New report suggests vast species turnover by end of century

A recent report by researchers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, looked in detail at how Earth's plant life - from rainforests in the Amazon and the Tibetan Plateau to the Great Plains and Mediterranean - might evolve as Earth's climate changes in response to rising levels of greenhouse gases from human activities.  

Publishing their results in the journal Climatic Change, the future appears to be one of  increasing ecological change.  As our biosphere (the thin green layer of plant, soil and water life that extends over the surface of the Earth) is put under stress by very rapid climate change, many plant and animal species will face increasing competition for survival and some will invade territories previously harvested by other species. The study suggests that most land not covered by ice or desert will undergo at least a 30 percent change in plant cover, inevitably requiring people and other animals to relocate.  Yet human urbanization and modern agriculture make this much harder for many animal species to migrate.

"Our study introduces a new view of climate change, exploring the ecological implications of a few degrees of global warming. While warnings of melting glaciers, rising sea levels and other environmental changes are illustrative and important, ultimately, it's the ecological consequences that matter most," explained Jon Bergengren, one of the scientists on the study.

The project used a model to simulate the future state of Earth's natural vegetation in line with climate projections from 10 different global climate simulation based on United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report which assumes greenhouse gas levels will double by 2100 (before leveling off) with global temperature increases of 3.6 to 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit (2 to 4 degrees Celsius).  A similar warming happened following the last major ice age - almost 20,000 years ago - only now is happening about 100 times faster.

Source: Science Daily

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