In the 1973 Loafer movie, there was this song called Aaj Mausam, Baiman Hai Bada. This was, Dharmendra was the star. And there is an old friend of mine who keeps referring to this song. But largely he refers to this song with relation to the political climate of the country. but there is also of course a strong reference to the climate of the country or the climate crisis that we are dealing with. So the question definitely arises that is the weather bad or are we doing bad with the weather? So those are questions that we need to grapple with because climate crisis is a reality today. We are facing it every day. The repercussions of it is of course born by those who are marginalized much more than the others. There are a lot of things that are circulating in the internet about it. There is a lot of information around it. How much understanding do we really have about it is a different matter. But everyone seems to have an opinion about it. So today we will have Soumya Dutta who is primarily a scientist. He is associated with MOHSAM, which is Movement for Advancing Understanding of Sustainability and Mutuality. He has also been a member of NAPM, the National Working Group member of National Alliance of People's Movement. He is also an executive member of the Friends of the Earth India and formerly on the advisory board of the UN Climate Technology Centre and Network. So it's a really unique combination of being a scientist as well as a social activist. So we'll welcome Soumya Da. The purpose of this series and we will do it in different tukdas. The purpose of this series is to actually understand the climatic events, the climate extreme events, how do we understand it, how do we grapple with it and also what we will try to do is not only understand the phenomena but also we will question as to what can the government do, what can the people do to safeguard themselves of course when we are talking about people and and what can the government do to actually do the needful. So, in this way, we will cover four particular phenomena in this series. We will start with flooding, then we will go to cyclones and storms, then we will go to heat waves, and finally we will deal with slow onset events like sea level rise like temperature rise over a long period of time its impacts on crops and those kinds of things So without further delay let start the first of the segment, if that's okay. Thank you. So let's talk about flooding. Shomeda, flooding has been a menace all through history, right? Because when we were children, we remember Kosi was called the sorrow of Bihar, Damodar was called the sorrow of Bengal. We have all grown up studying these things. We have also jokingly always referred to Calcutta as the Venice of the East because it would get flooded every time there is in the monsoons or when there is some amount of rain. So the fact that our infrastructure, city infrastructure is not coping with it, the fact that there has been flooding that's been a major issue for us. It doesn't seem to be a very new phenomenon, But at the same point of time, maybe there is something new that is happening. Can you explain what is it that is different? Okay, this is an interesting thing because this is the same debate that in multiple circles, not now the climate deniers, but the climate skeptics, they also bring up. Heat was there. One of the hottest year was 1978 or something. So what is new? There are several things which have changed completely. And for that we have to understand first there is a thing called weather which can vary year to year quite drastically for global and local phenomena. And there is a thing called climate which is a long term average of any place at any point of time. So, what we saw earlier is extreme weather events. Those were anomalies. Suddenly something weird, nothing you can do, but it's not regular. It's once in a like we call once in a 100 year event. So those kinds of things happen for as long as we have been keeping records and for the world we are keeping records of the weather all the parameters for the last 175 years all across the globe what has changed is this so-called once in a hundred year events and now because of the global heating and climate change is happening once in 10 years or once in five years so that's the big difference uh the other thing is about the flooding see what you mentioned Imagine Kolkata or Calcutta. Kolkata flooding or any city which is subject to tidal flows. The flooding happens during high tides. If there is an extra water input like rains during the high tide because the high tide brings the water from the sea, then there is very little chance of draining out. The drainage capacity of the city goes down. But as soon as within a six hour period as soon as the low tide comes the city is drained out so this used to be a regular phenomenon i grew up grew up in kolkata also early early on before i moved to asham and then to delhi so these were periodic phenomena and these were dealt with as a short-term inconvenient short-term loss of course you mentioned koshi flood damodar flood even Assam, Brahmaputra floods, true. These had a similar, before the Koshi barrage was built, which is an engineering massacre, a disaster. Before that, the Koshi used to flood Northern Bihar and that flood water used to get down very quickly. And that used to deposit very fertile silt from the Himalayan areas rich in minerals. So it was really never a big disaster for the people. the people and i have been going to koshi for years now i'm member of the koshi people's commission also so i have seen this people keep talking about this at that time we used to get flooded and the flood water used to recede but what is happening cyclical event it's a cyclical event and then people realize that okay this time this will come and within 10 days this will recede what is happening now is the science i will explain but what is happening now this is repeating much more frequently the intensity of the rainfall and flooding has gone up dramatically see what we call uh in the imd parlance india metallurgical department is very heavy rainfall very heavy rainfall and extremely heavy rainfall extremely heavy is 224 mm plus per day in a 24 hour period Those were extremely rare earlier. But due to global heating, particularly because the oceans have been, have heated up tremendously, sea and ocean waters, we are having intense rainfalls. And this is one thing, if you look at the UN DRR, UN Disaster Database, you will see over the last 40 years, extremely heavy rainfalls and storms, both have the same route. They have increased by 270%. That means 2.7 times. And this is a very, very unusual phenomenon. Because a major system, weather system or a climate system changing in the blink of an eye, 40 years, 50 years is really a blink of an eye for the geological time. Changing by 2.7 times, increasing. That's a massive impact. So why is it happening? Because the science of it is people think that okay because the trees have been cut down something is happening but then rainfall should have gone down. Everywhere trees have been cut. So we should not have the rainfall events. It should have all dried. But that's not happening. Actually the globally rainfall depends a lot on how warm the sea surface temperature is Basically the first 100 meter Right From the surface to the 100 meters because that the part which pumps moisture into the air. And the seas, oceans, 71% of the earth is covered. They are the main source of moisture to the atmosphere. It's not rivers or lakes or trees. In common parlance it's like tree cut there to cloud main part. That's not true because go to Himachal, go to Uttarakhand, over the last few years, millions and millions of trees have been cut. But the rainfall has increased. So should we say that if you cut trees, rainfall will increase? No, that's not true. And other way also not true in a global scale. It's true in a local scale. It will generate moisture. Forget about the forest like Amazon or Congo Basin. These are massive forests. So the amount of water available and the evapotranspiration by the trees are massive. If you leave those aside, then it's determined how much rainfall will be there is determined by how much moisture the air carries because the rain has to come from the air, from the clouds and the clouds will only form if there is enough moisture going up and condensing after going up they cool and they condense. What has happened is because of the greenhouse gases, we all know there is a global warming or now we call it global heating. Warming is a very soft term. So the global heating, 90 percent plus of the additional heat generated by the greenhouse gases has gone into the oceans. 90 percent plus by some estimate 92 percent. So what we are facing on the land is only 8-9% result of 8-9% of the extra heating. The rest has gone into the oceans. So the oceans absorb the major or almost the entire share of the heat. Almost the entire, leaving a tiny bit for land, for two-legged land animals or others to be troubled. But the oceans are going through massive change. Since we are not aquatic, thereby we don't see the… Yes, we are completely… this is called the hidden climate change. is part of the hidden climate change there is other factor but as a result of this massive warming huge pumping is happening moisture is because if you heat up water for tea you see the moisture coming right so that moisture is being pumped and every one degree celsius the air is warmer it can hold seven percent more moisture at saturation so air is generally three to four warmer in many areas because of global heating. So, oceans are pumping, the air is holding more moisture, much more, 20% more moisture, 22% more moisture. And as that heat drives it up, it expands and cools. And once it cools, it goes to anywhere. The oceans only, don't only rain on the oceans. With the upper level wind, it transforms, it goes to all over the world.
