Updated 03.00 | Published 02.55
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full screen Corn that ‘sweats’ worsens US heat. Photo: Charlie Riedel/AP/TT
“Sweating” corn is exacerbating the extreme heat prevailing in the US Midwest – where 55 million people are subject to high temperature warnings. The moisture that maize and other crops give off at high temperatures, evapotranspiration, contributes to increased air humidity which makes the heat felt more intense, reports The Guardian.
In addition, two of the states where the heat wave is at its worst, Iowa and Illinois, account for a third of US corn production. This contributes to the residents there feeling even warmer – at the same time it is expected to be between 41 and 46 degrees.
– It is the plants that react to the warmer weather. Then they also need more moisture, so they take up more water from the soil and bring it up to the atmosphere, says Chris Clark, agronomist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, to a local CBS channel.
A corn field that is about half a hectare in size can create up to 15,000 liters of “corn sweat”, according to Clark.
Heat waves are becoming more frequent, longer and hotter with climate change, according to research.