Aerial shot of the province of which was heavily damaged by super typhoon Yolanda (MNS photo)
MANILA (Mabuhay) – The Philippines may face stronger typhoons due to warmer temperatures, US Vice President Al Gore said Wednesday in a Climate Reality Project forum in Manila.
“Warmer oceans makes ocean-based storms much stronger,” Gore said.
He explained that 93 percent of the heat trapped in the atmosphere due to excessive carbon emission heats the ocean.
“Supertyphoon Yolanda crossed over parts of the Pacific Ocean that were three percent warmer than normal and it became the most powerful and most destructive storm to ever make a landfall,” Gore said.
“I am not here simply to do a lecture…I’m here also to ask you to be part of the solution. This is a moment in human history unlike any other…to have an obligation for those who come after us that is fundamentally different…” Al Gore, Manila Philippines (Al Gore in Manila Youtube video capture)
One of the strongest typhoons recorded to make landfall, Yolanda killed over 6,000 people and affected over a million families in November 2013. Last Saturday, Gore went to visit Tacloban City, one of the places that suffered the greatest damage due to the typhoon.
Gore explained how warmer temperature evaporates more moisture in the atmosphere, leading to longer – and more powerful – precipitation, leading to more flooding especially in areas with particularly low elevation.
“If we put much more water vapor in the sky and much more heat in the atmosphere, every storm is going to be different,” Gore said, “We have more storms yet we have longer droughts.”
He pointed out that Philippines is the country with most number of weather-related disasters, with 328 calamities recorded from 1994-2013.
“The Philippines is, in so many ways, more vulnerable compared to other countries,” Gore said.
Gore noted how the effects of burning more fossil fuels are beginning to be felt.
“In the decade of the 1980’s, for the first time we saw a statistical significant number of hot days. But in the last ten years, the number of hot days are now almost common than they were 30 years ago,” Gore said.
Globally, February 2016 is the hottest month ever recorded, while 14 out of 15 of the hottest years ever recorded happened after the turn of the millennium.
In his previous lecture, Al Gore said food, water and infrastructure systems in the Philippines are vulnerable to global warming.
“As a result we saw the consequences on people, on animals on plants, on ecosystems,” Gore said. (MNS)