Foreword (Bulletin Vol. 72 (2) – 2023)
Climate change is already very visible according to most recent reports of the WMO and the IPCC. We are breaking less comfortable records in real atmosphere year by year.
- Author(s):
- Prof. Petteri Saalas, Secretary-General, WMO
This is valid for the main greenhouse gas concentrations, melting of glaciers, sea level rise, heat content of oceans and the number of weather extremes and related economic and sometimes also human losses. It is essential to raise the ambition level of mitigation to achieve the targets of Paris Agreement. Besides mitigation adaptation is essential since the negative trend in weather patterns will continue until 2060’s at least. Unfortunately, the melting of glaciers and sea level rise continue for coming centuries due to already high concentration of carbon dioxide. It is also very important to provide model calculations on the future climate. The current and past climate models have been very useful in estimating the evolution of climatic averages, like temperature, rainfall and moisture of soil. There are limitations in our understanding of the future of the weather extremes and e.g. the melting speed