Win the Battle Against Heatwaves - written by 20118 Jung Seoyoon

Win the Battle Against Heatwaves

written by 20118 Jung Seoyoon

According to statistics from the National Weather Service, and the sensory temperature of most people, 2018 was the hottest summer ever. Heatwave alerts were issued for 51 days, which demonstrates a continued increase from 49 days in 2017 and 47 days in 2016. The temperature of Seoul reached 39.6 celsius, marking the highest temperature in 111 years. Such phenomena are seldom greeted with enthusiasm as their effects on Korean society are devastating.

Heatwaves are detrimental to rural and urban communities alike.

For rural communities, hot summers mean a sharp decrease in the profit earned from crops. Compared with last year, the production of pears, apples, persimmons, and grapes this year decreased by 21%, 15%, 10%, and 10% respectively. Typically crops either wither due to extreme drought or are burnt to death by the excessive heat and sunlight. Animals in farms also sustain serious injuries from the heat, adding to the list of worries farms are already dealing with. As for cities, blackouts are becoming increasingly more common following the spike of electricity usage in air-conditioners. This is proving to be more troublesome because in the case of large hospitals, blackouts during surgery could mean the life and death of a patient. While it is true that hospitals have backup generators, we should take into account the considerable time gap between a blackout and the operation of backup electricity. To add, since cities are covered by buildings, the heat emanating from the ground cannot escape easily, thus causing the temperature to rise even at night-a phenomenon called ‘the heat island effect.’

What causes the abnormal spike in temperature?

While scientists are suggesting various theories regarding the status quo, the most likely of them all is the weakened jet stream of the midlatitudes. Jet stream indicates the westerlies blowing in latitude 30 ~40, its velocity reaching up to 100 m/s in narrow areas. The jet stream is part of the Earth’s system that transports heat in a balanced way and is crucial for maintaining normal temperatures. However, because of global warming, the temperature gap between Northern parts of the globe and the middle part has lessened, thus bringing about the weakening of the jet stream. As a result, heat is being trapped in the mid-latitudes and has caused the extraordinary phenomenon that we experienced this summer.

Both sides of the coin

On the contrary, some people view the spike in temperature as a new opportunity. The financial advantage that one can derive from a more heated country is called the ‘high-temperature economy,’ in which products like summer goods and o2o(Online to Offline, food delivery or call-taxi services), suddenly increase in consumption. This phenomenon is especially prominent in China, even though Korea also enjoys similar effects. Most common products that benefit from the high-temperature economy include ice cream, beverages, sunscreen, air-conditioners, and so on. The biggest beneficiary this year was sunscreens, which increased for an average of 200~300% compared to last year and even reached 504% in Changsa, the hottest region.

However, people admit that this is not a recommendable phenomenon since the disadvantages of rising temperature clearly outstrip the benefits. The biggest point is that while advantages are limited to only a few products, disadvantages affect everyone living in the country. Thus, the government will be forced to exert all the effort we can into preventing abnormal temperatures, and to do this, they should tackle the fundamental problem-global warming.

There are three ways to tackle global warming.

First, we can adopt new technology. Many experts agree that now is a time for negative emission instead of zero-emission. That is to say, the international society has already exceeded the era when we could reduce climate change by not emitting any carbon, but should actually try to decrease the amount of carbon that is already out in the atmosphere. A rising method is CCS, burying the carbon in the ground. Using this method we can capture more than 90% of the carbon in the atmosphere, and it is later liquified and buried underground or beneath the sea. Unfortunately, this technology is not spread widely due to cost problems, which is an obstacle that we should overcome in the developing process.

Yet the most important thing to keep in mind is that global warming is, as it is termed, a “global” problem. A single country alone cannot solve climate change - we need international cooperation. Countries should keep in mind the Paris Accord ratified in 2015, which called for a less than 1.5 increase in temperature for the years to come. Since the Paris Accord doesn’t include any specific measures concerning how exactly to decrease the carbon rates, countries should come up with more specific measures in order to solve the problems of climate change.