Climate change blamed as the Philippines pay a high human cost – A greener life, a greener world

By Anders Lorenzen

As world leaders and negotiators gather in Brazil for the next round of UN climate talks at COP30, the second extreme weather event in just over a week has struck, presenting a timely warning that climate change is not some future challenge.

As Typhoon Kalmaegi this week hammered the Philippines, before heading to Vietnam, it comes less than a week after Hurricane Melissa struck Jamaica and surrounding island states for the worst hurricane the country has ever witnessed.

 Philippines: Battered by extreme weather events

Even though Kalmaegi with peak windspeeds of 184 km/h (114 mph) is not technically the most powerful storm to hit Southeast Asia this year, it is just the latest extreme weather event hitting the region, having been on the firing side for the last few months of relentless extreme weather events.

These back to back events means countries have not been able to recover before being hit again, and again.

For the people of the Philippines, a low-lying country extremely vulnerable to climate change, Kalmaegi has so far cost the lives of nearly 200 people in the country. Unfortunately that number is likely to increase as clean-up operations gets underway and rescue teams arrive in the highly impacted areas.

As Kalmaegi made landfall in the Philippines, the storm caused sudden and extreme flooding, which took many by surprise, and in addition to the high human cost it wreaked havoc to infrastructure and farmland across the low-lying archipelago.

Climate scientists have warned that extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and extreme as the planet warms.

Warmer seas create perfect extreme storm conditions

Ben Clarke, an extreme weather researcher at London’s Grantham Institute on Climate Change and Environment, pointed to the warm seas in the region as a key contributor, “The sea surface temperatures in both the western North Pacific and over the South China Sea are both exceptionally warm. Kalmaegi will be more powerful and wetter because of these elevated temperatures, and this trend in sea surface temperatures is extremely clearly linked to human-caused global warming.”

While we can’t say to what degree an extreme weather event has been influenced by climate change before a study has been conducted, a rule of thumb is that, generally, as warmer sea surface temperatures speed up the evaporation process and pack more fuel into tropical cyclones, there is a clear link between warmer oceans and more extreme and intense cyclones.

As is the case for hurricanes, the climate science data does not suggest we, at least so far, will see an increase in cyclones due to climate change, but that the intensity of those weather events will increase.

However, last year, within the space of a month the Philippines experienced six deadly typhoons, as well as four tropical cyclones developed simultaneously. 

The Philippines and other developing countries vulnerable to climate impacts would want to stress at COP30 that climate finance helping developing countries to adapt to climate change needs to move up the order of priorities.

Anders Lorenzen is the founding Editor of A greener life, a greener world.