Today’s kids will live through three times as many climate disasters as their grandparents, study says
clock Adriana Bottino-Poage is 6 years old, with cherub cheeks and curls that bounce when she laughs. She likes soccer, art and visiting the library. She dreams of being a scientist and inventing a robot that can pull pollution out of the air. She wants to become the kind of grown-up who can help the world. Yet human actions have made the world a far more dangerous place for Adriana to grow up, according to a first-of-its-kind study of the impacts of climate change across generations. If the planet continues to warm on its current trajectory, the average 6-year-old will live through roughly three times as many climate disasters as their grandparents, the study finds. They will see twice as many wildfires, 1.7 times as many tropical cyclones, 3.4 times more river floods, 2.5 times more crop failures and 2.3 times as many droughts as someone born in 1960. People around the world increasingly see climate change as a personal threat, new poll finds These findings, published this week in the journal Science, are the result of a massive effort to quantify what lead author Wim Thiery calls the intergenerational inequality of climate change. Drawing on multiple climate and demographic models, Thiery and 36 colleagues compared the risks faced by previous generations to the number of extreme events todays children will witness in their lifetimes. Unless world leaders agree on more ambitious policies when they meet for the United Nations climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, this fall, the study says, todays children will be exposed to an average of five times more disasters than if they lived 150 years ago. The changes are especially dramatic in developing nations; infants in sub-Saharan Africa are projected to live through 50 to 54 times as many heat waves as someone born in the preindustrial era. The disparities underscore how the worst effects of climate change will be experienced in places that contributed least to warming, by people who have had little say in the policies that allow continued emissions to occur, Thiery said. More than half of all greenhouse gases in the atmosphere were generated after 1990, meaning that most of the disasters todays children will experience can be linked to emissions produced during their parents lifetimes. Biden vows to double aid for vulnerable nations dealing with climate change Young people are being hit by climate crisis but are not in position to make decisions, he said. While the people who can make the change happen will not face the consequences. Aggressive efforts to curb fossil fuel use and other planet-warming activities can still dramatically improve the outlook for todays children, he added. If people manage to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels, newborns risk of extreme heat exposure will fall almost by half. They could see 11 percent fewer crop failures, 27 percent fewer droughts and almost a third as many river floods than if emissions continue unabated. But the world is nowhere near meeting that 1.5 degree target. A U.N. report published earlier this month warned that, based on countries current climate pledges, greenhouse gas emissions could actually increase by 16 percent by the end of the decade. That would put the planet on track to warm by 2.7 degrees Celsius (4.9 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the century. This makes Adriana angry. The Woodbridge, Va., first-grader already worries about the wildfires in California, where her half brother lives. She has heard about islands being inundated by rising seas, caught glimpses of hurricanes and droughts on the news. Meanwhile, adults dont listen, and they keep doing it and keep making the Earth hotter she added. Everything will keep getting worse and worse until I grow up. Somebody has to do something. The Science paper was partly inspired by Thierys three sons, who are 7, 5 and 2. But its implications are not restricted to children. Anyone under 40, he said, is destined to live a life of unprecedented disaster exposure, experiencing rates of extreme events that would have just a 1 in 10,000 chance of happening in a preindustrial world. It used to be a story of, like, yeah we have to limit global warming because of grandchildren, he said. This study is making clear that climate change has arrived. Its everywhere. The numbers provided in the study are almost certainly an underestimate, said co-author Joeri Rogelj, director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London. Data limitations, and the complexity of the analysis, meant the scientists didnt assess the increased risk of some hazards, such as coastal flooding from sea level rise. The study also doesnt take into account the increased severity of many events; it only looks at frequency. On the other hand, he noted, countries also have a chance to adapt to the changes that are coming. If the world invests in making communities safer for example, installing flood barriers, adopting fire-safe building codes, providing shelter for people at risk from deadly heat disasters dont have to be as destructive for future generations as they are for people today. Our aim is for this not to be the conclusion of this debate, Rogelj said, but for this to be the start of looking at the lived experience of children being born today. As climate pledges fall short, U.N. predicts globe could warm by catastrophic 2.7 degrees Celsius Kim Cobb, a climate scientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology who was not involved in the new research, called it a robust study based on established findings from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. As a scientist, Cobb said, she was unsurprised by the results. But Cobb is also a mother to four children. Reading the report through that lens, she said, it brings into sharp focus what so many economic models of climate change impacts fail to capture the vast toll of human suffering that is hanging in the balance with our emissions choices this decade. She added: The moral weight of this moment is almost unbearable. In a report published in conjunction with Thierys findings, Save the Children International called on world leaders to make the changes necessary to meet the 1.5 degree Celsius target. Wealthy nations must also follow through on their unmet pledge to give $100 billion per year to help low-income countries curb their own emissions and adapt to changes that are already underway, the group said. Yolande Wright, who directs the nonprofits climate efforts, also hopes the findings will bolster legal efforts to force climate action on behalf of children. Last year, a federal appeals court threw out a case brought by 21 American young people who argued that the governments failure to act on climate change was a violation of their rights. Similar cases have been filed in Portugal, Peru and elsewhere. Now that we can really quantify how a child in their lifetime will see so many more of these extreme events ... it helps make the case, Wright said. Activists born into the climate crisis face another challenge: Fear of the future Environmental attorney Dan Galpern, general counsel and director of Climate Protection and Restoration Initiative, agreed that anticipatory research like this can help establish governments and corporations liability for real harms experienced by kids. Young people already say climate change has touched their lives and harmed their mental health. In a recent survey of 16- to 25-year-olds, scientists found that three quarters of respondents feared the future and more than half believed they would have less opportunity than their parents. Nearly 60 percent said their governments had betrayed them and future generations making them feel even more anxious. The future for me and everyone who comes after is so insecure, said Emanuel Smari Nielsen, a 14-year-old climate activist from Norway. When politicians and those with power do not do anything, it makes me feel tired. It almost makes me angry. Adriana, the 6-year-old, said she feels super nervous when she thinks about what the future might hold. In those moments, theres nothing that helps her feel better. I just wait till Im done thinking about it, she said. Experts say one way to help children cope with climate anxiety is to help them feel empowered to do something about it. The Save the Children report calls for communities, countries and global institutions like the U.N. to give young people a greater role in setting climate policy. 9 questions about the Civilian Climate Corps, answered Cormac Buck, an 8-year-old from Savannah, Ga., has decided to stop eating meat (except for the occasional chicken nugget). He is part of a group of kids at his school who have asked teachers and administrators to use fewer fossil fuels. Sometimes I hear some depressing things happening, like some animals because of climate change are really close to extinction ... and I feel sad, he said. And then I normally try to think of a way to stop that from happening again. And adults must earn back childrens trust, Thiery said, by making the dramatic emissions reductions that have been so long delayed. Our choices now will determine whether kids grow up in a world with four times as many heat waves or seven times as many heat waves, a world with occasional crop failures or chronic food shortages. We can still avoid the worst consequences, he said. That is what gives me strength as a father. ... Their future is in our hands. Sign up for the latest news about climate change, energy and the environment, delivered every Thursday Understanding our climate: Global warming is a real phenomenon , and weather disasters are undeniably linked to it . As temperatures rise, heat waves are more often sweeping the globe and parts of the world are becoming too hot to survive . What can be done? The Post is tracking a variety of climate solutions , as well as the Biden administrations actions on environmental issues . It can feel overwhelming facing the impacts of climate change, but there are ways to cope with climate anxiety . Inventive solutions: Some people have built off-the-grid homes from trash to stand up to a changing climate. As seas rise, others are exploring how to harness marine energy . What about your role in climate change? Our climate coach Michael J. Coren is answering questions about environmental choices in our everyday lives. Submit yours here. You can also sign up for our Climate Coach newsletter .