Monsoon in India is likely to get dangerous due to much more rains because of global warming, say researchers.
A research published in the Science Advances journal stated that scientists, after analysing changes in the past million years, have concluded that monsoon is set for the worse.
“We find that the projected monsoon response to ongoing ice melt and rising carbon dioxide levels is fully consistent with dynamics of the past 0.9 million years,” the research paper stated.
The team of researchers — led by Steven Clemens, professor of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Brown University — analysed mud samples from Bay of Bengal to reach the conclusion.
During a two-month research tour on a converted oil-drilling ship, the JOIDES Resolution, the team drilled 200 metres to collect core samples which provided in-depth analysis of monsoon rainfall.
Scientists analysed fossils of plankton embedded in samples that had died hundreds of years ago as monsoon rains poured more freshwater into the bay, reducing salinity at the surface.
Researchers found that high rainfall and low salinity followed periods of high carbon dioxide concentration in atmosphere and falling ice volumes.
“We can verify over the past million years that increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have been followed by substantial increases in rainfall in the South Asian monsoon system. The predictions of the climate models are wonderfully consistent with what we see in the past million years,” The New York Times quoted Clemens as saying.
The southwest monsoon in India, which sets in early June and lasts four months, causes f floods in several states as rivers get inundated from excessive rainfall.
The risk of the dangerous season could be further enhanced in the coming years.
There has already been a change in monsoon pattern over the last few years as climate disruptions have taken a toll on environment.
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