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We’re lucky climate change didn’t happen sooner
http://www.springer.com/gp/about-springer/media/springer-select/we-re-lucky-climate-change-didn-t-happen-sooner-/10507882[font face=Serif][font size=5]We’re lucky climate change didn’t happen sooner[/font]
[font size=4]Naturally occurring carbon dioxide concentrations gave mankind time to face up to fossil fuels’ impact[/font]
Heidelberg | New York, 21 July 2016
[font size=3]There is some consolation in how the fossil fuel-induced climatic changes we increasingly experience through droughts and storm surges are playing out. It could have happened sooner, and therefore already have been much worse.
Luckily, the natural atmosphere already contained carbon dioxide, enough that the human-induced changes were relatively small, for a long time. Had these concentrations been even slightly lower, the effects of the emission of harmful greenhouse gases would have been felt much earlier, at a time when mankind was not yet ready or knowledgeable enough to face up to mitigation efforts. This silver lining approach is taken by David Archer of the University of Chicago in the US, in a scenario exercise in Springer’s journal Climatic Change.
The concentration of carbon dioxide molecules in the atmosphere is measured as parts per million of dry air, or ppm. In the climatic past and earlier glacial periods, this level fluctuated between 180 ppm and 260 ppm. Measurements taken of Antarctic sheet ice show that the concentration of naturally occurring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was already 278 ppm in the 1750s before industrialization started in earnest.
“If the initial atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration were half its actual value, we would currently be experiencing the climate expected for the year 2050,” says Archer, setting out one possible scenario. “If there were only one-tenth as much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere initially, the climate forcing we are experiencing today would have already happened, in the year 1900.”
…[/font][/font]
[font size=4]Naturally occurring carbon dioxide concentrations gave mankind time to face up to fossil fuels’ impact[/font]
Heidelberg | New York, 21 July 2016
[font size=3]There is some consolation in how the fossil fuel-induced climatic changes we increasingly experience through droughts and storm surges are playing out. It could have happened sooner, and therefore already have been much worse.
Luckily, the natural atmosphere already contained carbon dioxide, enough that the human-induced changes were relatively small, for a long time. Had these concentrations been even slightly lower, the effects of the emission of harmful greenhouse gases would have been felt much earlier, at a time when mankind was not yet ready or knowledgeable enough to face up to mitigation efforts. This silver lining approach is taken by David Archer of the University of Chicago in the US, in a scenario exercise in Springer’s journal Climatic Change.
The concentration of carbon dioxide molecules in the atmosphere is measured as parts per million of dry air, or ppm. In the climatic past and earlier glacial periods, this level fluctuated between 180 ppm and 260 ppm. Measurements taken of Antarctic sheet ice show that the concentration of naturally occurring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was already 278 ppm in the 1750s before industrialization started in earnest.
“If the initial atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration were half its actual value, we would currently be experiencing the climate expected for the year 2050,” says Archer, setting out one possible scenario. “If there were only one-tenth as much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere initially, the climate forcing we are experiencing today would have already happened, in the year 1900.”
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1 replies
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