elementary lessons climate science phenomena

#Elementary lessons climate science phenomena series#

Yet policies currently in place point to a 2.8☌ temperature rise by the end of the century.

#Elementary lessons climate science phenomena series#

In a series of UN reports, thousands of scientists and government reviewers agreed that limiting global temperature rise to no more than 1.5☌ would help us avoid the worst climate impacts and maintain a livable climate. In the future, the number of “climate refugees” is expected to rise. Conditions like sea-level rise and saltwater intrusion have advanced to the point where whole communities have had to relocate, and protracted droughts are putting people at risk of famine. Some of us are already more vulnerable to climate impacts, such as people living in small island nations and other developing countries. People are experiencing climate change in diverse waysĬlimate change can affect our health, ability to grow food, housing, safety and work. The consequences of climate change now include, among others, intense droughts, water scarcity, severe fires, rising sea levels, flooding, melting polar ice, catastrophic storms and declining biodiversity.

Because the Earth is a system, where everything is connected, changes in one area can influence changes in all others. But temperature rise is only the beginning of the story. Many people think climate change mainly means warmer temperatures. The last decade (2011-2020) was the warmest on record, and each of the last four decades has been warmer than any previous decade since 1850. The average temperature of the Earth’s surface is now about 1.1☌ warmer than it was in the late 1800s (before the industrial revolution) and warmer than at any time in the last 100,000 years.

Human activities like the ones mentioned above are causing greenhouse gases that are warming the world faster than at any time in at least the last two thousand years. Humans are responsible for global warmingĬlimate scientists have showed that humans are responsible for virtually all global heating over the last 200 years.