New Delhi, Jan 13 (India Science Wire): In a recently published study in the journal
Nature Scientific Reports, it is estimated that there would be a decline of 35% in work
performance in the east coast region of India by 2100 due to heat stress caused by
extreme heat and humidity. This would be extended to most of the other regions of the
country due to increasing anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations and other
climate change related factors.
The research published in Nature Scientific Reports, December 2020 says that
excessive heat stress increases core human body temperature rapidly with damaging
effects on the brain and other vital organs that lead to a decline in the physical work
capacity of the workers. Heat stress is manifested by a range of health conditions like
milder heat rash and heat cramps to heat exhaustion. These are linked to occupational
health hazards depending on the nature of work that adversely affects productivity.
There are studies reporting heat stress where only temperature data are taken
into consideration without considering the effects of humidity. The present study has
however included humidity also as a key factor responsible for human discomfort and
therefore integrated it into the research model to arrive at the heat stress index data.
"As the duration and intensity of hot days will increase in future, while assessing
the severity of the situation in the two coastal regions of India (east and west coast),
heat stress index over India needs utmost attention to analyze to arrive at conclusions
on the future changes and their effect on productivity of the work force," said
researchers K. Koteswara Rao, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune and T.V.
Lakshmi Kumar, Atmospheric Science Research Laboratory, SRM Institute of Science
and Technology, Tamil Nadia, India.
Researchers estimated that the impacts of the notorious change in climate would
affect 250 million people living within the coastline area of the country. This is posing a
big threat to the livelihood of the coastal communities due to the decline in their work
performance as a result of the harsh environment.
Researchers, therefore, suggested the policymakers to take actions for the
protection of the workers from heat stress by preventing exposure to extreme heat in a
working environment and reduce illnesses caused by heat stress. This would help to
sustain work performance by limiting health hazards. The result of the research showed
that compared to the west coast, the east coast would be prone to more heat stress by
2100. Scientists observed a significant rise in the maximum temperature on both west
and east coast with a diurnal temperature range of 1-2 degrees C for the periods 1951
to 2010, which might contribute to the higher loads of heat stress over these areas.
Figure 1. Projected changes in four categories of summertime heat stress days (%) under
MEDIUM emission scenario for the three time epochs of 2016–2035 (left column), 2046–2065
(middle column) and 2080–2099 (right column) with respect to 1986–2005.
Figure 2. Projected changes in four categories of summertime heat stress days (%) under HIGH
emission scenario for the three time epochs of 2016–2035 (left column), 2046–2065 (middle
column) and 2080–2099 (right column) with respect to 1986–2005.
The study tried to correlate how the combined extremes of heat and humidity
work in warming the Earth. The researchers used 1986 to 2005 as the baseline period
during the summertime for arriving at statistical conclusions on rare events for three
time slices extending from 2016-2035, 2046-2065 and 2080-2099 under different
emission scenarios. The study projected heat stress by focusing on heat extremes,
Projected changes in four categories of summertime heat stress days (%) under
MEDIUM emission scenario (RCP4.5) for the three time epochs of 2016–2035 (left
column), 2046–2065 (middle column) and 2080–2099 (right column) with respect to
1986–2005
humidity and infrared radiation etc. which are associated with the decline in work
performance over India in the present and future climate.
The research authors claimed that their work would facilitate policymakers to
design better policy tools for taking necessary steps for the welfare of the working
people and to protect them from increased heat stress under changing climate
conditions.
The study led by Rao K.K. the research team comprised of Kulkarni A.,
Patwardhan S., Dandi A.R., and Sabade S. of Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology,
Ministry of Earth Sciences, Pune, Kumar T.V.L. of Atmospheric Science Research
Laboratory, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Tamil Nadu, Desamsetti S. of
National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting, Ministry of Earth Sciences,
Noida, Mahendranath B. of Department of Meteorology & Oceanography, Andhra
University, Visakhapatnam, Chang Hoi Ho of Seoul National University, Seoul, South
Korea, and Barbosa H. of Universiadade Federal de Alogoas, UFAL, Maceió, Brazil.
(India Science Wire)