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Updated March 27th, 2020 at 22:55 IST

Scientists claim 'Coronavirus will not reduce global warming', inspite of pollution drop

Scientists have recently revealed that the dip in vehicular traffic in major urban cities due to COVID-19 will not 'make a dent in the Climate change issue'

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With several major countries under lockdown due to the spread of the pandemic Coronavirus (COVID-19), the pollution in several major urban cities like Delhi, London, New York has seen a significant dip in pollution levels. Though UN environmental chief said that COVID-19 was a sign from nature on global warming, scientists have recently revealed that the dip in vehicular traffic due to COVID-19 will not 'make a dent in the Climate change issue'. Currently, several major countries like Italy, Spain, France, Germany, UK, Austria, Belgium, India, and Portugal have issued nation-wide lockdown to deal with the pandemic.

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'Coronavirus Won’t Make A Dent In The Climate Problem': Scientists

Scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder have claimed that the rising atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, which is at its highest levels in at least 800,000 years, have not slowed down despite the wide-scale shutdown of cities, extreme social distancing measures and a drastic reduction in transportation usage. "This is not anyone’s idea of a solution to the climate crisis," said Climate scientist Kristopher Karnauskas. He added that for slowing down the rise in CO2, there must be big societal changes while accepting that there may be slowing down of rising CO2 numbers in the atmosphere in the next months if the shutdown continues.

Explaining the effect of China's shutdown due to COVID-19, Director Ralph Keeling at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography stated that there might be a slight slowdown in February and March in CO2 rise, but nothing extreme or beyond what could have happened naturally. On the other hand, he said that with the $2 trillion stimulus package pumped by US Congress, there will boost carbon emissions, as the industrialized world largely runs on fossil fuels. "There’s going to be some kind of rebound," said Karnauskas adding, "They’re going to work double-time to make up for it".

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Coronavirus Crisis

First originated in Wuhan, China, the Coronavirus has already seen globally over 565,009 cases with 25,410 deaths. While the initial epicenter was the Wuhan province, it soon shifted to Europe which has seen massive deaths in UK, Spain, Italy - with major leaders like UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Spanish deputy Prime Minister Carmen Calvo testing positive. Currently, the US has overtaken China in the number of positive cases and has emerged as the epicenter of the pandemic with 92,206 cases and 1371 deaths - no countrywide shutdown has been declared as of date in the US.

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Published March 27th, 2020 at 22:55 IST

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