From lengthy droughts to severe flooding, the intensity of water-related disasters around the world has increased over the last two decades as global temperatures climbed to record levels, according to new research.
The study from NASA scientists published Monday in the journal Nature Water found that increasingly frequent, widespread and intense droughts and floods were linked more strongly to higher global temperatures than to naturally changing weather patterns, like El Niño and La Niña. This suggests these intense events will increase as the climate crisis accelerates, the study says.
Matthew Rodell, lead author of the study and hydrologist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, looked at 20 years of NASA satellite data from 2002 to 2021, and analyzed the size, duration, and severity – how much wetter or drier it is than normal – of water-related extreme events around the world. “We thought, well, maybe this is related to global warming, because we do know the past seven or so years have been the hottest on record,” Rodell told CNN. “Sure enough, there was a significant correlation between this total worldwide intensity of these events and the temperature record.”
The most intense dry event the study recorded was in Brazil and Venezuela from 2015 to 2016, which Rodell said “was about twice as intense” as the current drought in the southwestern US as of the end of 2021. The drought severely threatened hydroelectric power, drained critical reservoirs, and cut crop yields.
UN scientists recently concluded that as the climate changes, droughts that may have occurred only once every 10 years or so now happen 70% more frequently; whereas heavy rainfall that used to happen once every 10 years now occurs 30% more often. Dramatic swings between both extremes – periods of drought and high precipitation – also known as weather whiplash is another phenomenon that scientists warn will occur more often under a warming planet in the coming decades.
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