A United Nations report warns of imperiled glaciers at iconic World Heritage sites — but climate action could save most of them.
A third of the world's glaciers in culturally and naturally significant World Heritage sites will almost completely disappear by 2050, a United Nations climate report warns. Without further reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, half of World Heritage glaciers could almost completely vanish after another 50 years.
"The changes are rapid and really alarming," Daniel Farinotti , a co-author of the new report and a professor of glaciology at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, told Live Science."If we want to do something about it, we need to reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases, and we need to do that now." Recent data show the world falling short of its Paris Agreement goals, The New York Times reported. However, UNESCO hopes its report helps spur a recommitment to those efforts."We believe this can be a strong message to decision-makers, given that these places are iconic for humanity," Carvalho Resende said.
Vital water resources and cultural iconsLosses predicted by 2050 include"the last remaining glaciers in Africa , as well as other iconic sites in Europe and North America," such as Italy's Dolomites and U.S. national parks, according to the report. The"business-as-usual" scenario would imperil larger glaciers, such as those at Machu Picchu in Peru and Olympic National Park in Washington state.
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