{"id":24885,"date":"2024-03-25T11:59:14","date_gmt":"2024-03-25T06:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/?p=24885"},"modified":"2024-03-25T11:59:20","modified_gmt":"2024-03-25T06:14:20","slug":"a-new-way-to-quantify-climate-change-impacts-outdoor-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/a-new-way-to-quantify-climate-change-impacts-outdoor-days\/","title":{"rendered":"A new way to quantify climate change impacts: \u201cOutdoor days\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This measure, developed by MIT researchers, reflects direct effects on people\u2019s quality of life \u2014 and reveals significant global disparities.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n

By David Chandler<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — For most people, reading about the difference between a global average temperature rise of 1.5 C versus 2 C doesn\u2019t conjure up a clear image of how their daily lives will actually be affected. So, researchers at MIT have come up with a different way of measuring and describing what global climate change patterns, in specific regions around the world, will mean for people\u2019s daily activities and their quality of life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new measure, called \u201coutdoor days,\u201d describes the number of days per year that outdoor temperatures are neither too hot nor too cold for people to go about normal outdoor activities, whether work or leisure, in reasonable comfort. Describing the impact of rising temperatures in those terms reveals some significant global disparities, the researchers say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The findings are described in a research paper<\/a> written by MIT professor of civil and environmental engineering Elfatih Eltahir and postdocs Yeon-Woo Choi and Muhammad Khalifa, and published in the Journal of Climate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eltahir says he got the idea for this new system during his hourlong daily walks in the Boston area. \u201cThat\u2019s how I interface with the temperature every day,\u201d he says. He found that there have been more winter days recently when he could walk comfortably than in past years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Originally from Sudan, he says that when he returned there for visits, the opposite was the case: In winter, the weather tends to be relatively comfortable, but the number of these clement winter days has been declining. \u201cThere are fewer days that are really suitable for outdoor activity,\u201d Eltahir says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather than predefine what constitutes an acceptable outdoor day, Eltahir and his co-authors created a website<\/a> where users can set their own definition of the highest and lowest temperatures they consider comfortable for their outside activities, then click on a country within a world map, or a state within the U.S., and get a forecast of how the number of days meeting those criteria will change between now and the end of this century. The website is freely available for anyone to use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is actually a new feature that\u2019s quite innovative,\u201d he says. \u201cWe don\u2019t tell people what an outdoor day should be; we let the user define an outdoor day. Hence, we invite them to participate in defining how future climate change will impact their quality of life, and hopefully, this will facilitate a deeper understanding of how climate change will impact individuals directly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After deciding that this was a way of looking at the issue of climate change that might be useful, Eltahir says, \u201cWe started looking at the data on this, and we made several discoveries that I think are pretty significant.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First of all, there will be winners and losers, and the losers tend to be concentrated in the global south. \u201cIn the North, in a place like Russia or Canada, you gain a significant number of outdoor days. And when you go south to places like Bangladesh or Sudan, it\u2019s bad news. You get significantly fewer outdoor days. It is very striking.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To derive the data, the software developed by the team uses all of the available climate models, about 50 of them, and provides output showing all of those projections on a single graph to make clear the range of possibilities, as well as the average forecast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we think of climate change, Eltahir says, we tend to look at maps that show that virtually everywhere, temperatures will rise. \u201cBut if you think in terms of outdoor days, you see that the world is not flat. The North is gaining; the South is losing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While North-South disparity in exposure and vulnerability has been broadly recognized in the past, he says, this way of quantifying the effects on the hazard (change in weather patterns) helps to bring home how strong the uneven risks from climate change on quality of life will be. \u201cWhen you look at places like Bangladesh, Colombia, Ivory Coast, Sudan, Indonesia \u2014 they are all losing outdoor days.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The same kind of disparity shows up in Europe, he says. The effects are already being felt, and are showing up in travel patterns: \u201cThere is a shift to people spending time in northern European states. They go to Sweden and places like that instead of the Mediterranean, which is showing a significant drop,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Placing this kind of detailed and localized information at people\u2019s fingertips, he says, \u201cI think brings the issue of communication of climate change to a different level.\u201d With this tool, instead of looking at global averages, \u201cwe are saying according to your own definition of what a pleasant day is, [this is] how climate change is going to impact you, your activities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, he adds, \u201chopefully that will help society make decisions about what to do with this global challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The project received support from the MIT Climate Grand Challenges project and the Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For most people, reading about the difference between a global average temperature rise of 1.5 C versus 2 C doesn\u2019t conjure up a clear image of how their daily lives will actually be affected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24886,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment","category-research"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",900,599,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-200x200.jpg",200,200,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-601x400.jpg",601,400,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-768x511.jpg",750,499,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-675x449.jpg",675,449,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",900,599,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",900,599,false],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",900,599,false],"ultp_layout_landscape":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-870x570.jpg",870,570,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-600x599.jpg",600,599,true],"ultp_layout_square":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-600x599.jpg",600,599,true],"newspaper-x-single-post":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-760x490.jpg",760,490,true],"newspaper-x-recent-post-big":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-550x360.jpg",550,360,true],"newspaper-x-recent-post-list-image":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0-95x65.jpg",95,65,true],"web-stories-poster-portrait":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",640,426,false],"web-stories-publisher-logo":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",96,64,false],"web-stories-thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/MIT_Outdoor-Days-01_0.jpg",150,100,false]},"author_info":{"info":["By David Chandler"]},"category_info":"Environment<\/a> Research<\/a>","tag_info":"Research","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24885"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24885\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24887,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24885\/revisions\/24887"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.revoscience.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}