Peru Tries to Adapt to Dangerous Levels of UV Radiation Brought on by Climate Change
Peru Tries to Adapt to Dangerous Levels of UV Radiation Brought on by Climate Change
By Lucas Iberico Lozada On 3/15/16 at 7:01 AM
Many Cusco residents carry umbrellas on sunny days, wear long-sleeve shirts and apply sunscreen
several times a day.
Rodrigo Abd/AP
The brisk March morning air is a shock after the tourists have recently, regretfully unpacked themselves from their cozy alpaca wool blankets and climate-controlled buses. Watching them is Natividad Sonjo, who has been selling blankets, painted stones and carved bamboo instruments for 15 years on the eastern edge of Sacsayhuamán, an archaeological complex of enormous stone walls and wide lawns just north of Cusco, Peru, the seat of the great Inca empire. The diffuse sunlight of a cloudy morning high in the Andes softly illuminates the city. And then, all at once, the sun breaks through, bringing with it a wallop of heat. Soon, any memory of the cool air has evaporated along with the clouds, but Sonjo doesn't remove the elaborately embroidered wool jacket she put on first thing that morning. "The sun used to warm us," she says, repeating a common refrain among inhabitants of the Peruvian altiplano. "Now it burns us."
The sun has always been strong in Cusco. The city's proximity to the equator and its altitude—some 11,150 feet above sea level—mean that come summer in the Southern Hemisphere, sunlight doesn’t have to travel far to reach Cusco. It also doesn’t encounter much interference along the way—not a good state of affairs for those who live here. The amount of ultraviolet radiation that makes it to Earth is limited by atmospheric ozone, a molecule made up of three oxygen atoms bound together. At higher altitudes, there are fewer ozone molecules between the Earth and the sun, making UV readings normally elevated in mountainous regions near the equator. In 2006, climate researchers found Cusco and the surrounding area to have the highest UV readings in the world. But now, as climate scientists say the planet is reaching critical temperatures worldwide, Peruvian meteorologists are recording record levels of UV radiation throughout the country, while meteorologists in Chile, Argentina and Bolivia are recording similarly increased levels in regions close to Peru.
The effects of prolonged exposure to ultraviolet radiation can be calamitous. The risk of developing skin cancer doubles after only a few acute exposures, say dermatological researchers, while repeated exposure can cause cataracts and permanent eye damage. The planet is affected too: Increased UV can limit photosynthesis in crops and raise the temperature of the uppermost layer of the ocean, killing off the phytoplankton that are a key source of nutrition in the ocean's food chain.
As the Peruvian meteorological agency's chief UV researcher, Orlando Ccora is responsible for collecting the data from a network of nine spectrophotometers dotted throughout the country's varied landscape. The data show that cities up and down Peru's Pacific coast, including Lima, the capital, have regularly recorded daily UV index readings of over 14 during the past two months, while in the southern Andes region, one in every four days has had a reading of 16. For comparison, the highest UV index reading in Miami last year was roughly 12.5, and the World Health Organization regards any reading over 11 as "extreme." In January, Ccora's team recorded an average UV index reading of 13.6 for Cusco—the highest average monthly reading since they began collecting data in 2009.
More:
http://www.newsweek.com/peru-climate-change-ultraviolet-radiation-ozone-436746?piano_t=1