Climate Outlook: Global Study Suggests It's Worse Than Feared

As the Paris climate talks are ongoing between the United Nations, research from the University of Edinburgh has surfaced showing that land surface temperatures may be on the rise. The data, taken from historical temperature and emissions records, shows that temperatures may rise as much as 8° Celsius (46.4° Fahrenheit) in the next 85 years.

A rise of this amount could place billions of people in a position of potential devastation, at risk from flooding, regional drought, food shortages, and extreme temperatures, according to a news release.

The researchers created an algorithm to determine what factors are key in shaping climate change, then estimated those factors' impact on the world's ocean and land temperatures. Compared with the method used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which "assesses the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant for the understanding of the risk of human-induced climate change," the team's algorithm is fairly straightforward.

The study, published in the journal Earth and Environmental Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, looked at the effects of atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases, and their increases about pre-industrialization levels. It found that at the current rate of emission growth, by 2100 temperatures will have increased 7.9º Celsius over 1750 levels if no action is taken.

"Estimates vary over the impacts of climate change. But what is now clear is that society needs to take firm, speedy action to minimize climate damage," Professor Roy Thompson, of the university's School of GeoSciences, who carried out the study, said.

The levels found by the study are on the highest range of temperature rise that the IPCC calculated, and also breaches the UN's "safe limit" of 2º Celsius, which the UN says will yield dangerous climate changes if breached.

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