As humans continue to burn fossil fuels and pump greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the planet is progressively warming and having a discernible impact on some of the world’s weather, particularly to heat waves across the globe.
A new report released Monday in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society finds that long-lasting heat waves "are becoming increasingly likely" due to human-caused climate change, but its effect on other types of extreme events – such as California’s prolonged, severe drought and extreme rain in Colorado – is a lot less clear.
The report, titled "Explaining Extreme Events of 2013 from a Climate Perspective," looks at possible links between 16 bouts of weather last year and man-made climate change. After analysis of 22 studies, the report’s authors concluded that heat waves – all five studied were in Australia, Europe and Asia – were more likely and more severe because of burning fossil fuels.
"It’s very hard to imagine how you could have had those temperatures in a world without climate change," contributor Peter Scott told the San Francisco Chronicle. Many countries, including Australia, saw some of their hottest years on record in 2013. But weather extremes beyond heat waves, such as droughts, heavy rain events and storms, could not conclusively be linked to human-caused climate change. Instead, the authors pinned these extremes on natural variability in the weather.