Expect more extreme rain as planet warms - expert

Professor Liz Stephens, Professor of Climate Risk and Resilience at the University of Reading, comments following various global extreme weather events, such as Typhoon Yagi in South East Asia, the Sahel floods and the central European floods.

 

"Climate change is leading to heavier rainfall and therefore higher impacts from weather events, making them more noticeable by the global news media. 

 

While it would be a difficult task to attribute the current combination of weather patterns around the world to climate change, the fundamental principle remains, that for every 1 degree of warming the atmosphere can hold 7% more moisture, and therefore we expect the rain that does fall to be heavier."

 

Increased sea surface temperatures due to climate change have been linked to many of the floods that have occurred recently, for example Typhoon Yagi in South East Asia, the Sahel floods and the central European floods have been linked to temperature anomalies in the South China Sea, tropical North Atlantic and the Mediterranean respectively."