The world’s water resources face growing pressure from climate change while emergencies involving the life-giving resource are increasingly impacting lives and livelihoods, the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Thursday. “Water-related hazards continue to cause major devastation this year,” said Celeste Saulo, WMO Secretary-General. “The latest examples are the devastating monsoon flooding in Pakistan, floods in South Sudan and the deadly flash floods in the Indonesian island of Bali. And unfortunately, we see no end to this trend.”. Ms. Saulo noted that these emergencies have been happening amid increasingly warm air temperatures, which allow more water to be held in the atmosphere leading to heavier rainfall. Her comments coincided with the publication of a new WMO report on the state of the world’s waterways, snow and ice which notes that 2024 was the hottest in 175 years of observation, with the annual mean surface temperature reaching 1.55 °C above the pre-industrial baseline from 1850 to 1900.
‘No end’ expected to floods and storms as global heating continues | UN News
