NEW DELHI: A new study published in Science reveals that climate change is dramatically altering global rainfall patterns, potentially intensifying typhoons and other tropical storms.

This research comes in the wake of Typhoon Gaemi, the year’s most powerful storm, which recently battered Taiwan, the Philippines, and China.

Led by Zhang Wenxia at the China Academy of Sciences, researchers analyzed historical meteorological data and found that approximately 75% of the world’s land area has experienced increased “precipitation variability” – wider swings between wet and dry weather.

The study attributes this phenomenon to warming temperatures enhancing the atmosphere’s moisture-holding capacity.

People walk through a flooded area after a breach in Munak canal that supplies water from Haryana to Delhi, led to knee-deep waterlogging in parts of JJ colony, Bawana. (PTI Photo)

“This is going to increase as global warming continues, enhancing the chances of droughts and/or floods,” Steven Sherwood, a climate scientist at the University of New South Wales told Reuters.

The research suggests that while tropical storms may become less frequent, they are likely to grow more powerful.

Typhoon Gaemi exemplified this trend, making landfall in Taiwan on Wednesday as the strongest storm to hit the island in eight years. With wind speeds reaching 227 kph (141 mph), it forced widespread closures of schools, businesses, and financial markets across the region. In China, hundreds of thousands were evacuated ahead of the typhoon’s landfall on Thursday.

While attributing individual weather events to climate change remains challenging, climate models consistently predict that global warming will strengthen typhoons.

Sachie Kanada, a researcher at Japan’s Nagoya University, notes, “In general, warmer sea surface temperature is a favorable condition for tropical cyclone development.”

Recent climate reports from China and Taiwan corroborate these findings. China’s “blue paper” on climate change indicates a significant decline in typhoon frequency in the Northwest Pacific and South China Sea since the 1990s, but notes an increase in their intensity.

Similarly, Taiwan’s climate change report suggests fewer but more intense typhoons in the region.

As global temperatures continue to rise, the impact on tropical storms could be substantial. Feng Xiangbo, a tropical cyclone research scientist at the University of Reading, states that for each 1 degree Celsius increase in temperature, water vapor capacity in the lower atmosphere is expected to rise by 7%.

This could lead to a dramatic 40% surge in tropical cyclone rainfall in some regions for each degree of warming.

Agencies

Agencies