The scariest climate statistic |
The world’s top weather agency just added a new number to the climate story — and it may be the most fundamental one of all.
It’s not 1.5 C. Not 2 C. Not the carbon loading of the atmosphere or the string of record-breaking annual temperatures. For the first time, the World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) annual assessment includes the “Earth's energy imbalance” as a key climate indicator.
It sounds arcane but it’s powerfully simple. It’s the difference between the energy hitting the Earth and the energy going back out into space. If the balance between what comes in and what goes out still sounds abstract, maybe cast your mind back to your last bout of constipation.
The whole planet is bunged up. Increasingly swinging out of balance. That means heat is getting trapped, unable to discharge. And what the planet’s weather gurus desperately want policymakers to understand is that the amount of pent-up heat isn’t just growing steadily but accelerating. We are lurching ever further out of balance, and the Earth’s energy imbalance paints the clearest picture of where we’re headed. It is, says the WMO's deputy chief, Ko Barrett, a “dire picture.”
It is impossible to truly wrap our heads around the amount of energy........