Scientists around the world strive to learn more about how Rising average temperatures around the world affect weather. they say increasingly likely that climate change is making weather events more intense, more frequent or longer lasting.
Her pierce temperatures in heat waves and adding some precipitation to heavy storms. It can also cause weather events to occur outside of places or times where they typically occurred in the past.
But what is causing climate change? Why are global temperatures rising? Andes Mountains Is the warming climate to blame? for wild weather events? Here are some important information:
What does climate change mean?
Weather is what you see outside the window. Climate is what happens in a region over the years or decades. Climate change is the difference between long-term trends in air, water, and ocean temperatures versus longer-term weather patterns..
Monitoring stations around the world add to a growing wealth of information revealing how temperature and precipitation are changing. Some have decades of measurements, while others have more than a century of data. In Japan, they recorded the debut cherry tree blooms For more than 1,200 years.
Scientists use these historical records to study the rise in global average temperatures. For example, the records show how. sap rises earlier in maple trees horse when forest fire season comes start earlier They know that while warmer water temperatures burn fuel, higher temperatures delay ice formation on the Great Lakes. sea lake effect snow.
DEFINITIONS:Are climate change and global warming the same thing?
EFFECTS:How is climate change disrupting our daily lives and fueling disasters?
What is the most important cause of climate change?
This greatest impact on the planet’s changing climate According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, it is the release of emissions into the atmosphere from burning oil, gas and coal to move people and goods from one place to another and create energy.
Here’s how it works:
- Carbon dioxide and other naturally occurring gases have always existed. Just as a greenhouse keeps tropical plants alive in winter, the atmosphere keeps the earth warm. Scientists are seeing a “greenhouse effect” in ice cores, sediments and tree rings.
- Modern day measurements show CO2 emissions rising. Since 1958, the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, measured at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii, has risen from 316 parts per million to 417 parts per million.
- Measured in such small quantities, the change may seem very small. But NASA and others have warned that because CO2 has risen by more than 30% changes have a huge impact on global average temperatures.
- How national and international studies are documenting excess carbon dioxide traps excess energy and cause the planet to warm faster.
If CO2 doubles pre-industrial levels, draft latest National Climate Assessment He said global temperatures could rise by 4.5 – 7.2 degrees, leading to deadly heatwaves, crop damage and other cascading effects around the world.
What are the other causes of climate change?
- Manufacturing, mining and deforestation.
- The release of methane and nitrous oxide also contribute to the greenhouse effect.
- A model of changing water temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, the El Niño Southern Oscillation can change the weather.
- Volcanic eruptions can produce carbon dioxide emissions that warm the Earth, but also aerosol particles with a cooling effect.
How to stop climate change
So what can be done to prevent the predicted dire consequences if emissions and temperatures continue to rise?
Scientists at the United Nations and governments around the world say fossil fuel emissions must be cut as soon as possible to avoid “disastrous consequences.” To keep the rise in global average temperatures at 2.7 degrees Celsius compared to temperatures in the late 1800s, the world needs to reach “net zero” CO2 emissions by 2050. recent climate assessment.
The world cannot reduce all emissions, so achieving a net zero emission result Requires removal of carbon dioxide from the air By both natural and mechanical means, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported. This includes measures such as protecting forests and wetlands that store carbon, and developing technologies that can absorb carbon effectively from the air.
Other methods promoted by the UN and others include living a less carbon-intensive lifestyle and increasing the use of renewable energy sources.
Even if the world reaches net zero emissions, the national climate assessment states that it will be impossible to prevent some of the warming that is already in motion.
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Dinah Voyles Pulver covers climate and environmental issues for USA TODAY. She can be reached at dpulver@gannett.com or on Twitter at @dinahvp she.
