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The Antarctic Canary — the human impact on climate change
September 05, 2006British Antarctic Science Festival
As the UK attempts to move towards a low carbon economy, leading scientists and a world expert on sustainable energy in buildings this week discuss the evidence for climate change and possible solutions. A public seminar - 'the Antarctic Canary - the human impact on climate change' at the BA Festival of Science in Norwich will be held on Monday 4 September.
Evidence from an 800,000-year Antarctic ice core record shows unprecedented atmospheric change due to carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Dr Eric Wolff from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), leader of the science team for the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA) says,
"Ice cores reveal the Earth's natural climate rhythm over the last 800,000 years. When carbon dioxide changed there was always an accompanying climate change. Over the last 200 years human activity has increased carbon dioxide to well outside the natural range and we have no analogue for what will happen next."
Although large increases in carbon dioxide may be alleviated by natural sinks in the ocean and on land, a critical issue is how these sinks will behave in the future. For the last 15 years international scientists, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, have used research into carbon cycle by Dr Corrinne Le Quéré of UEA and BAS. She says,
'Our land and oceans may well become less efficient carbon sinks as concentrations increase. We cannot rely on them to solve the problem.'
Scientific knowledge, especially about climate change, is essential for a sustainable economy. In the UK the built environment accounts for around 50% of energy consumption, with housing alone contributing around 27% of UK carbon dioxide emissions.
Professor Peter Smith, University of Nottingham and author of 'Architecture in a Climate of Change', offers creative solutions to improve the energy efficiency of buildings. He says,
"There is an urgent need to find innovative technologies to reduce the impact we are having on our climate. If we are committed to a low carbon economy the UK needs a vigorous twin track programme of demand reduction and renewable energy technology. Governments may have only 10 years in which to determine the destiny of our planet - giving only five years in which to develop feasibility and design studies. I am disappointed that the recent UK Energy Review totally fails to appreciate the urgency of the situation."
British Antarctic Survey
"Ice cores reveal the Earth's natural climate rhythm over the last 800,000 years. When carbon dioxide changed there was always an accompanying climate change. Over the last 200 years human activity has increased carbon dioxide to well outside the natural range and we have no analogue for what will happen next."
Although large increases in carbon dioxide may be alleviated by natural sinks in the ocean and on land, a critical issue is how these sinks will behave in the future. For the last 15 years international scientists, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, have used research into carbon cycle by Dr Corrinne Le Quéré of UEA and BAS. She says,
'Our land and oceans may well become less efficient carbon sinks as concentrations increase. We cannot rely on them to solve the problem.'
Scientific knowledge, especially about climate change, is essential for a sustainable economy. In the UK the built environment accounts for around 50% of energy consumption, with housing alone contributing around 27% of UK carbon dioxide emissions.
Professor Peter Smith, University of Nottingham and author of 'Architecture in a Climate of Change', offers creative solutions to improve the energy efficiency of buildings. He says,
"There is an urgent need to find innovative technologies to reduce the impact we are having on our climate. If we are committed to a low carbon economy the UK needs a vigorous twin track programme of demand reduction and renewable energy technology. Governments may have only 10 years in which to determine the destiny of our planet - giving only five years in which to develop feasibility and design studies. I am disappointed that the recent UK Energy Review totally fails to appreciate the urgency of the situation."
British Antarctic Survey
Climate, Change Current Events and Climate, Change News RSSLong-term study shows effect of climate change on animal diversity
Two species of giraffe, several rhinos and five elephant relatives, along with multitudes of rodents, bush pigs, horses, antelope and apes, once inhabited what is now northern Pakistan.
IMPACTS: On the Threshold of Abrupt Climate Changes
Abrupt climate change is a potential menace that hasn't received much attention. That's about to change. Through its Climate Change Prediction Program, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Biological and Environmental Research (OBER) recently launched IMPACTS - Investigation of the Magnitudes and Probabilities of Abrupt Climate Transitions - a program led by William Collins of Berkeley Lab's Earth Sciences Division (ESD) that brings together six national laboratories to attack the problem of abrupt climate change, or ACC.
Climate change may boost Middle East rainfall
The prospect of climate change sparking food and water shortages in the Middle East is less likely than previously thought, with new research by an Australian climate scientist suggesting that rainfall will be significantly higher in key parts of the region.
Tracking down abrupt climate changes
In an article in the scientific magazine Nature - Geosciences, the geoscientists Achim Brauer, Peter Dulski and Jörg Negendank, (emeritus Professor) from the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Gerald Haug from the DFG-Leibniz Center for Surface Processes and Climate Studies at the University of Potsdam and the ETH in Zurich, and Daniel Sigman from the Princeton University prove, for the first time, an extremely fast climate change in Western Europe.
Climate change and species distributions
Scientists have long pointed to physical changes in the Earth and its atmosphere, such as melting polar ice caps, sea level rise and violent storms, as indicators of global climate change.
Rising energy, food prices major threats to wetlands as farmers eye new areas for crops
Critical food shortages and growing demand for bio-fuels and hydro-electricity due to high fossil fuel prices rank among the greatest threats today to the preservation of precious wetlands worldwide as farmers and developers look for new areas for agriculture, energy crop plantations and hydro dams.
Report - adapting farming to climate change
CSIRO today released a national overview of climate change impacts and adaptation options for Australian agriculture.
Climate change may challenge national security, classified report warns
The National Intelligence Council (NIC) has completed a new classified assessment that explores how climate change could threaten U.S. security in the next 20 years by causing political instability, mass movements of refugees, terrorism, or conflicts over water and other resources in specific countries.
Climate change could severely impact California's unique native plants
The native plants unique to California are so vulnerable to global climate change that two-thirds of these "endemics" could suffer more than an 80 percent reduction in geographic range by the end of the century.
Field project seeks clues to climate change in remote atmospheric region
Scientists are deploying an advanced research aircraft to study a region of the atmosphere that influences climate change by affecting the amount of solar heat that reaches Earth's surface.
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