Texas heatwave an ‘exceptional event driven by climate change,’ scientist says - KXAN.com

KXAN Weather: Texas heatwave an 'exceptional event driven by climate change'

AUSTIN (KXAN) — “The types of temperatures that we’re seeing this week are extremely unlikely to happen in a world without climate change,” MIT climate scientist Dr. Daniel Gilford said.

As the First Warning Weather team predicts Austin’s hottest June 14-20 period on record with an average high temperature of 104°+ over the next week, a new tool from Climate Central attributes the heat wave to manmade climate change.

“The Climate Shift Index is a tool that helps us discover the fingerprints of climate change on our day-to-day weather,” Gilford, who works with Climate Central, said.

The tool examines the frequency of Austin’s temperatures throughout history, both in an unaltered past climate and in the current human-altered climate. It then compares the probability of recording given temperatures today versus recording that same temperature in the past.

According to Climate Central’s analysis, Austin’s high temperatures by Thursday afternoon exceeding 100° are at least five times more likely because of climate change.

A 5 on the Climate Shift Index scale means, “Climate change made the conditions at least 5 times more likely, potentially far more. This is an exceptional event driven by climate change,” according to Climate Central.

How are humans changing the climate?

The atmosphere is naturally composed of heat-trapping gases that make Earth a livable planet. But since the Industrial Revolution 200 years ago, humans have been burning fossil fuels for energy, transportation and warmth.

This increases the concentration of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere artificially, enhancing how much heat the atmosphere traps and warming global temperatures.

Couldn’t it just be the urban heat island effect as Austin grows?

The urban heat island effect is when large urban areas have warmer temperatures than rural surroundings due to a high coverage of asphalt, concrete and buildings that absorb more of the sun’s heat than the natural tree canopy and ground cover.

While the urban heat island is leading to warmer temperatures in Austin than surrounding communities, Dr. Gilford said that both urban and rural areas are warming at the same rate.

“Climate change is here, it’s happening in Austin right now, and the temperatures over the next few days are going to show us that,” Gilford said.

What can I do about the problem?

Gilford said he frequently speaks with people who feel powerless when confronted with the scale of the issue of global climate change. But he encourages an open dialogue on the topic to normalize the subject in our communities.

“Climate change is a collective problem that requires collective solutions,” Gilford said. “The most important thing that I believe we can do about climate change is talk about it with our neighbors.”