The United Nations University – Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) has recently published the Interconnected Disaster Risks Report 2023, shedding light on six critical risk tipping points that lie ahead of us.
- Accelerating extinctions
- Groundwater depletion
- Mountain glaciers melting
- Space debris
- Unbearable heat
- Uninsurable future
Understanding Risk Tipping Points
- A risk tipping point is a critical threshold in a socio ecological system.
- When this threshold is crossed, the system can’t cope with risks or perform its normal functions.
- This increases the risk of catastrophic impacts on these systems significantly.
- The study provides multiple examples demonstrating that risk tipping points aren’t limited to just climate, ecosystems, society, or technology.
- They are interlinked and are heavily influenced by human activities and livelihoods
Accelerating Extinctions
Tipping point: The extinction of a strongly connected species in a given ecosystem can trigger cascading extinctions of dependent species, which can eventually lead to ecosystem collapse. Extinction has been a part of Earth’s history. It is part of the evolution of life.
- Typically, extinction is slow, happening over thousands to millions of years.
- Human activities such as changing land use, overuse, climate change, pollution, and introducing invasive species have accelerated extinctions.
- The extinction rate is now hundreds of times higher than usual.
- This increased rate is due to human influence and it affects all life forms.
- Ecosystems depend on a network of connections between species.
- The risk of extinction could be much greater than we estimate as many species are interconnected.
Co-Extinction
- If one species disappears, it can cause a ripple effect. This is called “co-extinction”.
- Co-extinctions can cause a chain reaction that may lead to the collapse of an entire ecosystem.
- For instance, the gopher tortoise, a threatened species, digs burrows.
- These burrows are used by over 350 species for reasons like breeding, feeding, and protection from predators and extreme temperatures.
- The dusky gopher frog, a critically endangered species, depends on these burrows for its survival.
- The frog helps control insect populations, thus preventing pest outbreaks in longleaf pine forest ponds.
- If the gopher tortoise goes extinct, it’s likely the dusky gopher frog will follow, disrupting the entire forest ecosystem.
- Sea otters, endangered due to overhunting, help maintain balance in Pacific kelp forests by eating sea urchins.
- When otters are absent, sea urchins overgraze the kelp, leading to the creation of urchin barrens, where the kelp forest is destroyed.
- Over 1,000 species like sharks, turtles, seals, whales, birds, fish, and more depend on the kelp for shelter, food, and protection.
- Without the kelp, these species would likely face extinction.
Solutions
- Current conservation efforts usually focus on individual species, overlooking the complex relationships between them.
- This approach underestimates the true impact of extinction on the systems that support life.
- We need to do more to conserve both target species and the species that depend on them.
- Quick, decisive action is needed to protect ecosystems and their biodiversity.
- We should place more value on nature as a part of our culture, beyond just a resource for monetary gain or development.
- Doing so will help maintain ecosystem resilience and preserve the living webs of our planet.
Groundwater Depletion
Tipping point: When the water table in a given aquifer drops consistently below the well depth, access to groundwater will become problematic, increasing the risk for farmers to be unable to irrigate their crops.
- Groundwater is a vital source of freshwater.
- It’s stored in underground reservoirs known as “aquifers”.
- Over 2 billion people rely on these aquifers for drinking water.
- Around 70% of the water drawn from aquifers is used in agriculture.
- However, there’s a significant depletion issue: 21 out of the 37 major aquifers worldwide are being depleted faster than they can be replenished.
- The water in aquifers often takes thousands of years to accumulate and would require an equal amount of time to recharge.
- Essentially, this makes groundwater a non-renewable resource.
- As water levels in these at-risk aquifers lower, both lives and livelihoods are increasingly threatened.
Some Examples Of Groundwater Overexploitation
- Some areas globally have already heavily used their groundwater resources.
- A prime example is Saudi Arabia, which once had one of the world’s largest aquifer systems.
- In the 1970s, this system was utilised to turn the desert into a fertile place.
- By the mid-1990s, farmers were extracting about 19 trillion litres of water annually.
- This activity allowed Saudi Arabia to become the world’s sixth largest wheat exporter.
- However, over extraction led to an estimated depletion of over 80% of the aquifer.
- This situation forced the Saudi government to declare the 2016 wheat harvest as its last.
- Today, Saudi Arabia depends on crop imports from other countries to feed its population of over 30 million.The High Plains aquifer in the U.S. provides a third of the country’s groundwater for irrigation.
- This aquifer aids in producing over $35 billion in crops like wheat and soy.
- If unsustainable groundwater extraction persists, about 40% of the aquifer will be unfit for irrigation by 2100.
- Since the U.S. exports nearly half of its groundwater-dependent crops, countries like Mexico, China, and Japan will be affected.
- India uses more groundwater than any other country, even more than the U.S. and China combined.
- The north-western region of India is a major food source for the country’s 1.4 billion population.
- Punjab and Haryana, states in this region, produce half of the country’s rice and 85% of its wheat.
- Punjab has 78% of its wells classified as overexploited.
- The north-western region of India is forecasted to face severe groundwater shortages by 2025.
Solutions
- Groundwater extraction rates are increasing due to agricultural intensification and new technologies.
- These advancements make groundwater more affordable to use, leading to significant aquifer depletion.
- Groundwater is no longer an unlimited source of easily-accessible freshwater.
- Its accessibility is declining, and it has clear limits, which creates concerns for its use during droughts.
- We urgently need to reform our global agricultural system.
- We must consider groundwater limitations and our capacity to use it.
- It is crucial to develop regulations and technologies for sustainable groundwater use.
- We need to conserve this resource for crucial times.
Mountain Glacier Melting
Tipping point: When glaciers retreat, long-term ice storage melts and is gradually released as meltwater. Initially, the volume of water released increases until a maximum is reached, known as peak water. After this tipping point, glacier meltwater volume decreases as the glacier continues to shrink with effects on freshwater availability for humans and other species.
- Glaciers, found on the world’s highest peaks, serve as “water towers,” storing fresh water.
- This glacier meltwater is essential for drinking, irrigation, hydropower, and ecosystems.
- Glaciers retreat when the old ice melts quicker than it can be replaced by new snow.
- Global warming has doubled the speed of glacier melting over the last 20 years.
- From 2000 to 2019, glaciers lost an annual average of 267 gigatons of ice, equal to the mass of 46,500 Great Pyramids of Giza.
- Even if global warming is limited to 1.5°C, we still expect to lose 50% of the world’s glaciers (excluding those in Greenland and Antarctica) by 2100.
- Glaciers that start to retreat slowly melt, increasing water flow to river basins.
- This added meltwater enhances the risk of downstream flooding.
- Occasionally, this leads to “glacial lake outburst floods“. This occurs when a natural dam fails, releasing meltwater rapidly with harmful results.
- The glacier will eventually reach its highest melting point, producing the most water runoff, a stage called “peak water”.
- After peak water, the availability of freshwater will continuously decrease.
- Peak water has already occurred or is anticipated to occur in the next 10 years in basins with small glaciers, such as those in Central Europe, western Canada, and South America.
- Even the highest peak glaciers, like those in Asia’s high mountains, are projected to experience peak water by the mid-century.
- The 90,000+ glaciers of the Himalayas, Karakorum, and Hindu Kush mountains are threatened.
- The nearly 870 million people who depend on these glaciers are also at risk.
Many Glaciers Have Reached Their Peak
- Meltwater is used as a substitute for rainfall in dry seasons.
- Shrinking glaciers reduce the availability of this water source.
- This forces mountain communities and those downstream to change how they handle water resources.
- In the Andes, many glaciers have already reached their peak water.
- These communities face the effects of unreliable water sources due to shrinking glaciers and changing rainfall patterns from climate change.
- The Quelccaya glacier in Peru, once the biggest tropical ice cap, has decreased in size by 31% over the past 30 years.
- This reduction has brought on periodic water shortages in the dry season and widespread effects.
- In 2021, a drought led to the loss of one third of the alpacas for villagers living near the Quelccaya glacier.
- The disappearance of glaciers takes away an iconic feature in many mountain areas.
- This loss has negative effects on livelihoods, economies, and heritage, both tangible and intangible.
Solutions
- Glaciers are receding, signalling an urgent need to lower greenhouse gas emissions.
- These ice formations are not just natural marvels. They are also vital for many communities’ survival and well-being.
- A warmer, more unpredictable climate is looming. This change will greatly affect these communities.
- There will be direct impacts to their way of life and their water supply.
Space Debris
Tipping point: When there is a critical density of objects in orbit around Earth, such that one collision between two objects can set off a chain reaction, it will cause our orbit to become so dense with shrapnel that it becomes unusable. This would threaten our ability to monitor, for example, the weather and environmental changes, and to receive early disaster warnings.
- Thousands of satellites circle our planet.
- They gather important data used for weather reports, early warning systems for disasters, and communication networks.
- Recent progress in technology has made launching satellites easier and cheaper.
- Now, not only countries but also companies and individuals can send satellites into space.
- Satellites greatly enhance our safety, convenience and connectivity.
- They form a crucial infrastructure that society heavily relies on.
- But there’s a downside: the increasing number of satellites leads to a rise in space debris.
- This debris threatens the functioning of existing satellites and jeopardises the future use of our orbit.
- Space debris refers to different objects in space. These can range from tiny paint flakes to large metal pieces.
- The number of objects being tracked in orbit is 34,260.
- Only a quarter of these tracked objects are functioning satellites. The rest are considered junk.
- The junk category includes broken satellites or parts discarded from rockets.
- There are an estimated 130 million pieces of debris that are too small to track. Their size ranges between 1 mm and 1 cm.
- All these debris pieces move at speeds exceeding 25,000 kilometres per hour.
- Even the tiniest debris can cause substantial damage due to their high speed.
- Each piece of debris acts as a roadblock on the orbital “highway”, increasing the risk of collisions for operational satellites.
Risk Of space Debris
- There is a real risk of space debris causing issues. In 2009, an incident occurred where a useless satellite collided with an operational one, leading to the creation of thousands of debris pieces.
- These debris pieces are still orbiting Earth and can potentially harm other objects, like the International Space Station (ISS).
- To avoid this debris, ISS performs avoidance manoeuvres roughly once per year.
- Even satellites are not immune from collision. The European Sentinel-2 satellite had more than 8,000 collision warnings between 2015 and 2017.
- Avoiding collisions between active satellites is tricky. It requires quick communication and agreements between agencies.
- A real-life example of this was in 2019, when a European Space Agency satellite had to quickly move to avoid hitting a communications satellite because the agencies could not reach an agreement.
- The number of spacecraft in orbit could rise to over 100,000 by 2030, from the current 8,000.
- As more satellites are put into space, the orbit becomes more congested.
- This increases the likelihood of crashes.
- Each crash can create millions of pieces of debris.
- These debris pieces can hit other debris or satellites, producing even more fragments.
- Over time, a point may be reached where a single collision triggers a chain reaction.
- This could result in our orbit becoming too filled with debris to use.
- The space infrastructure we rely on could be destroyed.
- Future activities in space could become unachievable.
Solutions
- Space is a valuable frontier, attracting attention from nations and businesses alike.
- We must think about the type of future we want to establish in space.
- Our current path risks damaging Earth’s orbits.
- These orbits offer significant opportunities for society, both now and in the future.
- Stricter regulations are needed for space launches.
- Responsible disposal of satellites and spacecraft is crucial.
- Investing in technology for tracking and removing orbital debris is also important.
- Treating Earth’s orbits as a valuable communal resource is necessary.
Unbearable Heat
Tipping point: Being exposed to above 35°C wet-bulb temperature for longer than six hours will result in a healthy, young, resting adult in the shade and wind suffering extreme health consequences. This threshold becomes far lower as other factors are considered, such as age, medical conditions or activity level.
- Climate change, caused by humans, is raising global temperatures.
- This rise results in more frequent, intense heatwaves with severe effects.
- In the past 20 years, heatwaves have caused roughly 500,000 extra deaths annually.
- Those most vulnerable are affected the most.
- High humidity worsens the impacts of heat as it prevents sweat evaporation, our body’s cooling mechanism.
- Scientists measure these high heat stress conditions using the wet-bulb temperature, which factors in both temperature and humidity.
- When the wet-bulb temperature is above 35°C (95°F) for over six hours, the human body can’t cool itself by sweating.
- This inability to cool can lead to stable core body temperature, potentially causing organ failure and brain damage if not addressed.
Wet-Bulb Temperatures
- Two weather stations have reported wet-bulb temperatures above the critical level. One is in the Persian Gulf and the other in the Indus River Basin.
- Jacobabad in Pakistan, one of the hottest cities on Earth, has experienced this twice since 2010.
- These instances have been brief but are becoming more frequent.
- In a 2023 heatwave in India, wet-bulb temperatures exceeded 34°C.
- Studies predict that by 2070, places in South Asia and the Middle East will regularly exceed this temperature.
- Currently, deadly climate conditions affect 30% of the global population for at least 20 days each year.
- By 2100, this number could increase to over 70%.
- The maximum wet-bulb temperature humans can endure is 35°C.
- However, the effects of heat can be felt at much lower wet-bulb temperatures.
- The 2021 British Columbia heatwave caused over 600 heat-related deaths with a wet-bulb temperature of only 25°C.
- Vulnerable populations to extreme heat include older adults, young children, and individuals with specific health conditions.
- Certain jobs, such as construction, farming, or working in hot kitchens, can increase the risks due to additional environmental heat or physical exertion.
- Your socioeconomic status can also affect how you experience heat.
- For instance, the heat experience can differ significantly between an individual in an air-conditioned room and one living under a tin roof, even in the same city on the same day.
Solutions
- The problem of climate change is complex.
- Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is important but not enough.
- There is a looming danger of reaching an irreversible tipping point.
- Many discussions focus on people migrating from extremely hot regions.
- Yet, some people cannot move due to work, social ties, monetary issues, political constraints, or disabilities.
- Therefore, we need adaptive solutions in existing living areas.
- This includes modifying our environments, homes, and lifestyle habits.
- Individuals, communities, and governments need to prepare.
- Support should be in place for people unable to escape intolerable conditions.
Uninsurable Future
Tipping point: Increasingly severe hazards drive up the costs of insurance until it is no longer accessible or affordable. Once this point is passed, people are left without an economic safety net when disasters strike, opening the door to cascading socioeconomic impacts in high-risk areas.
- The frequency and intensity of extreme weather events worldwide are increasing.
- These severe weather events are causing more damage.
- Since the 1970s, the cost of weather-related disasters has multiplied seven times.
- In 2022, global economic losses due to these disasters reached $313 billion.
- Insurance helps protect people from the financial losses that disasters can cause.
- The cost of insurance is calculated based on the likelihood of such losses.
- Climate change is changing the risk landscape, leading to more frequent and intense disasters.
- By 2040, we expect the number of severe weather events to double globally.
- These changes are likely to result in higher insurance premiums.
- Extreme weather events have drastically increased home insurance prices. Some areas report a 57% surge since 2015.
- Due to rising losses, insurance companies are altering their policies. They may limit coverage, cancel policies, or exit the market in high-risk areas.
- If insurance isn’t available for certain risks, in certain regions, or at reasonable prices, those areas are deemed “uninsurable”.
- In Australia, an estimated 520,940 homes could become uninsurable by 2030. This is mainly because of the increasing risk of floods.
- Population growth and development continue in vulnerable areas.
- Social and economic factors are driving people to live in high-risk places like coasts, rivers, and floodplains.
- These areas are increasingly exposed to extreme weather events.
- As a result, more people and property are put at risk.
- The number and size of these high-risk areas are predicted to increase.
- Climate change is expected to expand the range of hazards, such as wildfires and storms, into new areas.
- People without insurance face huge financial loss.
- Buying or selling homes becomes difficult if they are uninsurable.
- This affects stable housing markets.
- The risk of inequality increases as only those with the means will move away.
- Vulnerable individuals are forced to stay in hazardous situations.
- These situations get worse as more people seek cheaper housing in these areas.
- They face extreme events without insurance.
Solutions
- Traditionally, the solutions considered to address uninsurability have been economic, like government subsidies.
- However, little focus has been given to reduce the escalating underlying risks.
- Insurance is beneficial for managing risks but has limits when risks are high.
- It’s best used with other risk reduction measures, not as a licence to live in hazardous situations.
- We need transformative approaches to address the social and environmental risk drivers.
- This is crucial before we lose this safety net when we need it the most.
United Nations University (UNU)
- The United Nations University (UNU) is a global organisation located in Japan.
- It is a think tank and an educational institution for postgraduate studies.
- UNU’s mission is to help solve global issues related to human survival, welfare, and development.
- It works closely with other universities and research institutes from UN member countries.
- UNU bridges the gap between international academia and the United Nations system.
- It also contributes to capacity building through its postgraduate programs, primarily in developing countries.
- The Rector, who holds the rank of UN Under-Secretary-General, oversees the University’s direction, organisation, administration, and programs.
- The UNU Council devises the University’s principles and policies and approves its budget and work program.
- The University includes 14 institutes distributed in 12 countries worldwide.
- As a member of the UN family, UNU maintains a strong working relationship with other UN agencies, programs, commissions, funds, and convention secretariats.
Read the full report here.