Mediterranean to get more deadly hot days: study - Reuters

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Mediterranean to get more deadly hot days: study

Fri Jun 15, 11:43 AM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Deadly heat waves around the
Mediterranean, like those that killed some 18,000 people
in 2003, could become the norm this century if current
trends in greenhouse emissions continue, researchers
reported on Friday.

The number of dangerously hot days in the Mediterranean
region that includes parts of Europe, Africa and the
Middle East could increase by 200 percent to 500 percent,
according to a study in the journal Geophysical Research
Letters.

France would have the biggest rise in extreme high
temperature days, the study said. Paris would truly
sizzle if simulations of the future come to pass, with
temperatures that occurred in the French capital during
the killer heat wave of 2003 exceeded dozens of times
each year.

However, cutting greenhouse gas emissions could make
the dangerously hot days as much as 50 percent less
intense, the authors said in their analysis of climate
simulations extending to the year 2099.

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Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070615/sc_nm/climate_mediterranean_dc