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<ul><li>According to a new study, tropopause has been witnessing an increase in expansion over the past few decades.</li><li>It’s expanding at a higher rate than before and this is due to <keyword id="6361617" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="climate-change" source="Orion">climate change</keyword>.</li><li>The tropopause is defined as the upper limit of the troposphere which is the lowest layer of the atmosphere.</li></ul>A new study shows the earth’s atmosphere is expanding due to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/environment/news/the-earth-is-losing-its-shine-and-heres-why-we-should-be-worried/articleshow/86746118.cms">climate change</a>. The study revealed that the tropopause which sits on top of the troposphere has been expanding upward at around 164 feet every decade since 1980. The <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abi8065">study</a> also found that the troposphere has expanded at a faster rate after the year 2000.<br /><br />The findings of the study published in the journal Science Advances detail how climate change is causing these changes in the lowest layer of the earth’s atmosphere. The tropopause is defined as the upper limit of the troposphere which is the lowest layer of the atmosphere. It also constitutes the boundary between the troposphere and the stratosphere. This is also where most of the atmospheric weather occurs, and the tropopause also expands and shrinks according to changing seasons. <br /><br />But scientists discovered that this <a href="https://www.space.com/earth-troposphere-expanding">expansion rate</a> is happening at an alarming rate. Scientists analysed data from 1980 to 2020 to examine how climate change is affecting tropopause. It analysed atmospheric data such as pressure, temperature and humidity along with GPS data. The results showed that due to the increasing quantities of greenhouse gases trapping more heat in the atmosphere, the tropopause is expanding even further.<br /><br />Specifically, there was an increase of around 164 feet per decade between 1980 and 200. This later increased to an average of 174 feet between 2001 and 2020. The study also revealed that 80% of the total increase in temperature was due to human activities. <br /><br />Although there is an increase in the expansion of the tropopause, there’s no conclusion yet on how exactly this would affect the climate or weather. But the study suggests this could lead to planes flying higher in the atmosphere to avoid turbulence. <br /><br /><strong>SEE ALSO:</strong><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/environment/news/the-earth-is-losing-its-shine-and-heres-why-we-should-be-worried/articleshow/86746118.cms" data-type="tilCustomLink">The earth is losing its shine and here’s why we should be worried</a><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/environment/a-new-report-says-cars-must-be-banned-latest-by-2035-to-limit-global-warming-to-1-5-degree-celcius/slidelist/86640652.cms" data-type="tilCustomLink">A new report says cars must be banned latest by 2035 to limit global warming to 1.5-degree Celcius</a><br />

Climate change is expanding the earth's lower atmosphere and it's not a good sign

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><ul class="summary-list"><li>A terror attack in <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/kashmir" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kashmir</a> that killed at least 40 soldiers led India to launch airstrikes on Pakistan - the first in more than 50 years between the two nations.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/india" target="_blank" rel="noopener">India</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/pakistan" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pakistan</a> each have about 140-150 <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/nuclear-weapons" target="_blank" rel="noopener">nuclear weapons</a>. Though nuclear conflict is unlikely, Pakistan said its military is preparing for "all eventualities."</li><li>Climate scientists simulated the effects of so-called "limited, regional nuclear war" between the two countries, and found that nuclear explosions could start firestorms that send millions of tons of smoke into the atmosphere. That could cripple the ozone layer, cause <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/climate-change" target="_blank" rel="noopener">global cooling</a>, and trigger food shortages.</li><li>The newest simulations show the effects "are about five times worse than what we've previously calculated," one researcher said.</li></ul><p>Deadly tensions between India and Pakistan are boiling over in Kashmir, a disputed territory at the northern border of each country.</p><p>A regional conflict is worrisome enough, but climate scientists warn that if either country launches just a portion of its <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nuclear-arms-deal-terminology-definitions-2018-7">nuclear weapons</a>, the situation might escalate into a global environmental and humanitarian catastrophe.</p><p>On February 14, a suicide bomber <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pakistan-readies-military-hospitals-for-war-nuclear-rival-india-kashmir-pulwama-2019-2">killed at least 40 Indian troops</a> in a convoy traveling through Kashmir. A militant group called Jaish-e-Mohammed, which is based in Pakistan, claimed responsibility for the attack. India responded by <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/indias-modi-unleashes-military-on-pakistan-after-pulwama-terrorism-2019-2">launching airstrikes</a> against its neighboring country - the first in roughly 50 years - and Pakistan shot down two Indian fighter jets, capturing <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pakistan-to-return-indian-pilot-avoid-escalation-conflict-2019-2">one of the pilots</a>.</p><p>Both countries possess <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nuclear-weapons-stockpiles-world-map-2017-8">about 140 to 150 nuclear weapons</a>. Though nuclear conflict is unlikely, Pakistani leaders have said their military is preparing for "<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-26/pakistan-army-says-indian-jets-intruded-neighbor-s-airspace" target="_blank" rel="noopener">all eventualities</a>." The country has also assembled its group responsible for <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pakistan-clings-to-nukes-after-embarrassing-air-strikes-by-india-2019-2">making decisions on nuclear strikes</a>.</p><p>"This is the premier nuclear flash point in the world," Ben Rhodes, a political commentator, said on <a href="https://crooked.com/podcast/trumps-north-korea-summit-v-2-venezuela-international-lgbt-rights/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Wednesday's episode</a> of the Pod Save the World podcast.</p><p>For that reason, climate scientists have modeled how an exchange of nuclear weapons between the two countries - what is technically called a limited regional nuclear war - might affect the world.</p><p><em><strong>Read more</strong>: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/qa-whats-at-stake-as-india-pakistan-tensions-rise-2019-2">Here's why India and Pakistan are at each other's throats again - and why the stakes are so high</a></em></p><p>Though the explosions would be local, the ramifications would be global, that research concluded. The ozone layer could be crippled and Earth's climate may cool down for years, triggering crop and fishery losses that would result in what the researchers call a "global nuclear famine."</p><p>"The danger of nuclear winter has been under-understood - poorly understood - by both policy makers and the public," <a href="https://staff.ucar.edu/users/mmills" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Michael Mills</a>, a researcher at the US National Center for Atmospheric Research, told Business Insider. "It has reached a point where we found that nuclear weapons are largely unusable because of the global impacts."</p><h2>Why a 'small' nuclear war could ravage Earth</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>When <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/new-nuclear-blast-videos-2017-3">a nuclear weapon explodes</a>, its effects extend beyond the structure-toppling blast wave, blinding fireball, and mushroom cloud. Nuclear detonations close to the ground, for example, can spread <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nukemap-nuclear-blast-estimates-radioactive-fallout-shelters-2018-10">radioactive debris called fallout</a> for <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/north-korea-nuclear-warhead-damage-map-united-states-2017-10">hundreds of miles</a>.</p><p>But the most frightening effect is intense heat that can ignite structures for miles around. Those fires, if they occur in industrial areas or densely populated cities, can lead to a frightening phenomenon called a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/endor-holocaust-death-star-collision-physics-2017-5">firestorm</a>.</p><p>"These firestorms release many times the energy stored in nuclear weapons themselves," Mills said. "They basically create their own weather and pull things into them, burning all of it."</p><p>Mills helped model the outcome of an Indian-Pakistani nuclear war in <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2013EF000205/full">a 2014 study</a>.  In that scenario, each country exchanges 50 weapons - less than half of their arsenals. Each of those weapons are capable of triggering a Hiroshima-size explosion, or about 15 kilotons' worth of TNT.</p><p>The model suggested those explosions would release of about 5 million tons of smoke into the air, triggering a decades-long nuclear winter.</p><p>The aftereffects of this hypothetical nuclear conflict would eliminate between 20% and 50% of the ozone layer over populated areas. At the same time, surface temperatures would become colder than they've been for at least 1,000 years.</p><p>The bombs in the researchers' scenario are about as powerful as the Little Boy nuclear weapon that was dropped on Hiroshima, which is enough to devastate a city. But that's far weaker than many weapons that exist today. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/north-korea-hydrogen-bomb-test-evidence-2017-9">The latest device North Korea tested</a> was estimated to be about 10 times as powerful as Little Boy. Meanwhile, the US and Russia each <a href="https://www.techinsider.io/how-nuclear-weapons-work-2016-1">possess weapons 1,000 times as powerful</a>.</p><p>Still, the number of weapons used is more important than strength, according to the calculations in this study. </p><h2>How firestorms would wreck the climate</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>Most of the smoke in the scenario the researchers considered would mostly come from firestorms that would tear through buildings, vehicles, fuel depots, vegetation, and more. This smoke would rise through the troposphere (the atmospheric zone closest to the ground), and particles would then get deposited in a higher-up layer called the stratosphere. From there, tiny black-carbon aerosols could spread around the globe.</p><p>"The lifetime of a smoke particle in the stratosphere is about five years. In the troposphere, the lifetime is one week," <a href="http://people.envsci.rutgers.edu/robock/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alan Robock</a>, a climate scientist at Rutgers University who worked on the study, told Business Insider. "So in the stratosphere, the lifetime of smoke particles is much longer, which gives it 50 times the impact."</p><p>The fine soot would cause temperatures in the stratosphere to skyrocket. Normally below freezing, the particles would lead the stratosphere to be dozens of degrees warmer than usual for five years. It would take two decades for conditions to fully return to normal.</p><p>This would cause ozone loss "on a scale never observed," according to the study. That ozone damage would consequently allow harmful amounts of ultraviolet radiation from the sun to reach the ground, hurting crops and humans, harming ocean plankton, and affecting vulnerable species all over the planet.</p><p>But it gets worse: Earth's ecosystems would also be threatened by suddenly colder temperatures.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>The fine black soot in the stratosphere would prevent some sun from reaching the ground. The researchers calculated that average temperatures around the world would drop by about 1.5 degrees Celsius over the five years following these simulated nuclear blasts.</p><p>In populated areas of North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, changes could be more extreme (as illustrated in the graphic above). Winters there would be about 2.5 degrees colder, and summers between 1 and 4 degrees colder, reducing critical growing seasons by between 10 and 40 days. Expanded sea ice would also prolong the cooling process, since ice reflects sunlight away. </p><p>"It'd be cold and dark and dry on the ground, and that'd affect plants," Robock said. "This is something everybody should be concerned about because of the potential global effects."</p><p><em><strong>Read more</strong>: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/what-can-kill-planet-earth-2016-3">8 horrifying ways the Earth could end</a></em></p><p>The change in ocean temperatures could devastate sea life and fisheries that much of the world relies on for food. Such sudden blows to the food supply and the potential "ensuing panic" could cause a "global nuclear famine," according to the study authors.</p><p> Temperatures wouldn't return to normal for more than 25 years.</p><h2>'It might be much worse than we thought before'</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>Robock is currently working on new models of nuclear-winter scenarios; his team was awarded a nearly <a href="https://www.openphilanthropy.org/focus/global-catastrophic-risks/miscellaneous/rutgers-university-nuclear-conflict-climate-modeling" target="_blank" rel="noopener">$3 million grant</a> from the Open Philanthropy Project to do so.</p><p>"You'd think the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies would fund this research, but they didn't and had no interest," he said.</p><p>Since his earlier modeling work, Robock noted, the potential impacts of a nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan have gotten worse. That's because India and Pakistan now have more nuclear weapons than they used to, and their cities have also grown. </p><p>"It's about five times worse than what we've previously calculated," he said.</p><p>Because of his intimate knowledge of the potential consequences, Robock advocates for the reduction of nuclear arsenals around the world. He believes Russia and the US - which has nearly 7,000 nuclear weapons - are in a unique position to lead the way.</p><p><em><strong>Read more</strong>: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nuclear-weapons-stockpiles-world-map-2017-8">About 14,525 nuclear weapons exist today in the arsenals of these 9 nations</a></em></p><p>"Why don't the US and Russia each get down to 200? That's a first step," Robock said. He added, "if President Trump wants the Nobel Peace Prize, he should get rid of land-based missiles, which are on hair-trigger alert, because we don't need them. That's how he'll get a peace prize - not by saying we have more than anyone else."</p><p><em>Kevin Loria contributed reporting to a previous version of this article. Alex Lockie also contributed to this post.</em></p>

If India and Pakistan have a 'limited' nuclear war, scientists say it could wreck Earth's climate and trigger global famine

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><ul class="summary-list"><li>Pakistan's prime minister recently <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pakistan-india-threat-war-kashmir-2019-9">threatened to go to war</a> with India over the disputed Kashmir region. Both nations are armed with nuclear weapons.</li><li>A new paper simulates what would happen if India and Pakistan entered into a nuclear war. </li><li>The results suggest that scenario could lead 125 million people to die. Earth's global temperature could drop by 5 degrees Celsius, which would cause major agricultural challenges.</li><li>The researchers estimate that the disaster could trigger a global famine.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Businessinsider.com for more stories</a>.</li></ul><p>Pakistan and India have fought three wars over Kashmir, a disputed territory to which both nations lay claim. Pakistan's prime minister, Imran Khan, recently suggested the countries could be headed toward another.</p><p>"There is a potential that two nuclear-armed countries will come face to face at some stage," Khan <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pakistan-india-threat-war-kashmir-2019-9">said at the United Nations annual summit</a> in September, referring to the Kashmir conflict.</p><p>Together, India and Pakistan possess 2% of the world's nuclear arsenal: India is estimated to have <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/global/2019/06/16/heres-how-many-nuclear-warheads-exist-and-which-countries-own-them/">around 140 nuclear warheads</a>, while Pakistan is estimated to have around 160. But they're <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-kashmir-pakistan-nuclear-factbo/factbox-india-and-pakistan-nuclear-arsenals-and-strategies-idUSKCN1QI4O5">in an arms race</a> to acquire more weapons.</p><p>By 2025, India and Pakistan could have expanded their arsenals to 250 warheads each, according to <a href="https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/10/eaay5478">a new paper</a> that predicts what might happen if the two nations entered into a nuclear war. </p><p>In that extreme scenario, the researchers write, a cloud of black soot could envelop the sky, causing temperatures to fall dramatically. Key agricultural hotspots would lose the ability to grow crops, triggering a global famine. </p><p>"It would be instant climate change," Alan Robock, an author of the study, told Business Insider. "Nothing like this in history, since civilization was developed, has happened."</p><p>His paper estimates that up to 125 million people could die. </p><h2>Nuclear weapons are becoming more powerful</h2><p>Robock said the situation outlined in the paper isn't likely, but it's possible. So to determine the hypothetical consequences of a nuclear war between Pakistan and India, the researchers sought the advice of military experts.</p><p>"We clearly don't want to burn cities and see what would happen," Robock said. "Most scientists have test tubes or accelerators. Nature is our laboratory, so we use models."</p><p><em><strong>Read more</strong>: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nuclear-disaster-dos-and-donts-2019-9">If a nuclear bomb is dropped on your city, here's what you should (and shouldn't) do to stay alive</a></em></p><p>The paper doesn't speculate as to which nation is more likely to initiate a conflict. But it estimates that if India wanted to destroy Pakistan's major cities, the nation would need to deploy around 150 nuclear weapons. The calculations assume that some of these weapons might miss their target or fail to explode, so the model is based on the explosion of 100 weapons in Pakistan.</p><p>If Pakistan attacked India's major cities, the researchers estimated, about 150 nuclear weapons would likely go off.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>If all of those bombs were 15-kiloton weapons - the size of the "Little Boy" atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan - the researchers predict that 50 million people would die.</p><p>But Robock said the US' nuclear weapons today are around 100 to 500 kilotons, so it's likely that India and Pakistan will have acquired more powerful weapons by 2025, the year in which his simulation takes place. If the nations were to use 100-kiloton weapons, the study suggests, that conflict could kill about 125 million people. </p><h2>A nuclear war between India and Pakistan could wreck Earth's climate</h2><p>Nuclear explosions produce sweltering heat. Structures catch on fire, and then winds either spread those flames or the fire draws in the surrounding air, creating an even larger blaze known as a firestorm.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>Either way, enormous amounts of smoke would enter the air, the researchers write. A small portion of this smoke would contain "black carbon," the sooty material that usually comes from the exhaust of a diesel engine. That substance would then get pumped through the troposphere (the lowest layer of Earth's atmosphere) and into the stratosphere. Within weeks, black carbon particles could spread across the globe.</p><p>It would be "the biggest injection of smoke into the stratosphere that we've ever seen," Robock said.</p><p>Smoke particles can <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/india-pakistan-kashmir-nuclear-weapons-climate-cooling-2019-2">linger in the stratosphere</a> for about five years and block out sunlight. In Robock's simulation, that could cause Earth's average temperature to drop by up to 5 degrees Celsius. Temperatures could get "as cold as the Ice Age," he said. With less energy from the sun, the world could also experience up to 30% less rain. </p><p>The researchers estimate that it would take more than a decade for temperatures and precipitation to return to normal. In the meantime, farmers around the world - especially in India, China, Southeast Asia, Indonesia, tropical South America, and Africa - would struggle to grow food.</p><p>Entire marine ecosystems could also be devastated, which would destroy local fishing economies.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div></p><p>In sum, the authors write, a nuclear war could trigger mass starvation across the globe.</p><p>"As horrible as the direct effects of nuclear weapons would be, the indirect effects on our food supply would be much worse," Robock said. </p><p>This isn't the first time Robock has modeled this type of scenario: In 2014, he <a href="https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2013EF000205">contributed to a paper</a> that predicted what would happen if <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/india-pakistan-kashmir-nuclear-weapons-climate-cooling-2019-2">India and Pakistan deployed 50 weapons apiece</a>, each with the strength of a "Little Boy" atomic bomb.</p><p>Even that "limited" nuclear-war scenario, he found, would cripple the ozone layer, expose people to harmful amounts of ultraviolet radiation, and lower Earth's surface temperatures for more than 25 years. But those explosions wouldn't release nearly as much black carbon as the scenario in the newer model, so the cooling effect wouldn't be as severe. </p><h2>'We've been really lucky'</h2><p>Robock said this type of global climate catastrophe has happened before, but has never been created by humans. He compared the nuclear conflict modeled in the recent paper to the asteroid crash that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/timeline-consequences-of-dinosaur-killing-asteroid-2019-9">triggered the extinction of dinosaurs</a> 66 million years ago. That explosion released billions of tons of sulfur into the atmosphere, causing global temperatures to plummet.</p><p>Robock emphasized that unlike that disaster, nuclear war is preventable. </p><p>"There are all kinds of ways that something like this could happen, but if nuclear weapons didn't exist, then it wouldn't produce a nuclear war," he said.</p><p>A key takeaway of the paper, he said, is that when nations threaten to nuke one another, they threaten their own safety, too. A nuclear war between two countries would "affect everybody in the world, not just where the bombs were dropped," he added. </p><p>"We've been really lucky for the last 74 years" since Hiroshima, Robock said. "Our luck might run out sometime."</p>

If India and Pakistan have a nuclear war, scientists say it could trigger Ice-Age temperatures, cause global famine, and kill 125 million people

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Climate change is expanding the earth's lower atmosphere and it's not a good sign

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If India and Pakistan have a 'limited' nuclear war, scientists say it could wreck Earth's climate and trigger global famine

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If India and Pakistan have a nuclear war, scientists say it could trigger Ice-Age temperatures, cause global famine, and kill 125 million people

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