Kathmandu, Sep 17: Nepal plans to seek around $20 million from a United Nations fund for climate-related losses and damage, using a new study that links human-induced climate change to the deadly floods that struck the Nepal-Tibet border last month.
The World Weather Attribution (WWA) study, released on Thursday, said climate change was likely a contributing factor in the rock-and-ice avalanche that triggered the devastating floods. The disaster has killed around 1,400 people in Nepal, while 6,150 remain missing, according to official data as of Wednesday.
Scientists said the floods were triggered by the collapse of a rock wall and glacier ice near Langtang Lirung in the Himalayas. The study described the disaster as a “compound event” involving rising temperatures, thinning glaciers, thawing permafrost and existing geological weaknesses.
Temperatures in the region during July and August were around 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer due to human influence on the climate, while glaciers have been thinning by about half a metre a year, potentially increasing instability.
Heavy snowfall in October and November also contributed to a large amount of meltwater earlier this year, the study said. It noted that climate change was not the only cause of the disaster but acted as a “destabilising factor” on pre-existing geological vulnerabilities.
“There was absolutely no doubt that human-induced climate change played a role here in the preconditioning of the disaster,” said Dr Friederike Otto, an Imperial College London climatologist and co-author of the study.
Nepalese officials have been preparing satellite and drone images, along with preliminary reports, to substantiate their request to the UN Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage.
“The report will be the main basis of our claim as it has detailed what role climate has played in this disaster,” said Maheshwar Dhakal, spokesperson for Nepal’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forest and Environment.
Nepal’s leaders have estimated that around $5 billion will be needed for reconstruction following the floods and landslides.
Nearly 120 countries have already submitted claims to the UN fund, with requests totalling almost $3 billion, while the fund reportedly has less than $400 million available for disbursement.
Officials overseeing the fund are due to meet in December to consider claims and whether an urgent decision should be taken on Nepal’s request.
Nepal has repeatedly called for greater global action on climate change, stressing that it contributes relatively little to greenhouse gas emissions but remains highly vulnerable to the effects of global warming.
Prime Minister Balendra Shah is expected to raise the recent disaster and climate justice at the UN General Assembly in New York next week.
Climate adaptation specialist Danya Liu said Nepal’s use of the term “compensation” for recovery funds pointed towards a different approach to financing climate-related losses.
“The distinction points toward a polluter-pays model, rather than one in which affected countries shoulder most of the cost and rely on aid to fill the gaps,” Liu said.
The WWA report has not been published in a peer-reviewed journal, although the organisation says its studies use a peer-reviewed methodology. Experts have welcomed the findings while cautioning that more research is needed.
Dr Simon Cook, a glacier expert at the University of Dundee, said the report provided “some strong evidence that climate change was a key factor”, but added that researchers were “not yet at a point of being able to say exactly how this happened”.
“There remains much to learn about the processes involved… and what we can do to monitor these high-mountain regions to provide early warnings of such events in the future,” Cook said.
