Latest climate outlook outlines big warming to come for Texas

AUSTIN, Texas - The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, was released on Monday. The report starts by saying that "It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land."

The latest observations show average temperatures are about 2° F above global average temperatures recorded before the industrial revolution. That has risen in conjunction with the carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, though temperature changes lag several years behind CO₂ levels.

The IPCC report forecasts the temperatures will continue to rise and there is high confidence that global temperatures will increase by another 0.5-2° F possibly as soon as 2050. The increasing temperatures will have significant impacts on weather across the globe, including here in central Texas.

According to State Climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon from Texas A&M University, changes in global average temperature are amplified here in Texas. "Additional global warming of a few tenths of a degree would probably translate into somewhere around an additional 1° Fahrenheit."

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That’s because the continents warm faster than the ocean. Only 29% of the earth’s surface is land, so the majority of the heat energy goes straight into the water lessening the observable impacts. Texas and most of north America, therefore, will become a ‘hot spot’, warming much faster than the earth’s average temperature.

"And, of course, the humidity goes up too, says Nielsen-Gammon, "because the Gulf of Mexico water temperatures would increase."

That increase in humidity directly affects both the afternoon ‘feels like’ temperatures and also the overnight low temperatures. If the pace of warming doesn’t slow down, by 2050 central Texas could see summer low temperatures closer to 80° with frequent mornings starting in the mid 80s.

And if things get much hotter then Nielsen-Gammon worries that water would become a huge issue.

"We would probably see greater loss of water," says Nielsen-Gammon, "we could well see central Texas no longer supporting forests."

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Water loss would come in the form of evaporation which would put strain on drinking and irrigation water from reservoirs. The forest losses would come from much drier soils due to less frequent rainfall. The worst part is how the forests are eliminated.

"the way you lose forests unfortunately, is through wildfires," says Nielsen-Gammon, "so some of the consequences of that big a change would be quite important for not just the environment, but the people who live here."

There is somewhat of a bright spot in that, at least for the next hundred years or so, Texas won’t be significantly impacted by sea level rise. Sea level rise of 3 feet or less – the current IPCC projections for 2100 – will have minor impacts on everyday life since most of the coastal cities have significant infrastructure to protect against tropical systems. Though storm surges from stronger tropical systems will be added to the mean sea level when the storms make landfall.

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