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Understanding Climate Change: Causes and Consequences Explained

Explore the Earth's changing climate, from past climates to modern-day phenomena like global warming. Learn about feedback mechanisms, possible causes, and the impact of human activities on climate change. Discover the role of atmospheric particles, solar output variations, and the Earth's orbit in shaping our planet's climate. From the Milankovitch theory to plate tectonics, delve into the science behind climate change and the factors driving it. Uncover the effects of rising temperatures, sea level changes, and implications for the future. Stay informed about the Kyoto Protocol, droughts, tropical forest die-offs, and hurricane activities in the context of climate change.

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Understanding Climate Change: Causes and Consequences Explained

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  1. Chapter 14: Climate Change • The earth’s changing climate • Possible causes of climatic change • Global warming

  2. The Earth’s Changing Climate 18,000 years ago • The earth’s climate is • always changing • 20,000 years ago the • sea level was so low • that the English • Channel didn’t • even exist

  3. Determining Past Climates • fossil evidence: pollen • sediment cores: ocean, lake • ice cores: Antarctic, Greenland • oxygen isotope ratios • dendrochronology: tree-ring • Isotopes are atoms whose nuclei have the same number of protons but different numbers of neutrons. • As the global warming debate has intensified in recent years, many methods of reconstructing past climates have undergone close scrutiny.

  4. Climate During Past 1000 Years and since 1860 “Hockey Stick” graph The global warming of the past 100 years has notbeen constant

  5. Climate Change and Feedback Mechanisms • positive feedback mechanisms: reinforce the interaction • negative feedback mechanisms: weaken the interaction • water vapor-greenhouse feedback: positive • snow-albedo feedback: positive • Cloud feedback: uncertain; overall negative • Feedbacks cause climate changes to be either amplified or reduced.

  6. Possible Causes of Climate Change • external: changes in incoming solar radiation • external (e.g., volcano) or human (e.g., CO2): changes in the composition of the atmosphere • external (e.g., mountain uplifting) or human (e.g., land use): changes in the earth’s surface • Emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases areby no means the only way to change the climate.

  7. Climate Change and Atmospheric Particles (decadal-century) • sulfate aerosols • volcanic aerosols • Sulfate aerosols are thought to cool the climate andtherefore counteract global warming to some extent.

  8. Climate Change and Variations in Solar Output (decadal-century) • sunspots

  9. Climate Change and Variations in the Earth’s Orbit (10K-100K years) • Milankovitch theory:- eccentricity (100K yr)- obliquity (41K yr) - precession (23K yr)

  10. Climate Change, Plate Tectonics, and Mountain-Building (100M yr) • theory of plate tectonics Landmasses 150M years ago Today

  11. Rising atmospheric temperature Rising sea level Reductions in NH snow cover And oceans.. And upper atmosphere…. Warming is Unequivocal

  12. Human and Natural Drivers of Climate Change Carbon dioxide is causing the bulk of the forcing. On average, it lives more than a hundred years in the atmosphere and therefore affects climate over long time scales. without air, the earth surface temperature would be 33C colder

  13. Natural versus human-caused temperature increase • Climate models are needed: aerosols; cloud; precipitation; land processes; ….

  14. Observed Expected for all forcings Natural forcing only Understanding and Attributing Climate Change Anthropogenic warming is likely discernible on all inhabited continents

  15. What’s in the pipeline and what could come Warming will increase if GHG increase. If GHG were kept fixed at current levels, a committed 0.6°C of further warming would be expected by 2100. More warming would accompany more emission. CO2 Eq 3.4oC = 6.1oF 850 2.8oC = 5.0oF 600 1.8oC = 3.2oF 0.6oC = 1.0oF 400

  16. A1B is a typical “business as usual” (2090-2099) scenario: Global mean warming 2.8oC;Much of land area warms by ~3.5oCArctic warms by ~7oC; would be less for less emission

  17. What else happens in a hotter world? Future changes just from these processes could be up to 1.5 feet (0.5 m) by 2100, and up to 3 feet (1 meter) within about 2-3 centuries, depending on how much GHGs are emitted. But what about other processes? Rapid ice flow? Observations of sea level rise from satellites, 1993-2003. The global average SLR for the 20th century was about 6 inches (0.17m), mostly from expansion of the hot ocean, and with contributions from glacier melt (Alaska, Patagonia, Europe….).

  18. Other related issues • Drought • Tropical forest dieoff • Hurricane activities • Kyoto Protocol

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