Artificial intelligence reveals that the climate crisis is already being felt almost everywhere.

It is no secret that the consequences of climate change are already showing up. Numerous studies have been published in recent years revealing the impact of global warming in various areas. And with the help of artificial intelligence, researchers have now analyzed data from more than 100,000 of those studies to understand where climate change is already hitting. The results are sobering. Together, the more than 100,000 studies reveal that anthropogenic climate change is already affecting at least 80 percent of the Earth’s surface and at least 85 percent of the world’s population.

No doubt about it

“Our study leaves no doubt that the climate crisis is already being felt almost everywhere on Earth,” said researcher Max Callaghan. “And that has already been extensively scientifically documented.”

Lots of dates

While climate research was still in its infancy a few decades ago, today it is different. Numerous studies are published every year on the impact of climate change. And often they only deal with a certain area or aspect of the climate system, so that – despite all that studies and data – we still do not have a good picture of the global impact that climate change is already having. To gain more insight into this, Callaghan and colleagues turned to artificial intelligence.

They developed an algorithm that was able to fish certain information from a large number of scientific studies in a short time. Think, for example, of the observed climate impact, the driving force behind that impact and the location where that impact was determined. The researchers then applied the algorithm to 102,160 publications about the consequences of climate change. On the basis of that data, it became clear in which places climate change is (proven) being felt. The researchers then tested the algorithm’s findings by comparing them with data and models on trends in temperature and precipitation attributable to anthropogenic climate change.

Gap

The research thus reveals that climate change is already being experienced by the majority of the world’s population. But it doesn’t stop there; the study also makes it painfully clear that the climate impact – despite the fact that thousands of papers have been written about it – are not equally well documented everywhere. Where intensive research is being conducted into the impact of climate change in high-income countries, the situation is often very different in low-income countries. It means that those countries – whose models often predict that they will be hit hardest by climate change – do not have the data to show how and where climate change is already manifesting itself. This makes it much more difficult for these countries to plan climate adaptations. Because if you do not know what impact climate change has locally, it is also difficult to take measures to mitigate that impact.

As far as the latter is concerned, there is still work to be done. It should result in even more publications. But what the study shows is that with a little help from artificial intelligence, it is quite possible to combine data from all those studies and thus get a picture of the impact that climate change is having worldwide. “Our global map of climate impact guides the global fight against warming, regional and local risk assessments and climate adaptation,” concludes Callaghan.