What is it about?
This paper analyzes changes in exposure to lightning hazards due to growth in population, urbanization and climate change. It depicts the increase in risks to various components of human society in an era of climate change. Although the magnitude of future climate change is uncertain, different scenarios are evaluated viz-a-viz their impact on thunderstorms and lightning frequencies.
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Why is it important?
This is the first research that aims to converge societal trends with the predicted changes in lightning distribution due to climate change in the coming decades of the 21st century. We show how city expansion, economic growth and related human activities (mostly pollution) change lightning distributions and juxtapose this information with predicted lightning flash density changes. This enables assessing the growing hazard of thunderstorms.
Perspectives
My attempt in this work is to show the increased risks and point to the action needed for raising awareness in various sectors which will be most affected (air travel, shipping, wind turbines, forest management) and in the general population.
Yoav Yair
Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Lightning hazards to human societies in a changing climate, Environmental Research Letters, November 2018, Institute of Physics Publishing,
DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/aaea86.
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