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A future without forests?

Alok Jha

Comprehensive analysis of the potential effects of human-made global warming.

MORE THAN half of the world's major forests will be lost if global temperatures rise by an average of 3 degrees Centigrade or more by the end of the century, it was claimed on Monday. The prediction comes from the most comprehensive analysis yet of the potential effects of human-made global warming.

Extreme floods, forest fires and droughts will also become more common over the next 200 years as global temperatures rise owing to climate change, according to Marko Scholze of the University of Bristol. Dr. Scholze took 52 simulations of the world's climate over the next century, based on 16 different climate models, grouping the results according to varying amounts of global warming they predicted by 2100: less than 2 degrees C on average, 2 degrees C-3 degrees C and more than 3 degrees C. He then used the simulations to work out how the world's plants would be affected over the next few hundred years. The results were published on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Alan O'Neill, science director for the National Centre for Earth Observation said: "Some work in this area has been done before looking at the meteorological forecasts for climate change and feeding those into vegetation models ... this is a much more comprehensive study." Dr. Scholze said the effects of a 2 degrees C category were inevitable. This is the temperature rise that will happen, on average, even if the world immediately stopped emitting greenhouse gases. This scenario predicts that Europe, Asia, Canada, central America, and Amazonia could lose up to 30 per cent of its forests.

A rise of 2 degrees C-3 degrees C will mean less fresh water available in parts of west Africa, central America, southern Europe, and the eastern United States, raising the probability of drought in these areas. In contrast, the tropical parts of Africa and South America will be at greater risk of flooding as trees are lost. Dr. Scholze says a global temperature rise of more than 3 degrees C will mean even less fresh water. Loss of forest in Amazonia and Europe, Asia, Canada, and central America could reach 60 per cent.

Dr. Scholze said his work could help to define the concept of dangerous climate change for policymakers. "Dangerous is very objective. We tried to define a dangerous level and see what the risks are," he said.

In his definition, climate change becomes dangerous when an event — such as extreme flooding or heat waves — that only happened once every 100 years becomes one that happens every 10 years." —

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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