2100 if the use of fossil fuels continues
without attempts to mitigate their effects.
Without
mitigation, "large range contractions can be expected even amongst common
and widespread species," concludes the study led by Rachel Warren of the
United Kingdom's University of East Anglia. It was published in the journal
Nature Climate Change.
In the
study, biologists and climate researchers looked at the effects of these
increasing temperatures on the living space of 48,786 animal and plant species
worldwide. "With no mitigation, the climate becomes particularly
unsuitable for both plants and animals in sub-Saharan Africa, Central America,
Amazonia and Australia."
Overall, the
study finds that 57% of plants and 34% of animals will see their habitats cut
by 50% or more by 2080, as temperature changes make them unsuitable for the
species. Given warming that has already occurred, some of those losses are
locked in already, but they could be reduced by 60% if greenhouse gas emissions
were to peak in 2016, the study shows.
"The
terrifying loss of biodiversity predicted by this study shows that climate
chaos will fundamentally transform our planet," Shaye Wolf of the Center
for Biological Diversity, a conservation group, says in a statement on the
study. "We need to cut emissions now, before our ecosystems suffer
catastrophic damage."
The 2007
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report had estimated that more than
20% of species worldwide are at "high risk" of extinction if
temperatures rise more than 3.6 degrees in this century.
