Global warming could force you to change your work hours

If the current pollution, emission and global warming trends continue, Indians living in cities like Delhi and Mumbai might have to move away from the classic 9-to-5 work life.

Global warming is terrible for office work!

According to a Duke University study, India already loses 101 billion work hours a year due to unbearable heat. This number stands to rise to about 230 billion hours a year as global warming stays on track to rise by 2 degrees Celsius.

Published in Nature Communications, the study says that countries with large populations in South and East Asia experience the most work hours lost, both in the coolest hours and in the full workday, with India showing the largest heat exposure impacts on heavy labour.

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Economic losses from unbearable heat levels

The study estimates the projected economic losses due to this lost productivity to be around $1.6 trillion (Rs 1.6 lakh crores) annually if warming continues to go up.

Jobs in agriculture and construction work will become the hardest to perform safely during afternoon hours in the summer in many places, the study warned.

Overall, the physiological limits to the heat and humidity that humans can tolerate will simply become too much for our work life to stay the same.

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