What is happening on Svalbard is extreme
Global climate emissions are changing Svalbard dramatically says a new report.
Director of the Environment Directorate,Ellen Hambro, believes that the developments are extreme.
The warming in the Arctic is occurring about twice as fast as on the rest of the globe, and Svalbard is in an area with faster warming than the rest of the Arctic according to the Svalbard report, which was presented in Longyearbyen on Monday evening.
“It is rare that I use words like this, but what is happening in Svalbard is extreme. The temperature rises faster here in the Arctic than anywhere else in the world, and climate change has already had major consequences, ” said Ellen Hambro.
Continued human emissions of greenhouse gasses at the same rate as today, with an increase from year to year, mean Svalbard could experience an average temperature of over 1 degree celsius by the end of the century. That is an increase of almost 10 degrees from the average in the period 1971–2000.
The report comes after the Norwegian Environment Agency asked 44 of Norway’s leading researchers to see what consequences climate change will have for Svalbard’s inhabitants if the world fails to implement dramatic cuts in climate emissions.
© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today
