The climate crisis risks pushing many Americans into entirely new climate realities, with a new analysis finding that by the end of the century, 16 American cities are at risk of experiencing summer temperatures equal to those of the ‘Middle East.
Heat waves have hit large areas of the United States this summer, putting nearly a third of the population under some form of heat advisory and driving temperatures as high as 115 F (46 C) in parts of the Great Plains. Hundreds of heat records have fallen, from Boston, Massachusetts, which reached 100F (37C), to Portland, Oregon, which reached 102F (38.9C) on Tuesday.
But global warming may plunge many places in the US into the kind of extreme heat once thought unthinkable, changing their long-term climates to conditions that are now common in places much further south, or even in the foreigner
An analysis of temperature trends by Climate Central found that summer temperatures by 2100 for many cities will be more similar to conditions further south, 437 miles south on average, with Washington DC having summers more like Austin, Texas; Boston is more like Philadelphia; and Billings, Montana, similar to El Paso, Texas.
Map of four US cities, with lines connecting them to cities in the Middle East.
Some American cities could be changed to the kind of climates that cities in other countries now experience, such as Los Angeles, which is more like Tuxpan in Mexico. A select few can take an epic turn-of-the-century climate trip, with Austin summers becoming like present-day Dubai, Phoenix resembling Saudi Arabia, and Las Vegas resembling Kuwait.
“The real risks will be in heat waves that are now occasional extremes that will start to last longer,” said Peter Girard, a spokesman for Climate Central, a research organization made up of climate scientists and science communicators. “These kinds of heat waves are going to become normal and the dangers are going to be much more present. There are going to be people who have never needed air conditioning who are going to be dealing with this. It can quickly go from uncomfortable to dangerous.”
The researchers gathered temperature data from 1990 to 2020 to establish today’s “normal” temperature and analyzed 20 different projections of temperatures for this century under different climate change scenarios. They decided to compare the status quo with a scenario in which global warming emissions are not radically reduced and the global average temperature rises by about 3.6°C by the end of the century.
List of 16 US cities and Middle Eastern cities with summer temperatures that could be similar in 2100.
The world has already warmed by about 1.2 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times, a situation that has already helped spur the kind of ferocious heat waves and wildfires recently experienced in the US and Europe. “Extreme heat is a silent killer, but it affects more Americans than any other weather emergency, especially our nation’s most vulnerable,” said Gina McCarthy, White House National Climate Advisor.
Many analysts expect the temperature rise to be restricted below 3.6C, due to the growing use of renewable energy, but Girard said even lower levels of warming will prompt changes in the rules climates of North American cities.
“No matter the scenario, this is going to be a short-term challenge pretty much everywhere,” he said. “Reducing emissions will slow the temperature rise and give governments and cities more time to take action to keep people safe.”