Lead Editor-Newsgathering
ryan.bachoo@cnc3.co.tt
Nothing puts climate change into perspective quite like the melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica. Though sitting on different continents, the melting ice is directly resulting in sea level rise here in T&T.
At COP28 in Dubai, the opportunity presented itself to speak to Pam Pearson, Executive Director for the Secretariat of Ambition on Melting Ice, Sea Level Rise and Mountain Water Resources. Few are better to talk to on this topic and she is deeply aware of the impact melting ice is having and will have on Caribbean islands.
“The problem is as we approach 1.5 degrees and especially as we go past it there will be more and more water coming off the ice sheets and very soon they are going to eclipse all other sources of sea level rise,” she told Guardian Media.
The 1.5 degrees she is speaking of refers to the maximum temperature of the earth (internationally agreed upon) that the world should not cross. Pearson said the science shows if emissions continue as they are at the current rate, the world could see three metres of sea level rise by the end of the century. Parts of T&T will be uninhabitable by that time.
T&T’s lead climate negotiator, Kishan Kumarsingh, added his voice to the issue telling Guardian Media, “Moreover, once the ice melt is triggered, it would be irreversible and even bringing temperature increases back on track, is unlikely to impact on the melting. This means that the sea level rise expected by the heating of the oceans will be exceeded by orders of magnitude by the sea level rise from melting ice.”
The outlook is far more concerning than sea level rise, however. Pearson, who is a former United States diplomat with 20 years of experience working on global issues including climate change said warming poles could have serious consequences for T&T and the Caribbean. While the rainfall could be more violent, there is a real chance of droughts and extreme heat. Further to that, scientists have found that ice is melting at a far more alarming speed than was thought to be.
At the current rate, she said a metre of sea level rise can be expected by 2070, three metres of sea level rise in the early 2100s, six metres in the early 2200s and 15 metres in the early 2300s. “These big ice sheets take a long time to respond but once they start responding we can’t stop it,” Pearson said.
She added, “Three metres is probably inevitable already right now. We probably can’t stop that. We’re probably going to lose a lot of the west Antarctica sheet and Greenland even at 1.5 degrees but it may take us a thousand years to get there and we can adapt to that as opposed to three metres in the next 70 years.”
Such occurrences mean small island states like T&T will face the consequences of the global failure of climate change. However, Pearson advised, “There are two things. One is to make a big noise about it by protesting and saying that this is about our existence because that has a lot of currency I think in settings like COP28. The second is for these countries to show the way of carbon-neutral development both to develop as much as possible in a carbon-neutral fashion but also to demand assistance that is supposed to be coming.”
A report titled ‘State of the Cryosphere’ published this year and reviewed by 60 scientists showed that all of the earth’s frozen parts will experience irreversible damage at two degrees of global warming, with “disastrous consequences for millions of people, societies, and nature.”
Kumarsingh further said, “The implications for T&T and other small island states underscore with scientific certainty that climate change is indeed an existential threat. If the world does not act decisively and with urgency to constrain temperature increases, our future would be at the mercy of the changes that the world would be unable to control.”