2.2.2 Climate change and the incidence and severity of extreme weather events
Content
- Geographic inquiry and concept(s)
- The effects of global climate change on places, societies and environmental systems
- Geographic knowledge and understanding
- Climate change and the hydrosphere, atmosphere and biosphere, including: incidence and severity of extreme weather events, including drought
- Case study or detailed examples
- Neither required by the syllabus
- Aims of this lesson.
- To understand how climate change impacts the incidence and severity of extreme weather events, including drought.
Base knowledge and understanding
News article
‘Forcing a reckoning’: How Asia is preparing for a ‘supersized’ El Niño
From Sri Lanka to South Korea, governments are preparing for droughts, wildfires, typhoons and floods – with climate plans facing their biggest challenge to date
The Guardian · 17 September 2026
Key terms
- Drought
- A prolonged and abnormal deficiency in precipitation relative to the statistical multi-year average for a particular region, leading to water scarcity, reduced soil moisture, and adverse impacts on ecosystems, agriculture, and human activities.
- Extreme weather event
- An occurrence of a weather or climate variable that significantly deviates from historical norms, reaching values at the extreme ends of what has been previously recorded.
- Incidence
- Frequency or rate of occurrence of an event.
- Severity
- The degree of damage and disruption caused by an event.
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Review
- Explain how deforestation reduces the biosphere's ability to act as a carbon sink. [2]
- Outline one way in which rising ocean temperatures affect the capacity of oceans to store carbon. [2]