Energy / Climate Change

August 16, 2004

 

Kanto Region's Daily Maximum Temperatures to Exceed 35 C by the Summer of 2100

Keywords: Climate Change Government 

On June 7, 2004, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) released a report on future climate change that analyzes global warming effects in the Kanto region (which includes Tokyo and its six neighboring prefectures). Typical conditions on a clear summer day with a light wind and no precipitation around the year 2100 are predicted to be as follows:
1. The daily mean temperature will be higher than current levels by one degree Celsius (C) in urban areas, and 1.5 degrees C in non-urban areas;
2. The daily maximum temperatures around 2 p.m. will be higher by an average of one degree C in the entire region, exceeding 35 degrees C or 95 Fahrenheit (F) over the extensive area of the inner Kanto Plain;
3. The daily minimum temperatures around 5 a.m. will be higher by an average of two degrees C in the region, exceeding 25 degrees C or 78 F in most of the Kanto Plain.

After having issued several "Global Warming Projection Studies," JMA has come to realize that predictions of global warming in urban areas should take into consideration the high temperatures generated by the synergistic effects of global warming and urbanization.

JMA has developed an "Urban Climate Model," a climate change simulation system with a four-kilometer horizontal resolution. Given data on the effects of urbanization and artificial exhaust heat, the system estimates the temperature, wind and humidity within a 200 kilometer (125 mile) radius in the Kanto region. The model forecasts climate change based on the assumption that emissions of greenhouse gases will increase at a high level; specifically that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions will rise by 1.3 percent a year, and that the CO2 density will soar to 819 parts per million (ppm) by 2100 from the current level of 374 ppm.





Posted: 2004/08/16 01:21:55 PM
Japanese version

 

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