Scientists make concerning discovery after analyzing bottom of the ocean: 'A stronger impact ... than we are currently taking into account'

We all know that the Earth is getting hotter — but new research indicates that it may be warming even faster than scientists had predicted.

What's happening?

Scientists from NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research analyzed sediment from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean for the study, which was published in the journal Nature Communications and reported by SciTechDaily. The researchers used a newly developed method to derive past atmospheric carbon dioxide content and compare CO₂ levels in a single location over the past 15 million years.

Their results indicated that doubling atmospheric CO₂ levels would increase the planet's average temperature by 13 to 25.2 degrees Fahrenheit.

"The temperature rise we found is much larger than the 2.3 to 4.5 degrees Celsius (4.1 to 8.1 degrees Fahrenheit) that the U.N. climate panel, [the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change], has been estimating so far," said the study's first author, Caitlyn Witkowski.

Why are CO2 levels so important?

Scientists have already drawn a correlation between the amount of CO₂ we release into the atmosphere and the amount of planetary overheating we experience. This new research makes the correlation clearer than ever.

"This research gives us a glimpse of what the future could hold if we take too few measures to reduce CO₂ emissions and also implement few technological innovations to offset emissions," said another of the study's authors, Professor Jaap Sinninghe Damsté, a senior scientist at NIOZ and professor of organic geochemistry at Utrecht University.

"The clear warning from this research is: CO₂ concentration is likely to have a stronger impact on temperature than we are currently taking into account," Damsté added.

Global overheating is leading to, among other things, the melting of glaciers, which is causing ocean levels to rise and coastal communities to flood; various changes to the climate that are causing more frequent and intense extreme weather events; the spread of infectious diseases; crops becoming ungrowable in many previously hospitable climates; and heat-related deaths.

What's being done about rising global temperatures?

Several industries are responsible for releasing massive amounts of CO₂ into the atmosphere — chief among them is the dirty energy industry, which releases huge quantities of carbon dioxide whenever its oil and methane gases are burned.

To prevent catastrophic planetary overheating, we must leave these energy sources of the past behind and switch instead to clean, renewable energy sources such as wind and solar.

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