The continued warming of the planet will bring catastrophic impact on Bangladesh, said a report published from USA on Monday. The report predicts that the world is heading for a 3 degree Celsius rise in global temperature instead of earlier prediction of 1.5 degrees. The catastrophic impact especially threatens coastal communities in Bangladesh bringing more episodes of extreme cyclones and salinity resulting in massive human migration.
There would be more intensified droughts, floods and deadly and destructive storm surges in Bangladesh threatening food security, economic and social developments. The report, titled, ‘Ice sheet contributions to future sea-level rise from structured expert judgment,’ says that without major reductions in emissions of carbon dioxide, sea level would rise between 52cm and 98cm by 2100.
To address such colossal disasters Bangladesh would need about US$ 70 billion by 2030 to reduce carbon dioxide emission as well as to take adaptation and mitigation measures to face the challenges of global warming. Scientists believe that global sea levels could rise far more than predicted, due to accelerating melting in Greenland and Antarctica.
The long-held predictions has been that the seas would rise by a maximum of just under a metre (98 cm) by 2100. This new study, based on expert opinions, projects that the real level may be around double that figure (2m). Such a rise in temperature could lead to the displacement of hundreds of millions of people, including in Bangladesh which is one of the worst affected countries by climate change.
In view of the new threats from global sea level rise Bangladesh is preparing to adapt new strategies in order to face the environmental changes.
“We are seeking to find new strategies in adaptations,” Abdullah Al Mohsin Chowdhury, Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change told Bangladesh Post on Tuesday.
He said, “We already sought US$42 billion from the Green Climate Fund for new adaptation actions and US$27 for reducing green House gas emission.”
Regarding release of the new study, Chowdhury said, “We are shifting our adaptation plans so that we can confront the climate change challenges.”
The question of sea-level rise was one of the most controversial issues raised at the platform of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), when it published its fifth assessment report in 2013.
Ice scientists are also concerned that the models currently used to predict the influence of huge ice sheets on sea levels don't capture all of the uncertainties about how these are now melting. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) report that during the period from 2015 to 2019 the carbon dioxide emission exceeded 415 parts per million (ppm).
Golam Rabbani, a climate change expert told Bangladesh Post, “Since 1840 we have had steady and slow rise in carbon emission but during the very recent years we have noticed that carbon emission has already exceeded an alarming 4015 ppm which now continues to advance to unsafe level.” Rabbani, a Fellow of Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies, BCAS, told Bangladesh Post, “The most worrying part of the sea level rise threat is the magnitude of the disaster. The rise in global temperature could be catastrophic for Bangladesh.”
He said that due to rapid industrialization in Bangladesh the per capita greenhouse gas emission exceeded from 0.85 ton in 2005 to 0.98 ton in 2012 which indicates that Bangladesh is heading towards a disaster. In the researchers' view, if emissions continue on the current rate then the world's seas would be very likely to rise by between 62cm and 238cm by 2100. Scientists believe that the first is that we need to do is to limit global warming to 1.5 Celsius which can bring a lot of benefits compared with limiting it to two degrees.