Unit 2 - Climate change

What is DOM?

DOM is mass accumulations of carbon stored as dead organic matter. Around 400-500 Gigatonnes of carbon as DOM are stored in periglacial enviroments as compared to the 700-800 Gigatonnes in the atmosphere.

How does carbon affect the oceans?

It acidifies the water as it stores around 50 times more carbon than in the atmosphere. Since 1750, ocean pH is 0.1 more acidic which is a 30% change. Carbon can dissolve in the ocean to become carbonic acid with reacts with carbonate. With more and more excess carbon, more carbonate is used and less available to lend to self-shell building organisms, leading to thinner and weaker shells.

Why are phytoplankton populations decreasing?

As more and more carbon is in the ocean, the phytoplanktons are unable to keep recycling the carbon at such a fast pace and the carbon heats up the ocean, killing the phytoplanktons as they grow better in cool, nutrient-rich waters.

Why are phytoplankton population decrease of concern?

Phytoplanktons are essential players in marine food webs, providing nutrition to filter-feeding corals and taking in carbon from the ocean to produce oxygen like many other plants. However, as they fail to keep up with the sheer amount of caborn being produced, they are slowly killed off, leaving corals without food, and carbon unrecycled.

What is the impact of Deforestation?

Trees and forests are natural sinks coverting carbon to biomass they can store while realeasing oxygen, their soil even absorbing and storing large amounts of carbon. Deforestation releases all these stored carbons into the atmosphere

How much carbon dioxide do terrestrial plants absorb?

Around 25% of the CO2 released in the atmoshpere anthropogenically.

What are storm activities and how are they affected by CC?

Thunderstroms expected to last 30% longer, they are things like floods, tornadoes, heavy downpours and even cyclones

What are floods and how are they affected by CC?

They are the overflow of water onto land, often causing soil erosion or land depression. They source from melting glaciers, heavy rain, storms. Causes around 93 deaths annually

What are Heat Waves and how are they affected by CC?

Trapped air under high pressure leading to unnaturally hot weather for more than 2 days. Causes around 180 deaths annually

What are freezes and how are they impacted by CC?

Large area predicted to be under temps lower than 32F Causes around 159 deaths and 751 injuries annually

What are Wild fires and how are they impacted by CC?

Rapidly spreading fire through wild areas or vegetations No data on deaths

What are Tornadoes and how are they affected by CC?

rapidly rotating air extending from thunderstorms Causes around 317 injuries annually

Droughts

Around 350 injuries annually

Impacts on crop yields?

1-3C : Possibly rising yields (esp in high latitude regions) 1-5C : Falling crop yields (esp in devoloping countries) 3.5-5C : Falling yields in devoloped regions

Impcts on water (glacier melts)?

1-2C : Small mountain glaciers disappear 2-4.5C : significant decreases in water (esp. in medditereanean + South Africa) 4.5-5C : Sea level rise to threaten major cities

Impacts on natural disasters in general (by degree increase)?

+1C: Artic sea ice melt + disappears in summer +2C: Heat waves capable of killing +10,000 ppl +4C: Arctic permafrost relasing great amounts of CH4 and CO2

How many people are affected by water shortages?

4 billion

Vectorborne diseases

Warmer temps means wider spread of places where vectors can breed and longer periods of time to transmit their dieases

Mental pressures

Great increase with increase climate stress (ex. natural disasters needing people to keep re-building can lead to decreased rates of food security and economic wellness and loss of motivation)

Effect on human migration + example in Kiribati

"HM increases as people search for better livelihoods and security from natural disasters/impacts as push factors increase in frequency. ex. ""king tides"", hurricanes and tropical storms in kiribati led to mass migration as there were 47 deaths per 1000 people as there was limited drinking water."

Change in lenghts of seasons?

winter is predicted to last shorter than 2 months by 2100 --> evidenced by 1952-2011 increase in summer lenght from 75 days to 95 may cause tourism boost as summer attractions increase in popularity can change crop growing --> increase crop yield but encourage invasive species

Political problems with inceased CC?

Ice melting can create new sea routes allowing people to travel around faster, cutting GHG emissions. But there can be political conflict over who takes over the new sea routes. Conversely, water scarcity can lead to wars over supply

Children and water scarcity

34 mill children exposed to high WS only 2.4% climate finacne tends to child-responsible activites of CC

What is the steric effect?

It is a negetive feedback loop as follows: Temp increase --> planet warms | | Ice caps/ ocean glaciers melt heats up | | sea levels rise

Animal-related impacts

40% wildlife = extinct Changes in biome distribution as animals all move polewards

Himalayas water situation

Gangori galcier = largest and on decline since 1780 leading to concern over water supply as over 1.5 bill ppl depend on the asian river connected to the Himalayas. By 1990, its alr rtreated more than 800m

Changes in Arctic ice

It's melting seasons have increase by 3 weeks 1988: 25% of ice older than 4 yrs 2018: >8% ice older than 4 yrs predicted to be ice free by 2040 Feb 2016, arctic ice reach lowest at 14.22 mill km2

How to prevent specices extinction

Migration poleward --> obstructed by anthropogenic enviroments, power lines, manmade fences + devolopments that block typical routes of migration for animals

Changes in Agriculture (hunger)

+2C: +200 mill hungry +3C: decrease of 35% crop yields in Africa and the Middle East

Changes in agriculture (Location)

crop growing/agriculture moved polewards due to increased heat in Tundra. by 2040, no wheat in USA

Changes in agriculture (water)?

Water decreases mean less variety in crop (only grow ones needing less water) + decreased crop growth success rate

Resilience

Capacity of societies to recover and resume as usual following a hazardous event

Adaptation

Action to protect people from the harmful impacts of CC (without tackling root issue)

Geo-engineering

Concious large-scale manipulation of enviroments to counter-act anthropogenic climate change (ex. cloud seeding to trick the atmosphere into creating clouds and rain)

Power in location and vunrability

Thoese with less vunrability have more power to act but less urgency to do so. This creates an imbalance that is a great obstical in our solving this problem.

Why is there less snow accumulation?

Due to hydrosphere (wind patterns that are temp dependent), glaciers lose their bottom edge and top of galciers can't recover from loss.

Define Global warming

increase in ave. surface temp rise. This can be caused by GHGs trapping solar energy which leads to extreme stroms, heat waves, etc. This means Global warming causes climate change.

Interglacial periods

Glaciers retreat, climate warms and sea level rise

How are ice cores formed?

snow being pushed into compact, solid masses that build up with more snow of new climates often trapping bubble of Co2 within the layers.

Why have conditions of earth changed drastically in only a few decades (list)

- Orbital changes (Milankovich cycles) - Volcanic activity (reducing insulation, albedo) - Continent + ocean rearrangement (change movement of climate patterns)

"What is the significance of articles refering to ""women and girls"" as marginalized communities?"

"It reflects the fact that most of the world's richest persons are almost exclusives (white) men and how women (of all ages: hence, the ""girls"") often lack the support from their communities that is needed to encourage them to thrive and bring out their potiential- this, to the extent that all women and girls are quoted to be part of a marginalized community."

How are women and children affected in places with drought?

They are often tasked with the job of walking miles on end to retrieve water which increases their chance of getting heat stroke. They are also fatigued by the end of it, and left vunrable to attacks, either physical, sexually assaltive or even rape.

"What is a ""climate cool"" enviroment"

Hot climates that are anthropogenically cooled with the use of aircons

Define anthropogenic carbon stock

Total amount of carbon produced/emitted by humans since 1750

Define Carbon intensity

Density of atmospheric CO2 per unit of GDP

What are glacial meltwater streams?

streams made from the melting of glaciers (ice formed near mountains)

Define natural thermostats

Naturally occuring control of the earth's climate to sustain life

Define migration

The movement of a species (in our case, humans) from one place to another

Define refugees

Migrants who are forced to leave their native habitats and cross international borders to seek refuge

Define Emigration

Movement of people OUT of a country or location

Define Migration Fields

The clustering of people from a specific region or culture into certain neighbourhoods or towns.

Define remittance

Money migrants/refugees send back to their home country (not contributing to their working country's economy)

Define Interglacial periods

Naturally occuring periods of time where the earth is exposed to a warmer atmosphere- enhanced rate of occurance due to enhanced greenhouse effects

Natural greenhouse effect

An essential natural process to manitain life and circle through glacial and interglacial periods.

Define enhanced greenhouse effect

An exposure to excessive heat and vicious cycle of extreme climates sourced through anthropogenic means

"What is the ""hothouse earth theory""?"

"The hothouse earth theory posits that if the Earth's temperature exceeds 2°C above pre-industrial levels, irreversible extreme conditions will arise. Preventing this would result in stable climate conditions, referred to as ""stabilized earth."" It is crucial to recognize that these extreme changes, if the critical temperature is reached, are unlikely to occur for millennia. This theory is based solely on existing scientific literature and does not incorporate new data. The theory's popularity stems, in part, from its tendency to generate sensationalist articles that prioritize public interest over accuracy."

Methane

2nd largest contributing gas to Climate Change (increase of 1% annually), shorter life span than Carbon but more effective in absorbing long wave radiation

CFCs

Man-made chemicals containing carbon, chlorine, and flourine. It destroys the ozone and absorbs long wave radiation- trapping heat 10x more efficently than CO2 (increasing at 6% annually)

Proxy data

Data that provides clues about the past. Comparing + analyzing multiple proxy data builds a more complete picture of the past and predicts future trends.

Proxy data conclusion

More than 95% probability that human activities caused most of Earth's warming since mid 20th century.

Green Climate Fund

UNFCCC created 2010 fund to allocate resources to most vunrable, devoloping countries to make them climate resistant. Fund is supposed to be contributed to by devoloped countries

Climate postive

The removing of CO2 in the atmosphere beyond carbon neutrality

ETFs

Enhanced transparency framework, where countries will transparently report on actions taken in CC mitigation+adaptation, and support provided/received. Info from ETF feeds into global stocktake to assess collective progress.

Green infrastructure

Can be both mitigation and adaption- using natural enviroments and building with them

Vunrability

Inability to resist a hazard or respond to it

El Nino

Climate pattern explaining unusual warming of surface waters in eastern equitorial Pacific Oceans

La Nina

Periodic cooling of ocean surface in central and eastern-central equitorial Pacific Oceans

Climate finance

Local, national or transnational financing that seeks to support mitigation and adaptation actions that will address climate change

Loss and Damage fund

Devoloped in COP28, its a fund that goes towards helping devoloping countries cope with the effects of climate change.

Carbon offsetting

Act of compensating for CO2 emissions by partaking in activites that reduce or prevent, equal amounts of CO2 as the amount released by the person, from being emitted.

Risk in London

If the Thane's flood barrier breaks, it would bring central London, along with the UK goverement 2 meters underwater. 1 million people are currently directly at risk.

Risk in Phillippines

Islands within tropical cyclone belt are target of 20 major storms annually with 60,000 deaths during past 20 years. These isolated islands are difficult to reach and warn, and the growing slum areas in Phillippines mean poorly built homes that are prone to be affected by the storms 1,250 people killed by storm surges near slums.

Artic indigenous communities risk?

Artic ice warming fast x2 than the world because of its high latitude. Can isolate communities by leaving them no way to safetly travel across areas, like how the 900 Disko people cannot cross anymore due to a lack of thick snow.

Define Carbon Leakage

Businesses trying to avoid paying for by relocating to enviroments with less strict policies (cap-and-trade)

What is geoengineering?

Also called solar engineering, it is a radical response to Climate Change.

Why can solar engineering be a bad thing?

Because it may discourage others from actually cutting down their emissions because it might seem like a managable problem again. Then, people are left with the effects adapted to, but not mitigated.

What is currently being done about carbon leakage?

the EU is holding pollutors accountable for the carbon emissions of the products they import as well as produce so that it puts off them from importing carbon-high goods. They are also cutting down the amount of carbon permits offered, rasing carbon prices.

"What are the problems with the current Carbon Market/ ""Cap-and-trade""?"

1) Carbon prices are too low 2) Rules and regulations of how to measure direct and indirect emissions have not been properly established 3) Unconsistent standards in the Carbon Market Internationally.

What did Joseph Stiglitz and Nicholas Stern suggest for carbon prices

They should be increased to $50-$100 per tonne of CO2 emitted by 2030.

What are some other challenges that arise when it comes to implementing solar engineering?

It requires international cooperation and agreement from all nations- globally- to have far enough a reach to actually make an impact.

What natural consequences can arise when implementing solar engineering?

It can cause changes in rain patterns and leave drought-striken places with even less water.

Where did the big gas cloud, that reached the stratosphere and caused the earth's temp to be lowered for 4 years, form from?

Mt. Pinatubo's volcanic explosion

Eccentricity

path of orbit around the sun- can be elliptical (closer to sun) or circular (far from sun) creating glacial and interglacial periods

Milankovitch cycles

Cycles that explain the sun’s effect on the world’s climat

Global dimming

The process of ash from pollution reflecting more of the sun’s solar radiation back to space and causing temperatures to drop

Obliquity

The axial tilt of the Earth in determine the areas that receive sunlight

Boserup’s optimistic view of resource management

New inventions with increase food availability by the use of new machinery and an increase in ingenuity will lead to higher crop yields. Land reform increases crop productivity and increases in population will stimulate agricultural change as more food is produced to meet population’s demand