IB HL Global Climate Change

12 Years to Act (Oct 2018)

Report stating that the effects of climate change would be irreversible by 2030

1992 Earth Summit, Rio

- UN conference on environment and development
- social, economic and environmental factors are interdependent and evolve together, success in one sector requires action in other sectors
- led to creation of Commission on Sustainable Development
- led to holding of first world conference on the sustainable development of small island developing states(1994)
- led to negotiations for the establishment of the agreement on straddling stocks and highly migratory fish stocks

1997-Kyoto Protocol

- international treaty, extended 1992 United Nations FCCC(commits parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions)
- United States and Australia initially did not sign it.

20 by 2020 & 80 by 2050

The EU has pledged to cut emissions by 20% by 2020 (cf. 1990 levels). By 2050 EU states have agreed to cut their emissions by 80%

Beyond EPICA

a follow up project to EPICA to dig further into the antarctic ice sheet which will reveal atmospheric conditions up to 1.5 million years ago

Biosphere

The world's ecosystems

CarbFix (Iceland)

Turning CO2 into stone to then lock it away underground. Climeworks, a swiss founded company trying to combat climate change, are using their state of the art technology to suck the carbon out of the atmosphere with their direct air capture fans so that it can then be collected to be turned into stone.

Cement

The creation of cement emits large amounts of CO2 (2.5 billion tonnes per year)

CFC's

CFC's are found in air conditioning, refrigerators and aerosol cans. Chlorofluorocarbons are 1000 times worse than CO2 affecting the ozone layer and therefore global warming more

Civil Society & Corporate Strategies

Non-governmental charities, organizations, companies...They take action, within there company, organization, charity to have a postive impact on climate change. They can be advised by the IPCC with RCP's (representative climate pathways) and other NGO's on how to act.

Clime Works

an NGO focused on the capture and storage of carbon dioxide directly from the air. Working in Iceland with CarbFix.

CO2 Mauna Loa

Since 1960, CO2 levels in the atmosphere have been measured from a balloon sent from here (Hawaii)

COP15 2009 -Green fund for poor countries

- agreement amongst countries to mobilise financial resources to developing countries to reduce their emissions from deforestation and forest degradation
- permitted the enhancement of forest sinks to capture more carbon

COP26 Glasgow

- Glasgow Climate Pact, Paris Rulebook
- commitments on forests, methane, car emissions, and private finance
- commitment from 137 countries to "halt and reverse forest loss and land degradation" by 2030

Cryosphere

The part of the earth were water is in solid form (Ice). The cyrosphere is the area which is changing the most due to global CC.

Ecological Footprint

All the energy used to sustain our life from food, heating, clothes and transport, measured in area.

EPICA Core

European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica, atmospheric data for 800,000 years of history

EU ETS

European Union Emissions Trading System, largest cap and trade system in the world

Global Overshoot Day

July 28th 2022. the day marks the date when humanity has used all the biological resources that earth regemerates during the entier year

Global Water Budget Changes

98.2% Saltwater is increasing. 2.8 % fresh is decreasing

Greenhouse effect Natural

The natural process where gasses in the earths atmosphere which trap the sun's heat. +33 degrees.

HFC's

Hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants (HFCs) are potent greenhouse gases that can be hundreds to thousands of times more potent than carbon dioxide (CO2) in contributing to climate change. HFC emissions cause increased warming of the stratosphere

Hockey stick graph- Michael Mann

for the past 1000 years global climate temperature has kept a consistent pattern yet for approximately the last 100 years the global average temperatures have skyrocketed forming a hockey stick shape.

Hydrosphere

The total amount of water on the planet inclusing the world's water cycle and stores

Inuit & Vulnerability

Despite having almost a neglible impact on climate change, inuit people have a high degree of vulnerability, mainly due to their isolation. Food has to be imported making it expensive, and their culture is being threatened.

IPCC

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This organization is the UN body that focuses on climate change. It's comprised of scientists from all over the world, and they publish reports and data about the current state of our climate. In 2018, they warned that we have 12 years to limit climate change. Today, very little change has been made, and we're down to 8 years.

Kitinger, Baumgartner, Babbage, Eustice

These were the people and bear who all atempted the highest jump from a balloon. The highest is now Eustice who jumped from 41 km in 2014

Kuznets Environmental Curve

suggests that the environmental pollution increases at the beginning of economic growth and decreases once a level of growth is reached

Longwave vs Shortwave radiation

Shortwave radiation comes from the sun and can easily pass through GHGs, but struggles with the ozone layer. Longwave radiation is from the Earth outwards and struggles with getting through GHGs.

Maunder Minimum/Medieval Ice Age

a time period from1650-1700 when the sunspot frequency dropped, leading to a global drop in temperature / aka a mini medival ice age

Milakovitch/Croll Cycles

Every 100,000 years, the Earth's orbit becomes more eccentric. This is due to the combined gravity of other planets lining up . This stretch is what causes Ice Ages, which occur when the orbit is at its most elliptical(greatest eccentricity).

Mount Pinatubo 1991/2

One of the largest volcanic erruptions in the earth's history, caused global dimming due to large clouds of volcanic ash.

Mount Tambora 1815

It is a volcano, located in Indonesia. It erupted in 1815 causing thousands of deaths and caused food shortages.

New Green Deal

This is the european/US climate deal set on trying reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030. There are many proposals in order to achieve this however none of them are mandatory.

Ozone Layer / Montreal Protocol

An international treaty designed to protect the ozone layer by banning production and consuming of ozone depleting substances called CFC's

Resilience

The capacity to quickly recover from difficulties. (eg. the biosphere's capacity to resist/recover from anthropogenic climate change)

Rice House

Innovative social enterprise that promotes circular economy by making construction materials using by-products of rice agriculture in the region, where they are typically burnt.

Solar Radiation Management (SRM)

Form of geoengineering and climate change response (eg. painting roofs white, or sending aerosols into the stratosphere.)

Stratosphere

The upper part of our atmosphere, situated between the troposphere and mesosphere. It starts 12 km up from the ground and ends 50 km up. The ozone layer lies between this layer and the mesophere, and protects us from harmful solar radiation.

Surf & Turf Orkney

work on wind and tital energy in scotland, because there a very small community they use exess energy to make hydrogen to power ferries

The year without a Summer-1816

Mount Tambora (Indonesia) erupted and dropped global temperature by 3°C. The amount of material in the atmosphere caused a cooling event around the world.

Thermosphere

outer most layer of the atmosphere (befor the exosphere/space) around80-800 km, the aurara borialas is here

Troposphere

The lowest layer of the atmosphere, containing the most dust, water vapour, and pollution(all 90% of all gases). Weather occurs in here and it warmed indirectly from the sun and clouds.

Tuvalu

the island of Tuvalu in the south Pacific ocean is being massively effectd by climate change (floods due to rising sea level), in contrast on their impact on the climate.

What If Foods

It is a food brand that turns natural ingridients and regenerative crops into food, that is nutrious to us and to the planet. Uses the Bambara nut, grown in Ghana and has a project to create Biochar with the nut waste, benefiting the local community, improving the soil and locking away carbon.