Projections of the world-wide population for future years are based on the current estimate and the projected difference between the number of births and the number of deaths that are expected.  The last numbers I saw were that the current population is around 7.7 billion.  In 2015 around 55 million died while there were approximately 140 million births.  My concerns are, how accurate are the projections for births and deaths and thus the future population?

Estimates for deaths are dependent upon the trends as the population ages.  Past projections were not based on “black swan” effects (non forecasted effects such as pandemics and global heating).  I wonder what affect global heating, pandemics, etc. will have on the future numbers.

One article titled “The Age of the Great Dying is Beginning” makes some dire statements.  It claims that around 4 million are now dead of Covid and that extreme temperatures kill more than 5 million people a year.  The article projects that the total recent yearly number is probably around a total of 10 million killed by heat and Covid.  That amounts to 10 million more than the approximately 55 million deaths in 2015.  The plots in the article also show that the trends are increasing.

It is impossible to project the future number of deaths due to pandemics, but it is easy to project that the number of deaths going up due to global heating will continue to rise since the heating of the earth is “locked in” for the future just based on the amount of greenhouse gases already released.  The heating of the earth has just begun, as are the problems with living on a hotter earth.

I also expect that the number of births will go down due to global heating.  I have neither seen nor can I think of any reasons otherwise.  We are approaching peak population levels, just due to global heating.

With the number of deaths increasing and the number of births decreasing, it seems to be a sure thing that past projections for the earth’s future projections are way high.  If we have more deaths due to pandemics and global heating, they will have a major impact on population levels.  

The results of global heating will have a major impact on not only population levels but on everything .… the things you probably haven’t considered.  I hope to write more later about the likely future impacts of global heating, and the impacts on water, food production, migrations, deaths, wars, energy, etc.