- 10 months ago
- #considerthis
2025 will be remembered as a year when climate extremes turned from risk to reality across Southeast Asia. Monsoon rains supercharged by warmer oceans have triggered catastrophic floods and landslides, while rare storm formations have tested preparedness and resilience. On this episode of #ConsiderThis Melisa Idris speaks with Professor Emeritus Dr Fredolin Tangang, Emeritus Professor of Climatology and Climate Change at UKM, Fellow of the Academy of Sciences Malaysia, and is currently serving at Universiti Brunei Darussalam. He is a former Vice-Chair of Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change.
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00:00Hello and good evening. I'm Melissa Idris. Welcome to Consider This. This is the show
00:15where we want you to consider and then reconsider what you know of the news of the day. 2025 will
00:20be remembered as a year when climate extremes turned from risk to reality across South Asia
00:29and Southeast Asia. Monsoon rains supercharged by warmer oceans have triggered catastrophic
00:35floods and landslides as well as rare storm formations testing our preparedness and resilience.
00:43So scientists have described some of these events as quote the new alarming reality rather than
00:49typical climate variability. So today on the show we're going to sit down with one of the world's
00:55leading climate scientists to take stock of what these events are telling us about our climate
01:01today. So joining me on the show is Professor Emeritus Dr. Fredlin Tengeng, who is an Emeritus
01:08Professor of Climatology and Climate Change at UKM, a fellow of the Academy of Sciences Malaysia
01:13and he is currently serving at University Brunei Darussalam. He is a former vice chair of Working
01:20Group Group 1 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is better known by its
01:25acronym IPCC. It is a UN body, United Nations body, created to assess the science related to climate
01:36change. Welcome to the show, Prof. It's good of you to join me today. I'm hoping we could take stock of
01:422025. So let's start with a review of the year. If you were to, from a climatologist perspective,
01:49assess the year of 2025, how would you characterize it for us?
01:55Well, thank you, Melissa. Thank you for having me. Consider it sounds like a very interesting
02:04program. I have been in many Astrawani programs, but this is the first time indeed. Yeah, it's good
02:14to discuss this. Yes, it's good for us to consider this. Yes, you know, when we talking about, you know,
02:23climate, the scientific aspect of climate, this is, this is like, you know, it's not like an everyday
02:29conversation of, you know, men on the streets. This is something like, you know, a university course,
02:36university module that you're taking, you know, under geography or under, you know, ocean sciences
02:43or under atmospheric science. But today we have opportunity to discuss this, you know. Yeah, 2025,
02:51yeah, I would say after the disasters that we have experienced, especially in Sumatra, in
03:02in Hat Nyai, southern part of Thailand, as well as in Vietnam. And, you know, if we go back the last,
03:12you know, the rest of 2025, actually, you know, if you look at, you know, the number of typhoon
03:18that we had in the Philippines, you know, typically they had, you know, around 20 typhoons a year.
03:27But this year, this is way more than that. So, you know, judging from this condition that we have
03:44experienced this year, I would say 2025 is rather unusual, unprecedented maybe. And I haven't mentioned
03:53about, we have also, you know, a couple of phenomenons kind of occurring at the same time,
04:01compounding what we, you know, disaster that we experienced this year. First, we have
04:10La Nina, you know, you know, whenever we have La Nina, this is a phenomenon that associate
04:19with the cooling of the Sisyphus temperature in the Pacific Ocean, but it is also causing the wind to
04:26strengthen, the wind that blowing from the ocean to our region, bringing all the moisture and warm
04:32waters. But at the same time, also, we do have this so-called negative, negative phase of the
04:39Indian Ocean Dipole. This is like La Nina of the Indian Ocean. And it's the fact, it's almost the same,
04:46which is blowing the moisture into our region. So, you know, if you can, if you can imagine
04:53Southeast Asia, on our right, you know, looking northward, on our right, Pacific Ocean, you know,
05:00you're getting a lot of moisture, you know, from Indian Ocean, you're also getting a lot of moisture.
05:06This is actually kind of fuel to the extreme condition that we're experiencing.
05:11Prof. So, when you say some of the weather events in 2025 have been unusual, unprecedented,
05:19how much of it can be explained by the weather variabilities like La Nina, like the negative phase?
05:27How much of that is weather climate variability? How much of that is climate change?
05:35Prof. How do we think this through?
05:38Prof. Well, you cut me off there.
05:40Prof. Oh, I'm so sorry. Please finish your thought.
05:42Prof. There is, you know, something that I haven't mentioned. In addition to that, because
05:47we have, we do have during that, you know, chaotic weather that we had in the last couple
05:53of weeks, we had cold surges as well.
05:56Prof. Coal surges?
05:56Prof. So, cold surges is really pulses of strong winds from the Siberian area, from the Asia
06:04continent. This is typical kind of, you know, phenomenon during North East Monsoon, where you
06:13have the strengthening of the pressure system over Siberia, and then this will push the cold
06:19air. But I would say, you know, what we had, you know, that causing rainfall over Adnyai and
06:29also northern part of Malaysia at that time, consider the first wave of this, you know, rather
06:37very strong. And, you know, so, but every year we do have around five to six episodes. So far,
06:46we had two during the Northeast monsoon, you know. So, you know, you have cold surges, you have
06:53La Nina, you have Indian Ocean Dipole, but on the background, we do have warming, you know,
07:02that continue year after year because of global warming.
07:04Okay.
07:05So, according to the IPCC, that's, you know, you mentioned this Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
07:13Change. Since 1990, since early 1970s, okay, since early 1970s, the earth climate system has been
07:25in the so-called relative imbalance. Meaning that it absorbing the heat from the solar radiation
07:33continuously, of course. That's what the climate system does. But in the normal way, it also
07:39balance out by, you know, releasing the top of the atmosphere into the outer space. But because
07:45of greenhouse gases getting more and more. So, since 1990, you know, 1970s, early 1970s, you have
07:55this so-called relative imbalance. Meaning that what's coming in is almost the same year
07:59after year, but what's going out becoming less and less. So, it means the climate system
08:04is trapping more heat. And 90, more than 90% of this additional heat basically absorbed by
08:12the ocean. So, the ocean is getting warmer and warmer, you know. So, this is the thing. And
08:19especially in Southeast Asian seas, where, you know, the sea is rather shallow. So, you know,
08:27compared to the, let's say, Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean, you know, deeper. So, some of the
08:33seeds, you know, distributed downward. But in the shallow sea, like, you know, in the sea
08:42surrounding, you know, within and surrounding Southeast Asia is relatively shallow. So, the heat
08:50stays within the, you know. So, you know, 2025 is rather, as I said, unprecedented maybe because
08:59of you have this natural climate variability. But in the background of it, you do have this
09:05global warming, climate change that perhaps, you know, you see this kind of unprecedented
09:12weather is becoming more and more frequent in the future.
09:15Hmm. On that note, Professor, how do we then think, at what point does a sequence of unprecedented
09:23weather events become more than just anomalies? And at what point does it start being a signal,
09:32a climate signal to us? Well, you know, we are talking about 2025. Last year, 2024, was declared
09:43as the warmest year on record. In fact, the global mean temperature has reached 1.55 degrees C above
09:53pre-industrial level. And this is the first time, you know, the earth temperature, the global
10:01mean temperature basically exceeded the so-called 1.5 degree, which is the threshold of this
10:07Paris Agreement that the world is trying to keep below. There is a reason for this, because
10:13if you exceeded this, and then, you know, the impact to all kind of human system as well
10:20as, you know, you know, ecosystem will becoming more and more if you exceeded this. And of course,
10:27you know, when we are talking about impact, it's not just rainfall, it's not just flooding. You
10:32also have the sea level rise. And, you know, earlier I mentioned that more than 90% of this
10:40excess heat actually absorbed by the ocean. And there is a reason for this, of course. And because
10:49of this, this so-called thermal expansion, it also causing the, the ocean to expand. In addition,
10:55of course, the melting of glaciers in the polar, you know, in the Arctic and Antarctic region, you know,
11:03so this causing sea level rise. And when you're talking about sea level rise, Southeast Asia is at the front
11:11of it. Because, you know, we are surrounded by, you know, almost every country in Australia basically
11:17has its coastline, except maybe two, I would say two countries landlocked, which is Laos and maybe,
11:25maybe Laos is the only country that does not have, you know.
11:29Okay. So, so I, that was one thing I was curious about, because I, a lot of your work has highlighted
11:35Southeast Asia as a very climate vulnerable region. And I wanted to talk about what makes a region
11:43climate vulnerable. Is it just because we are such a coastal region and therefore we are vulnerable to
11:50sea level rise? What else do you think it makes us, that climate risk? You know, we, we can, we can
11:57discuss this beyond this project, I mean this program, but I can, I can describe this rather briefly.
12:05Um, you know, uh, we, we are worried about climate because of its impact, the risk of impact, right? But
12:12the risk of impact is not just, you know, associated with, you know, the, the, the hazard climate,
12:19climatic, uh, extreme becoming more frequent and so on, uh, because of climate change. Uh, and of course,
12:27uh, climate variability, it will still be there, uh, to drive these climate extremes. But when you're talking
12:34about the risk is also a function of, you mentioned vulnerability and also exposure, you know, so, uh,
12:43when you consider all these three, I would say Southeast Asia country, uh, region is, is at the front of it.
12:51Right. And even it is at the current stage, we know, you know, countries, uh, that always been affected by,
12:58by, uh, you know, typhoon like Philippines in, in, uh, in Vietnam, uh, you know, every year,
13:05they are receiving 20 in this year, more than 20 already. Uh, you know, so these are actually
13:12categorized this country actually on the top, I was, I would say in the top five of, of, uh, more
13:18vulnerable country, but most of these countries within this region, uh, basically, you know, developing
13:25countries, uh, you know, when you're talking about developing countries, they do not have, uh,
13:30capability to deal with, you know, adapt to climate impacts and so on. So they are vulnerable countries,
13:36uh, uh, Malaysia is also a vulnerable country because every year we're receiving flood and so on. So, um,
13:42um, uh, so as climate change becoming, you know, uh, uh, serious and serious, you know, greenhouse gases
13:53becoming more and more, you know, uh, you know, uh, temperature becoming higher and higher, extreme
14:00event becoming more frequent and more intense. So that will drive the impacts, uh, you know, and together
14:06with exposure variability, certainly the risk increases, uh, and of course, you know, uh, that also
14:14depends on how, how, you know, this country developed, uh, you know, if you're talking about
14:22unsustainable development, uh, deforestation, that will increase, you know, your exposure as well. And
14:30of course, you know, a good example of this, uh, uh, type one, you know, recent, recent, uh, tropical storm
14:37senior that we, we learned from our neighboring countries, uh, you know. Professor, at the start of
14:42our conversation, you said that climate change is not something that, you know, part of everyday
14:47conversation. Do you think that's changing now that in the face of Malaysia facing the impact
14:55of climate change facing extreme weather events? Are people making it, making that connection? That
15:02this is all the impact of the climate crisis that we are now having to live through? Yeah, definitely.
15:09I would say, uh, you know, uh, you know, uh, public, you know, becoming more aware of the issue. Uh, I think
15:17this is the issue that need to be discussed. And the developed countries is, you know, even becoming a
15:22political, you know, uh, issue to, to, to talk about, uh, even to some extent, you know, uh, you know, uh,
15:31perhaps, uh, you know, uh, can, can decide on how the voting pattern, uh, in, in, in the developed countries.
15:40And, and, uh, perhaps this is also something that we can, we can consider in the future, you know,
15:45because you're talking about, uh, you know, the impact of disaster is going to be felt by everyone,
15:51uh, especially people, you know, poor people, and, you know, uh, they're losing their, their, you know,
16:00asset, their houses, you know, everything during, during floods, uh, you know. So, uh, definitely
16:06something that need to be, you know, but my, my worry about this region is that, uh, you know, um,
16:12uh, if the world failed to, to limit, uh, this greenhouse gases, uh, which is according to the science,
16:23according to the IPCC report, you know, this warming has to be limited below 1.5 degrees,
16:31because if it go beyond that two degrees, three degrees, and four degrees, then, you know, uh,
16:37you will be, uh, you know, catastrophic for, for, for human civilization, uh, you know, uh, so,
16:46but right now we are actually the brings of it, uh, you know, you're talking about last year,
16:52you know, you have already reached 1.55. Uh, so we surpassed it already. Yes, you know,
16:57we have surpassed it already. 1.55 degrees, uh, above pre-industrial, uh, you know. So, um,
17:06you know, the question now, basically, uh, whether the world would, uh, you know, uh, be able to,
17:13to limit this warming, and this is why we have this COP meeting, uh, and recently, you know, in, in,
17:19in November 10 until, I think, November 21st, uh, we had, uh, COP 30, uh,
17:27in, in, in, in Brazil, uh, of course, you know, this, the number after that COP,
17:3230, meaning they have 30 meetings, every year they have meetings, so, meaning 30 years,
17:38discussing about climate, climate, uh, you know, negotiation. Um, maybe I can highlight here that,
17:47you know, there are two things very important, uh, you know, that, that the world need to,
17:53to, to, to, to make a decision. One, in term of limiting greenhouse gases,
17:59and according to, uh, the, the scientific, uh, report, uh, you know, by the IPCC,
18:09if we were to limit, uh, warming by one point, below 1.5, you know, the current emission,
18:17which is, uh, around, uh, 60 gigaton, uh, CO2 equivalent, uh, I'm sorry, pardon me,
18:24this unit, uh, you know, uh, but 60, the number is 60. Okay. You know, if you were to,
18:34if the world were to, you know, to achieve, uh, this target under Paris Agreement, 1.5 degree,
18:40by 2030, which is, like, five years, four years, four years, five years, that has to be reduced by 50%,
18:51to about 20 to 30, uh, you know, and, and that is the science sets, uh, that, you know, if we were to,
19:00uh, uh, limit this, successful in limiting this, that is the trajectory. Okay. In addition to that,
19:08of course, by 2050, we must achieve this net zero CO2, uh, you know, so net zero meaning,
19:15whatever we produce a CO2, it has to be sucked up back by whatever system that we have. Okay.
19:22Including the forest. No more access, right? Yeah. No more access. Yeah. No more access. Yeah. No more access.
19:26But we are nowhere near that, that kind of, uh, you know, what the science says. In fact,
19:33we are still about 60 gigaton CO2 equivalent now, and based on what has been, you know, agreed by,
19:44what has been promised or pledged by countries, this is what we call NDC, uh, the nationally determined contribution.
19:53By 2030, we can only, you know, achieve about 50, 51 gigaton. So, a little bit of reduction,
20:02but this is, this is, this is still way much, a way higher than 20, 30 degree, I mean,
20:0920, 30 gigaton we're talking about. So, drastic, you know, drastic cutting, uh, need to be achieved,
20:19and this is what they're supposed to discuss in... In COP. In COP. Yes. But in COP30,
20:24no plan whatsoever, as far as I can understand, in how to achieve this. That's one failure. The other failure,
20:34of course, you know, uh, for developing countries, you know, uh, in order for them to take climate action,
20:46in terms of mitigation, as well as adaptation, they need finance. Yeah. So, financing is one
20:52big factor of, you know, what is being discussed in, in COP, uh, 30, uh, and the rest of the COP as well. Climate
21:00financing. Yeah. In, in the previous COP, COP 29, uh, or COP 28, uh, could mix up the number there, uh,
21:11it was, uh, you know, uh, recognized that the, uh, developing countries need, you know,
21:21financing in the order of three to four trillion. That's right. I think it was in Baku last year,
21:27wasn't it? Yeah. Yes. That's right. Three to four trillion. Yes. Wow. But, you know, what, uh,
21:36developed countries can, can, you know, uh, support a different unit, billion. So, you, you're talking
21:45about two different units. Big difference. Big difference. And even the billion, at that time,
21:51only 100 billion a year. And in, in, in COP 30, they increased that like three, four, only 300
22:00billion. But 300 billion, you know, you're talking about trillion. That's, that's a different unit.
22:05Yeah. Uh, I don't know how many, how many zeros behind. Many, many more. So, yeah, that's, that's a
22:13reality of it. Does it frustrate you as a climate scientist, as a climatologist, when the science is so
22:21clear about the urgency of the climate emergency? And you have, you know, the, the, the gathering of
22:31the world's climate champions saying, well, this is the best we can do. Indeed, indeed, you know, as a
22:38climatologist, as a scientist, this is really frustrating. You know, the science, uh, you know,
22:46uh, uh, you know, uh, uh, you know, uh, uh, uh, uh, and this is why actually, you know, keep me going in
23:01terms of how can we educate the public? Uh, you know, and I started to write, have my own, uh, column in,
23:08in, in the, you know, in a newspaper, online newspaper, you know, trying to translate my knowledge
23:14on the science into, you know, something that a man on the street can, public can understand.
23:20Yeah, it really frustrating, you know, uh, when, when, you know, you, you starting to understand
23:29the system is about to fail, the, the, the, the world, you know, uh, not to mention that, you know,
23:37uh, uh, country used to be leading on, on this, it's no longer part of it. Ah, the US? Well, I mean,
23:44you mentioned that, no longer part of it, uh, you know, and, uh, so, uh, and it's not only the US,
23:54but based on my understanding reading, because of that also, you know, uh, it's kind, kind of, uh,
24:03the, the initiative is no longer, you know, many countries also seem to be not really on. Yeah.
24:08Do you mean, you mean there's the lack of urgency? Lack of urgency and lack of, uh, you know,
24:14because this, this, uh, powerful country used to be the one that driving it. It's no longer part of it.
24:20Right. I understand. Prof, in the few minutes that we have left, we, we are a small nation,
24:27but we can do take measures or take act climate action to maybe avoid losses, losses of life,
24:35economic losses, um, limit our own greenhouse gas emissions. We have a new environment minister
24:42in cabinet now. So what would you like to say, or what would you like to see our country
24:50prioritize if we want to be a country that is proactive in taking climate action?
24:57Yeah. He's, he's, he's, he's from Sabah, I think. Yes.
24:59A very young, uh, uh, you know, uh, minister, um, usually young minister, you know, they appreciate
25:08issue like this, uh, you know, young people appreciate issues on, on environment issues,
25:12especially climate change. Yeah. I would say for Malaysia, uh, you know, what happened recently is a wake up call
25:20uh, you know, we have already experienced, uh, you know, three of these tropical storm,
25:28you know, uh, including the recent one. Uh, prior to that, we had, uh, of course, uh, tropical storm
25:36uh, uh, frozen Greg, that killed uh, a number many people as well, in Sabah 1996. Yes. Uh, and uh,
25:42uh, uh tropical storm, Bami, uh, uh, across, uh, Johor, uh, in 2001. Uh, uh,
25:49and recently of course it's rare but as climate change becoming more and more moisture becoming
25:58more and more because of climate change because of climate variability and you know it just
26:04you know the likelihood of a big flood that experience in our neighboring countries
26:09can happen here so i would say we need to take care of you know on backyard as well
26:18so adaptation climate adaptation is important especially flood but not only flood uh you know
26:25we have drought we have heat waves and so on uh but go by by the science of it uh you know so be guided
26:33by the by by the science uh you know um not just doing it randomly or you know uh but again we are
26:42part of the you know um so the world community here in trying to address climate change so be
26:51part of this uh un attribute effort in cutting down the emission drastic reduction i think uh it's not
26:59good not only good for climate but good for our own standing as well in the eyes of the world yeah uh this
27:05is a country that that really paying attention to to uh you know issues on environment climate change
27:13that we're serious about our commitment right we are serious in and you know we have to stop
27:18uh cutting for us arbitrarily uh you know so the deforestation must be a stop i think because
27:26you know sooner or later if we have typhoon or typical storm like senior hitting us it could be a
27:33disaster as well you know so uh i hope this new minister will pay attention more to issues like you
27:40you know climate change you and we both thank you so much for being and lending us some of your
27:45analysis i think it's such an important topic to to really digest and think about more and more as
27:50part of our going into the new year thank you for your time thank you for having me that's all the time
27:56we have for you on this episode of consider this i'm melissa idris signing off for the evening thank you so
28:01much for watching and good night