Indias Monsoons

Global warming and its effects

K. Kamala (Ph. D Student)
esearch !ellow" II#M" Pune
Monthl$ %conomic Digest " Ma$ &''(
The rainfall received over India during the four summer months from June to September
is very critical as it controls the countrys economy. Indias economy is closely linked to
the performance of summer monsoon rainfall over India and the social infrastructures
are finely tuned to the remarkable stability of the monsoon. Minor fluctuations in the
monsoon rainfall patterns end up causing major disturbance in both the socio and
economic domains. The pressures of an increasing population are bringing additional
stresses on the environment with implications for food security water resources and
health. !onse"uently climate variability and change especially the possibility that the
monsoon may become more volatile in a warmer world have major implications for
India. It is the general consensus that global warming has occurred because of the
increase in atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases due to human activities.
#uman activities $e.g. burning of fossil fuels and changes in land use and land cover%
are perturbing the earths climate system with possible serious adverse conse"uences. It
may influence local precipitation directly through changes in local vegetation cover and
indirectly though global warming. &iscernible human influences now e'tend to other
aspects of climate including ocean warming temperature e'tremes and wind patterns.
(ither ways global warming could cause trouble for the monsoon systems over )sia
reflecting in the substantial human suffering and political instability.
*eople are causing global warming by burning fossil fuels $like oil coal and natural gas%
and cutting down forests. Scientists have shown that these activities are pumping far
more !+, into the atmosphere than was ever released in hundreds of thousands of
years. This buildup of !+, is the biggest cause of global warming. Since -./0
scientists have known that !+, and other greenhouse gases trap heat and warm the
earth. )s the warming has intensified over the past three decades scientific scrutiny has
increased along with it. Scientists have considered and ruled out other natural
e'planations such as sunlight volcanic eruptions and cosmic rays. $I*!! ,11-%
Though natural amounts of !+, have varied from -.1 to 211 parts per million $ppm%
todays !+, levels are around 2.1ppm. Thats ,03 more than the highest natural levels
over the past 401111 years. Increased !+, levels have contributed to periods of higher
average temperatures throughout that long record. If atmospheric concentrations of
greenhouse gases double compared to pre5industrial levels this would 6likely7 cause an
average warming of around 28! with a range of , 9 :.08!. The ;ational )cademy of
Sciences $;)S% said global warming could lead to 6large abrupt and unwelcome7
changes in the climate and the Intergovernmental *anel on !limate !hange $I*!!% 9
which is made up of ,011 scientists 9 warns of human5induced global warming. <lobal
warming is having a significant impact on hundreds of plant and animal species around
the world 9 although the most dramatic effects may not be felt for decades.
<lobal warming is most likely caused by human activity and is a global phenomenon.
The evidence comes from direct measurements of rising surface air temperatures and
subsurface ocean temperatures and from phenomena such as increase in sea levels
retreating glaciers and changes to many physical and biological systems. It is affecting
the Indian subcontinent too. <lobal warming and climate change could affect Indias
growth unless a range of steps are taken to address the effects of increasing surface
temperatures particularly on monsoon pattern. =ecent observations indicate that the
earths climate is rapidly changing. Surface air5temperatures for the period -/1-5,110
indicated a significant warming of 1.08! for -11 years. There are large areas of a
significant warming trend along the west coast e'cepting the middle portion the interior
peninsula and over northeast India. ;orthwest India is conspicuous by its significant
cooling trend. The temperature has increased by about 1.08! over the last century and
will likely rise even more rapidly in coming decades. >or the ne't two decades a
warming of about 1.,8! per decade is projected for a range of greenhouse gas $<#<%
emission scenarios of the I*!!5S=(S. (ven if the concentration of all greenhouse
gases and aerosols had been kept constant at year ,111 levels a further warming of
about 1.-8! per decade would be e'pected. ?arming tends to reduce land and ocean
uptake of atmospheric carbon dio'ide increasing the fraction of anthropogenic
emissions that remains in the atmosphere. The cause for the increasing temperatures is
due to thickening layer of carbon dio'ide pollution mostly from power plants and
automobiles that traps heat in the atmosphere.
=ecently released reports of the I*!! confirms that the warming of the climate system is
une"uivocal as is evident from observations of increase in average air temperature and
ocean temperatures widespread melting of snow and ice and rising of the mean sea
level. The increasing sea level rise during the ,1
th
century has increased the potential
risk of fre"uent floods. This is a natural disaster as monsoons in our region are highly
variable unpredictable and known to cause both floods and droughts. It is also a fact
that these natural events are being e'acerbated because we have forgotten how to live
with nature. +bservations have shown that the monsoon rainfall for the country as a
whole does not show any trend e'cept over some areas. *ockets of increasing trend in
monsoon rainfall are found along the west coast north )ndhra *radesh and north5west
India and those of decreasing trend over east Madhya *radesh and adjoining areas
north5east India and parts of <ujarat and @erala. =ecent studies indicate an increasing
trend in the fre"uency and intensity of e'treme rainfall events over central India. Aut the
precipitation trends from -/11 to ,114 show that there is decrease in some parts of
South )sia. ) pronounced warming of the sea surface temperatures in the central and
eastern tropical *acific and the associated alterations of the ?alker circulation cause the
weakening of the monsoon flow. The causative links in these changes include higher
temperatures and decreased precipitation changes in sea surface temperature wind
patterns and decrease in snow cover.
)s the southwest monsoon progresses over India the space5time variation of rainfall
occurs in association with the genesis and movement of synoptic scale systems such as
syclonic disturbances $ StormsBdepressions%. The analysis of the cyclonic disturbance
over the Indian region for the period -..-5,114 indicates decreasing trend in the
fre"uency of monsoon season cyclonic disturbance due to global warming.
The (I ;ino5Southern +scillation +scillation $(;S+% is a major fluctuation across the
tropical *acific +cean which is associated with periodic variations in the sea surface
temperatures of the eastern *acific +cean. It is a large climatic cycle and it has been
shown to affect regions far removed from the *acific basin. ;ational +ceanic and
)tmospheric )dministration $;+))% has summed the enormity of this phenomenon in a
sentence 6?hen the *acific spanks the (arth listens7. (specially it has been proved
that the (I ;ino has affected the Indian summer monsoon and the precise manner in
which it does has recently been unraveled. It is now found that the fluctuations related to
SST warming over the *acific causes either deficient or e'cess rainfall due to the global
warming.
!limate has changed in the past and human societies have survived but today si' billion
people depend on interconnected ecosystems and comple' technological infrastructure.
!limate change is a global problem but the seeds of solution lay hidden in controlling
the emissions of the sulphate aerosols !>!s etc from the local networks around the
globe. >or this purpose an effort has been made to run the state5of5art =egional !limate
Model $=!M% developed by the #adley !enter for !limate prediction and =esearch
called *=(!IS at Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology $IITM% *une to obtain high5
resolution meteorological effects of greenhouse gas $<#<% emission scenarios of the
intergovernmental *anel on !limate !hange $I*!!5S=(S%. These high5resolution
regional climate change scenarios developed at IITM indicate a general increase in
precipitation and surface air temperature $S)T% for the country as a whole for the period
,1C-5,-11. The annual mean increase in S)T ranges from , to 0 o!. The warming
though monotonously widespread across the country is more pronounced over northern
India. The all round warming seen in the mean is also reflected in the e'treme
temperatures. Aoth night and days will get warmer in the future. Interestingly night
temperatures are seen to be increasing at a faster rate than day temperatures.
>urther consistent with the observed warming and increased atmospheric water vapor
the fre"uency of intense precipitation events has increased over most land areas.
?idespread changes in e'treme temperatures have also been noticed over the last 01
years. !old days cold nights and frost have become less fre"uent due to anthropogenic
forcing. It is more likely than not that anthropogenic forcing has increased the risk of the
heat waves.
Todays climate models can now reproduce the observed average climates over the past
century and beyond. Such findings have reinforced confidence in the capacity of models
to produce reliable projections of future climate. !urrent climate assessments typically
consider the results from a range of models and scenarios for future heat5trapping
emissions in order to identify the most likely range for future climatic change.
The projected changes in climate will have both beneficial and adverse effects at the
regional level for e'ample on water resources agriculture natural ecosystem and
human health too. The large and faster the changes in climate the more likely it is that
adverse effects will dominate. Increasing temperatures are likely to increase the
fre"uency and severity of weather events such as heat waves and heavy rainfall.
Increasing temperatures could lead to large5scale effects such as melting of ice.
The recently released I*!! )=: report also indicates decreased cereal crop yields up to
2
1
! change and beyond that yield in all cereals is decrease. It also fears of increased
water scarcity in this part of the world with a significant recession of #imalayan <laciers
by mid century.
(stimates of mean sea level made from past tide gauge data at selected stations along
the cost of Indias indicate a rise of slightly less than - mmByearsD however these
estimates needs to be corrected by including the rates of vertical land movements
whose measurements are not available at present. ?ith modeling results showing
further rise in sea5levels combined with increased number and intensities of Tropical
cyclones there is a possibility of enhanced vulnerability to coastal regions of India.
)nother important effect of global warming on meteorological conditions is an increase in
sea surface temperature $SST% in the oceans around the sub5continent. ?armer water in
the oceans pumps more energy. into tropical storms making them more intense and
potentially more destructive. The resulting greater convective activity will lead to an
uncrease in the intensity or wind speed of cyclones that form in the Indian +cean
particularly by Aay of Aengal where over .1 per cent of the cyclones originate. #igher
wind speeds will also result in bigger storm surges. The rise in sea level owing to this
regional meteorological cause will have a compounding effect on the global rise in sea
level caused by the melting of ice and glaciers from #imalayan <laciers and volume
e'pansion due to the warming of ocean waters.
In many parts of the world water resources have not been abundant to meet humans
needs. Aecause of anthropogenic change degradation in water "uality and "uantity has
been observed in recent years. ?arm air will hold more moisture and this increased
moisture may cause intense rainfall and snowfall leading to floods. ?armer climate may
result in snow melts and thus causing increasing runoff which may in turn accelerate the
hydrological cycle.
#uman activity is polluting the earth and if we fail to take action now our planet could be
sent 6 into a tail5spin of epic destruction involving e'treme weather floods droughts
epidemics and killer heat waves.7 Aut some of the damage is already done. >inally
global warming is directly or indirectly affecting the Indian summer monsoon either by
increasing or decreasing rainfall. ) good e'ample of such intense rainfall events are
seen from the last two years especially in few parts of the ?esterns <hats such as
Mumbai *une <oa etc. >rom the last few years the deficient rainfall is evident in the
western parts of )ndhra *radesh $eg. )nantapur%. >or sustaining the lives of the Indian
Subcontinent population and agriculture the necessary steps should be taken to reduce
the anthropogenic activities so that there is a possibility of avoiding the e'treme events
of Indian summer monsoon rainfall.