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::artlead::A new study by American students on global warming has warned that hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia could be made impossible later this century, when temperatures are expected to hit new records in summer.::/artlead::
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CAIRO – A new study by American students on global warming has warned that hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia could be made impossible later this century, when temperatures are expected to hit new records in summer.
“It is often assumed that humans would be able to adapt to any possible warming,” said Matthew Huber of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Illinois, New Scientist Magazine reported on October 26.
“But any wet-bulb temperature over 35 °C for extended periods should induce hyperthermia, as dissipation of metabolic heat becomes impossible.”
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The study, by Elfatih Eltahir of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Jeremy Pal of Loyala Marymount University, Los Angeles, used standard global climate models to show likely future temperatures in the Gulf, assuming global warming of 4 °C, which is possible later this century.
The wet-bulb temperature is the best measure of our ability to tolerate high temperatures, because it reflects the ability of the body to cool off by sweating.
In the study, both Pal and Eltahir made predictions of future humidity in order to assess likely “wet-bulb” temperatures, as measured by thermometers whose bulbs are kept damp.
Currently, wet-bulb temperatures rarely exceed 31 °C anywhere in the world, say Pal and Eltahir.
In the Gulf states, the figure is getting closer to the 35 °C threshold.
When wet-bulb temperatures reach 35 °C, which is approaching body temperature, “the human body can no longer get rid of heat”, says Eltahir.
At the end of July this year, when dry-bulb temperatures in the Gulf exceeded 50 °C at times, wet-bulb temperatures peaked at 34.6 °C, Christoph Schär of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich writes in an accompanying article in Nature Climate Change.
This is the first study to have predicted that populated regions could suffer conditions during this century that “may be fatal to everybody affected, even young and fit individuals under shaded and well-ventilated outdoor conditions”, says Schär.
Coastal urban centers such as Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha are most at risk.
While most of the Gulf citizens live inside air conditioned buildings, risk appeared for those attending hajj rituals in the open.
Last August, Islamic scholars and religious leaders issued a call for action on clime change to fight global warming.
The declaration called for action in madrassas and mosques around the world to emphasize the role Islam can play in combating climate change, according to Climate Action Network (CAN) statement.
The religious scholars' declaration, representing 1.6 billion Muslim, followed earlier interventions on climate change to spell out the moral imperative to reduce manmade greenhouse-gas pollution and prevent the worst effects of climate change.
Last June, Pope Francis, the spiritual leader of 1.2 billion Catholics, published a 181-page encyclical urging drastic cuts in fossil-fuel emissions to arrest the planet’s “spiral of self-destruction.”
The Church of England in April said it was divesting 12 million pounds ($19 million) from thermal coal and tar sands, adding to a growing number of pension funds and endowments at churches, universities, philanthropic groups and financial organizations that are shedding investments in the dirtiest fossil fuels.
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::artcaption::When wet-bulb temperatures reach 35 °C, which is approaching body temperature, “the human body can no longer get rid of heat”, says Eltahir.::/artcaption::
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::artsource::OnIslam & Newspapers::/artsource::
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