Hadley Centre Director Warns Asian CEOs On Climate Breakdown - Reuters

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SINGAPORE - "More severe tropical cyclones, heatwaves and a dramatic shift in rainfall patterns could batter Asia by the end of the century as its factories boom, a leading climate expert told Asian chief executives on Friday.

The average temperature of major Asian cities could rise by 3 to 10 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, while longer droughts and flooding threaten rural areas, said David Griggs, director of the UK Met Office's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research.
"We expect to see more heat waves, more warm nights, that land areas will warm quicker than the global average," he told Reuters after speaking to the Asia Business Council, whose members include executives of some of Asia's biggest companies.

"We expect that sea levels will rise between 9 cm and 88 cm (3.5 to 34.6 inches), that we will very likely see more intense precipitation events, more floods, more droughts," he said. The rare presentation on the risk of climate change to one of Asia's most powerful business groups represents the recognition that a severe deterioration in Asia's ecology and environment could accompany the region's rapid economic development.

It also demonstrated that concern over global warming was spreading to the world's fastest growing economies, and was no longer regarded as primarily a Western issue."

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