Environment
A Sixth of the World's Species Could Risk Extinction From Global Warming
Losses will accelerate the hotter the planet gets, according to new research.
As the planet continues to warm up like a Turkish bath, how many kinds of animals can we expect to perish?
Scientists have estimated a loss of anywhere from 0 to 54 percent of all species, according to Mark Urban, a biologist at the University of Connecticut. That's an astoundingly broad range, and not really helpful for preparing conservation strategies. So Urban did a meta-analysis of more than a hundred biodiversity studies and tightened the boundaries. In a new paper in Science, he reports that climate-induced extinctions could fall upon as little as 2.8 percent or as much as 16 percent of species.