Climate Change

and Global Warming

Global Climate Facts

Combustion of fossil fuels (coal, petroleum, natural gas)
emits carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere (currently
9.4 billion tons of carbon per year)!
Roughly half of the CO2 remains in the atmosphere; most
goes into the ocean (causing ocean acidification)!
Increasing CO2 heats the Earth; global surface temperatures
warmed from 1880-2014 by ~1.0C, of which 0.4C is
natural!
!

Three Lines of Evidence Link CO2 and Climate

Basic Physics: covered in last lecture, CO2 increases
trapping of heat When it comes to belief in global warming,
I attend the church of the radiative balance equation.
RADM Titley, former Oceanographer of the Navy
!

Observations!
!

Modeling!

Three Lines of Evidence Link CO2 and Climate

Basic Physics
!

Observations: increasing CO2, temperature increase, sea

level rise, Arctic sea ice loss, melting of mountain glaciers
and massive ice sheets, longer growing seasons, more
floods and droughts, reduction in snow cover!
!

Modeling:!

Three Lines of Evidence Link CO2 and Climate

Basic Physics:
!

Observations:!
!

Modeling: doubling of CO2 will raise surface temperature by

1.1C without feedbacks. Most feedbacks are positive.
Models suggest a rise of 3C for a doubling but the range is
1.5-4.5C. !

Higher CO2: Anthropogenic (Human) Influence

Co2now.org

The Keeling curve

CO2 is rising due to
burning of fossil fuel and
land use changes.
Wiggles are the
breathing of the
seasons (spring growth
and autumn death).

Observatory at top of Mauna Loa, the big Island

CO2 atmosphere
1850: 280 ppm
2014: 401 ppm
A level not seen on Earth
since 3 million years ago

Higher CO2: Anthropogenic Influence

It really is our CO2.
What we burn is in
the air and the
ocean. Tracers in air
confirm this. For
example, burning
fossil fuels uses
oxygen, but
volcanoes dont. The
drop in oxygen is
clear.

If CO2 from volcanoes,

ocean, etc., nothing is
burning so no oxygen
is used to make CO2

If CO2 from
burning (living or
formerly living
plants) oxygen is
used
R. Keeling and C.D. Keeling
Scripps Institution of Oceanography

(Well still be able to breathe!)

CO2 Hasnt Been >300 ppm For Over 1 Million Yrs

CO2 Rise in NOT Natural

Slide 15

Higher CO2, Warmer Temperatures

CO2

Plot of surface temperature anomalies relative to 20th century

average from NOAA. What happened 1940-1975?
Global dimming: suppression of warming by: 1) sulfates aerosols;
2) volcanic aerosols; 3) lower solar input
After 1975, anthropogenic CO2 warming takes over

Climate 30 year average

Actually, global
warming is clearly
continuing. Be careful
of cherry-picking, and
weather.

Climate usually a
30-year average,
for good reasons!

Source: Gavin Schmidt, NASA GISS

Has Global Warming Stopped? You Make The Call!

Jan. 12, 2013!

Rajendra Pachauri head of

IPCC, February 22, 2013 !

what has been a 17year pause in global

warming.!

http://tamino.wordpress.com/
2012/10/21/temperatureanalysis-by-david-rosedoesnt-smell-so-sweet/!

Has Global Warming Stopped? You Make The Call!

HadleyCRU
land [CRUTEM3] & sea surface temperature anomalies
0.6

1850-2012
1979-2012
0.4

Temperature anomaly, C

This is a plot of
surface temperature
anonomalies
relative to a
1960-1990 average
(baseline)

0.2

-0.2

-0.4

-0.6
1860

1880

1900

1920

1940

Year CE

1960

1980

2000

Has Global Warming Stopped? You Make The Call!

0.6

HadleyCRU
land [CRUTEM3] & sea surface temperature anomalies
1850-2012
1979-2012

Temperature anomaly, C

0.5

0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1

-0.1
1980

1984

1988

1992

1996

2000

2004

2008

2012

Year CE

30-year average shown in blue

Its The Sun, Stupid!

Not True!
Solar variability too
small to explain
observed warming

Radiative Forcings IPCC 4th Assessment 2007!

Radiative forcing is the amount of equivalent insolation (sunlight)!

Note that Solar variability is low: 0.12 w/m2!
CO2 1.66 w/m2; CH4 + halo 0.48 w/m2; ozone 0.35 w/m2; GHG total 2.5 w/m2!

Climate Models: The Sun Cant Do It!

Climate models: the Sun
cant do it!
!
Shows modeled (brown)
versus actual temperature
(black)!
!
Bottom show modeled
contribution of GHG, solar,
ozone, volcanism, sulfates!
!
!
Cool period from 1940-1980
due to sulfate aerosols,
volcanism, some solar !

Phanerozoic Icehouses & Greenhouses

Top: new update

From the perspective of
the last billon years, we
live in a generally cool
period in Earths history,
one with large ice sheets
Red = greenhouse (no ice
sheets)
Blue = cool/glaciations
From the book FIGURE 14-22 Average Global Temperature
during the Phanerozoic

Northern Hemisphere Ice Ages Last 2.5 Million Yr

warm

cold
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Five_Myr_Climate_Change.png

Over the past 2.5 million years, we have had a series of northern
hemisphere ice ages, the last from 20-26,000 years ago.
We live in an interval of unusually cold climate from a 100 milliion year
perspective but unusually warm climate (an interglacial) for the past
2.7 million

An Ice Age

During ice ages, ice sheets covered much of the northern

hemisphere (as far south as Scotch Plains and Menlo Park Mall)

Temperature Over The Last 11,300 Years!

Marcott et al. (2013)!

Human civilization started during the Holocene (last 11,300 yr),

the warm period we are living in. Global climate has been
generally warm and stable.

Reconstructions of Past Climate!

Iconoclastic figure for IPCC 3rd assessment report (TAR)!

Attacking the Hockey Stick

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/falseclaims-by-mcintyre-and-mckitrick-regarding-the-mann-etal-1998reconstruction/?lp_lang_view=fr!

Top: Willie Soon;!

Right: Sen James
Inhofe (R-OK)!
greatest hoax!

Hockey Stick Hokum Wall Street Journal!

It is routine these days to read in
newspapers or hear almost anywhere
the subject of climate change comes up
that the 1990s were the "warmest
decade in a millennium" and that 1998
was the warmest year in the last 1,000.!
!
The trouble is that there's no reason to
believe that Mr. Mann, or his "hockey
stick" graph of global temperature
changes, is right. !
!
This ended with a congressional
commissioning of the National
Research Council!

Northern Hemisphere Temperature

Medieval warm!
Little Ice age!

It can be said with a high level of confidence that global mean surface temperature!
was higher during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period
during the preceding four centuries!
the committee finds it plausible that the Northern Hemisphere was warmer during the last few
decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium.
National Research Council!

Conclusions climate today

Global warming is real, surface temperatures warmed
from 1880-2014 by ~1.0C, of which 0.4C is natural!
!
Anthropogenic CO2 release is a primary driver of the
warming, especially since 1975!
!
Warming (& sea level rise) are not part of a natural cycle!
!
Humans will double CO2 in this century and
temperatures will rise 1.5-4.5C !

CO2 from fossil fuels

Warming
so far

Warming to come
(world continues
past 2100)

33

Brief summary of likely impacts

Temperature increase: loss of unique ecosystems,
disease transmission up, heat waves
Sea level rise (melting of mountain glaciers and massive
ice sheets): flooding!
Arctic sea ice loss: habitats & effects on storm tracks!
Crops: longer growing seasons, more floods and droughts
Damages a few percent of world economy (well over $1
trillion per year) or more
Uncertainties? Costs slightly less, slightly more, or much
more dont find much less

Other Climate Effects:

Regional Warming & Floods/Drought!

Cooling off in NYC!

Drought in Darfur!

Ammerman & McClennen 2000!

Delaware R. flood,
Stockton, NJ 2004!

Potential Effects of Global Climate Change

Climate Patterns
Extreme heat, heat waves, and heavy precipitation
are very likely to become more frequent

Effects of Climate Change on Water Resources:

Floods and Droughts?
Cannonsville Reservoir, Dec. 2001

Slide courtesy of
Tony Broccoli
Delaware River, Sept. 2004

Easton-Phillipsburg Bridge
June 2006

Global Warming and the Hydrologic Cycle!

The downward flux of radiative energy
(i.e., sunlight and infrared radiation) at
the surface is balanced by evaporation
and sensible heating of the atmosphere.
If the downward flux of energy
increases, evaporation increases
On a global basis, evaporation and
precipitation must balance.
As the earth warms, both evaporation &
precipitation increase.

The water
(hydrologic) cycle
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/crp/?
n=education-watercycle

Warmer world precipitation and evaporation!

Rich get richer, poor get poorer

Annual mean rainfall rate change (2071-2100) minus (1961-1990), mm/day
Source: IPCC Working Group I (2001); slide courtesy of Tony Broccoli

Sea ice

Sea ice projected to shrink in

both Arctic and Antarctic.

by mid part of this century, latesummer Arctic sea ice may

disappear entirely.

Fig. 4.9 Arctic summer sea ice

Fig. 4.2 Northern snow cover

Fig. 4.18 Greenland ice sheet

Fig. 4.15b, Glaciers

Fig. 4.18 Antarctic ice sheet

UNIPCC AR4 WG1

Arctic Sea Ice Minima

September Arctic Sea Ice Minima

1979-2007 mean

Changes in heat indices

The heat index combines the effects of
temperature and humidity to estimate
human comfort.!
Results are from simulations with three global
climate models with two emissions
scenarios, representing the low and high
ends of the IPCC range.!
Under the high emissions scenario, Tri-State
summers at the end of the 21st century are
projected to be similar to those in
Savannah, Georgia today.!

Slide courtesy of Tony Broccoli

Ski resorts?

% snow depth changes in March,

projected for 2041 - 2070 by the
Canadian Regional Climate Model
Slide courtesy of Tony Broccoli

Higher sea temperatures

stress tiny animals that
make up corals, leading
to coral bleaching and
death ~15% Pacific
corals died in the 1998 El
Nino (warmest year on
record)

healthy

Coral reefs threatened by:

Ocean acidification due to increased CO2
High sea surface temperatures
Pollution & Human interaction

bleached

Potential Effects of Global Climate Change

Climate Patterns
May change intensity of violent storms such as
hurricanes due to excess heat transfer

Losses from climate disasters increasing

Melting Glaciers
Himalayan glaciers that are sources of Asia's biggest
rivers could disappear as temperatures rise.
In India alone, Ganges provides water for drinking and
farming for more than 500 million people
Watch the documentary
Chasing Ice by James Balrog
http://www.chasingice.com

Boulder Glacier
Glacier National Park, MT

1932

T. J. Hileman photo
courtesy of GNP archives

2005

USGS Repeat Photography Project

http://nrmsc.usgs.gov/repeatphoto/

Greg Pederson photo

USGS

Sperry Glacier
Glacier National Park, MT

circa

1930

Morton Elrod photo

K. Ross Toole Archives
Mansfield Library, UM

2008

Lisa McKeon photo,

USGS

Repeating Elrods photograph from the same photo point was impossible since he shot
from the elevated perspective of the glaciers surface. The terminus of the glacier has
retreated beyond the field of view, but these images give a sense of the glaciers extent
and mass early in the 20th century.

USGS Repeat Photography Project

http://nrmsc.usgs.gov/repeatphoto/

Grinnell Glacier
Glacier National Park, MT

1910

Fred Kiser photo

courtesy of GNP Archives

2008

USGS Repeat Photography Project

http://nrmsc.usgs.gov/repeatphoto/

Lisa McKeon photo,

USGS

Grinnell Glacier
Glacier National Park, MT

T. J. Hileman photo
1938Courtesy
of GNP Archives

1981

Carl Key photo

USGS

1998

D. Fagre photo
USGS

2006

Karen Holzer photo

USGS

Oblique view of Grinnell Glacier taken from the summit of Mount Gould, Glacier National Park.
The relative sensitivity of glaciers to climate change is illustrated by the dramatic recession of
Grinnell Glacier while surrounding vegetation patterns remain stable.

USGS Repeat Photography Project

http://nrmsc.usgs.gov/repeatphoto/

Small glacier
from Stauning
Alps, east
Greenland

Ice edge
in 2005

Ice edge
~1900

1992

2002

Jakobshavn Ice Stream in Greenland

Discharge from many

major Greenland ice
streams has
accelerated markedly

Source: Prof. Konrad Steffen,

Univ. of Colorado

The Rise and Fall of Sea Level

Lecture 13B deals with sea-level rise and its impacts

View of NY harbor from the JOIDES Resolution

in an ice-free world (73 m rise)