<p>New Delhi: The relatively lower rise in temperatures across India compared to the average global temperature increase could be due to high aerosol concentrations and irrigation, according to a new study.</p><p>While India's land mass has seen a temperature rise of 0.88 degrees Celsius between 1980 and 1990 and 2014-2025, the global land temperature has increased by about 1.4 degrees Celsius over the same period, the paper stated.</p><p>The study, 'Critical Perspectives On Extreme Heat in India', was published by the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability at Harvard University and released on Monday.</p>.India’s climate reality: Unequal heat exposes deep social divide.<p>It addresses issues that came up during an interdisciplinary conference in Delhi last year titled "India 2047: Building a Climate-Resilient Future," organised by Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability, the Lakshmi Mittal and Family South Asia Institute, and India's Environment Ministry.</p><p>The analysis highlighted that winter daytime temperatures in northern India show weaker warming than the national average, and in some areas a distinct cooling trend can be observed, especially in January.</p><p>October, November, and December also show less warming over northern India than the national average.</p><p>This could be because of two reasons.</p><p>One, due to aerosols, which refer to all kinds of particles suspended in the atmosphere, and are emitted from crop-residue burning, industry, traffic, and cooking.</p><p>Aerosols scatter sunlight back, so that the land absorbs less heat. They also affect cloud formation, and clouds, in turn, impact how much sunlight is reflected or absorbed.</p><p>As a result, aerosols can cool temperatures during the daytime, according to the study.</p><p>Two, northern India is heavily irrigated, which helps cool the near-surface air through evapotranspiration -- combined processes that move water from the Earth's surface into the atmosphere.</p><p>The study noted that both aerosol concentration and irrigation intensity could fall in the following years, leading to accelerated warming over northern India.</p><p>While aerosol concentration may decline under a clean-air policy, irrigation intensity could drop due to reduced groundwater availability.</p><p>"The combination of continued greenhouse gas accumulation and weakening of transient suppression from aerosols and irrigation creates conditions in which warming over the Indo-Gangetic Plain could accelerate relative to the rates observed since 1980," the study mentioned.</p>
<p>New Delhi: The relatively lower rise in temperatures across India compared to the average global temperature increase could be due to high aerosol concentrations and irrigation, according to a new study.</p><p>While India's land mass has seen a temperature rise of 0.88 degrees Celsius between 1980 and 1990 and 2014-2025, the global land temperature has increased by about 1.4 degrees Celsius over the same period, the paper stated.</p><p>The study, 'Critical Perspectives On Extreme Heat in India', was published by the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability at Harvard University and released on Monday.</p>.India’s climate reality: Unequal heat exposes deep social divide.<p>It addresses issues that came up during an interdisciplinary conference in Delhi last year titled "India 2047: Building a Climate-Resilient Future," organised by Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability, the Lakshmi Mittal and Family South Asia Institute, and India's Environment Ministry.</p><p>The analysis highlighted that winter daytime temperatures in northern India show weaker warming than the national average, and in some areas a distinct cooling trend can be observed, especially in January.</p><p>October, November, and December also show less warming over northern India than the national average.</p><p>This could be because of two reasons.</p><p>One, due to aerosols, which refer to all kinds of particles suspended in the atmosphere, and are emitted from crop-residue burning, industry, traffic, and cooking.</p><p>Aerosols scatter sunlight back, so that the land absorbs less heat. They also affect cloud formation, and clouds, in turn, impact how much sunlight is reflected or absorbed.</p><p>As a result, aerosols can cool temperatures during the daytime, according to the study.</p><p>Two, northern India is heavily irrigated, which helps cool the near-surface air through evapotranspiration -- combined processes that move water from the Earth's surface into the atmosphere.</p><p>The study noted that both aerosol concentration and irrigation intensity could fall in the following years, leading to accelerated warming over northern India.</p><p>While aerosol concentration may decline under a clean-air policy, irrigation intensity could drop due to reduced groundwater availability.</p><p>"The combination of continued greenhouse gas accumulation and weakening of transient suppression from aerosols and irrigation creates conditions in which warming over the Indo-Gangetic Plain could accelerate relative to the rates observed since 1980," the study mentioned.</p>