Climate change: efforts to halt rise in global temperatures may be too late to save key glaciers, report warns

Report, published ahead of the UN’s COP27 conference, says icefields in World Heritage sites are among those likely to vanish by 2050

Areas affected include Yellowstone and Yosemite in the US, China’s Huanglong national park and European mountain ranges such as the Pyrenees and Dolomites

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The Three Parallel Rivers nature reserve in China’s Yunnan province is among 10 sites worldwide where glaciers “could almost completely disappear by 2100’. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 9:00pm, 8 Nov 2022Updated: 9:14pm, 8 Nov 2022

Glaciers in UN World Heritage sites are among those likely to disappear by 2050 as a result of global warming – regardless of efforts to limit the rise in global temperatures, scientists have warned.

Researchers fear their loss is likely to have a devastating impact on vital waterways – including the Yangtze and Mekong rivers – and on biodiversity and food security.

In a report published by Unesco and the International Union for Conservation of Nature on Friday, the researchers identified a number of glaciers in World Heritage sites and other well-known scenic areas as being likely to vanish within the next three decades.

The areas affected include the Huanglong national park in the southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan; Yellowstone and Yosemite national parks in the United States; Mont Perdu, on the border between France and Spain in the Pyrenees; and the Dolomites in northern Italy.

The report comes as world leaders at the United Nations COP27 summit in Egypt meet amid growing alarm about the consequences of failing to limit the rise in global temperatures.

The report studied 18,600 glaciers – representing nearly 10 per cent of the world’s total glacierised area – and found that the fastest melting of all are in the Three Parallel Rivers in Yunnan, the most biodiverse province in China.

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