The World Meteorological Organization on Friday warned that the trend of rise in sea levels globally would continue after the pace of increase has more than doubled from what it was during 1993-2002 and now hit a new record high last year.

Global mean sea level continued to rise in 2022, reaching a new record high for the satellite altimeter record (1993–2022). The rate of global mean sea level rise has doubled to 4.62 mm per year during 2013–2022 from 2.27 mm per year in 1993–2002, WMO said releasing its “State of Global Climate 2022” report.

“We have already lost this melting of glaciers game and sea level rise game, so that’s bad news,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said at a press conference webcast live. Waters would continue to rise for “thousands of years” because of high levels of greenhouse gases, he added.

On Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), which has a direct relation with good or bad monsoon, the UN weather body said that the positive phase of the IOD is characterised by below-average sea surface temperature (SST) in the eastern Indian Ocean and above average SSTs in the west. The negative phase has the opposite pattern. “The resulting change in the gradient of SST across the ocean basin affects the weather of the surrounding continents, primarily in the southern hemisphere. Positive IOD events are often, but not always, associated with El Niño and negative events with La Niña,” it said.

Negative IOD

For the second consecutive year, a negative IOD developed during austral winter. In combination with La Niña, this phase contributed to wet conditions across much of Australia in late austral winter and spring in 2022. It was the wettest spring and wettest October on record for New South Wales and Victoria, and the second-wettest spring nationally after 2010.

Major flooding affected multiple regions in the spring, particularly across large areas of eastern Australia. The negative IOD returned to neutral as austral summer began. As previously mentioned, the negative IOD, in combination with La Niña, contributed to the ongoing dry conditions in eastern Africa.

The WMO report mentioned grain (wheat) yields in India were reduced by the extreme heat in 2022 and there were a number of forest fires, particularly in Uttarakhand. It further said the pre-monsoon period was exceptionally hot in both India and Pakistan.

There was also significant flooding in India at various stages during the monsoon season last year, particularly in the North-east during June, with over 700 deaths reported during the season from flooding and landslides, and a further 900 deaths from lightning, it said.

The UN agency said the Indian Monsoon onset was earlier than normal and the withdrawal later than normal in 2022. The majority of the Indian subcontinent was wetter than average and the monsoon extended farther westward than usual towards Pakistan.