LSU Lays Out What Nuclear War With Russia May Look Like
The study said nuclear war would produce dire global consequences for humans and our environment
Louisiana State University’s Department of Oceanography & Coastal Sciences published a study on Thursday on how “modern nuclear detonations” would impact the world today.
The study was released a day after Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chairman of Russia’s national security council, warned about nuclear annihilation. Russia has been locked at war with Ukraine since its 24 February invasion. He has expressed dismay over the West’s support for Kyiv and said, “idea of punishing a country that has one of the largest nuclear potentials is absurd. And potentially poses a threat to the existence of humanity."
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Here are some of the key takeaways from the study that simulated a U.S.-Russia war and several India-Pakistan wars. “In all scenarios, firestorms from nuclear war would deliver soot to the upper atmosphere, blocking out the sun and causing global cooling.”
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(The report pointed out that there are more than 13,000 nuclear weapons in the world controlled by nine nations.)
Nuclear firestorms would release soot and smoke into the upper atmosphere that would block out the Sun resulting in crop failure around the world. In the first month following nuclear detonation, average global temperatures would plunge by about 13 degrees Fahrenheit, a larger temperature change than in the last Ice Age.
The sudden drop in light and ocean temperatures, especially from the Arctic to the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans, would kill the marine algae, which is the foundation of the marine food web, essentially creating a famine in the ocean. This would halt most fishing and aquaculture.
When the cooling event ends, Arctic sea ice is left in a new state, a sort of “Nuclear Little Ice Age.” Marine ecosystems would be highly disrupted by both the initial perturbation and the resulting new ocean state, resulting in impacts to ecosystem services worldwide, lasting for decades.
“Nuclear warfare results in dire consequences for everyone. World leaders have used our studies previously as an impetus to end the nuclear arms race in the 1980s, and five years ago to pass a treaty in the United Nations to ban nuclear weapons. We hope that this new study will encourage more nations to ratify the ban treaty,” said co-author Alan Robock, Distinguished Professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences at Rutgers University.