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Global Climate Change

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发表于 2017-10-31 20:26:32 | 显示全部楼层 |阅读模式

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本帖最后由 coolboy 于 2017-10-31 20:33 编辑

https://www.usatoday.com/story/n ... ort-says/815123001/

Climate change's impact on human health is already here

By Doyle Rice, USA TODAY Published 7:31 p.m. ET Oct. 30, 2017

Climate change is already having an extraordinary impact on human health worldwide — affecting the spread of infectious diseases, exposing millions to air pollution and heat waves and dramatically reducing labor productivity, according to a report released Monday.

"The human symptoms of climate change are unequivocal and potentially irreversible," the report by the British medical journal The Lancet (《柳叶刀》) says, and the situation is so serious that significant gains by modern medicine and technology are being undercut.

"The delayed response to climate change over the past 25 years has jeopardized human life and livelihoods," the report says.

While most previous similar studies have covered the potential impact of climate change on future public health problems, the Lancet report goes a step further and illustrates how it is no longer a future threat but a present one.

The direct effects of climate change "result from rising temperatures and changes in the frequency and strength of storms, floods, droughts and heat waves — with physical and mental health consequences," it says.

For example, from 2000 to 2016, there has been a 46% increase in the number of weather-related disasters, the report notes.

Warming is exacerbating the spread of Dengue fever, the world’s most rapidly expanding disease. In fact, two types of mosquitoes' ability to spread Dengue globally has increased by 9.4% and 11.1% since the 1950s.

An additional 125 million people around the world were exposed to heat waves each year from 2000 to 2016 (as compared with 1986-2008), and a record 175 million people were exposed to heat waves in 2015.

Rising temperatures have led to a 5.3% fall in labor productivity in the planet's rural areas since 2000, with a dramatic drop of 2% from 2015 to 2016. In 2016, this effectively took more than 920,000 people out of the global workforce.

Global exposure to dangerous levels of air pollution has increased by 11.2% since 1990.

Climate change is also worsening allergies in the United States. For example, Americans faced significantly longer exposure to ragweed pollen in 2016 compared with 1990.

Cutting the greenhouse gas emissions that lead to global warming is necessary for public health, the report says. Reductions have already begun to occur across major economies, driven by the expansion of renewable energy and the phasing out of coal.

Curbing emissions could have immediate and substantial health benefits, the report says, such as cleaner air in previously polluted cities.

“Preventing illnesses and injuries is more humane, more effective and more economical than treating people once they've become sick," said Howard Frumkin of the University of Washington School of Public Health, one of the study authors.

"That's plain common sense," he added. "What this report makes clear is that fighting climate change is disease prevention.”

Christiana Figueres, former executive secretary of the United Nations' Framework Convention on Climate Change, said “the Lancet Countdown's report lays bare the impact that climate change is having on our health today. It also shows that tackling climate change directly, unequivocally and immediately improves global health. It's as simple as that."




发表于 2017-11-1 09:28:39 | 显示全部楼层
美国今年的自然灾害比较多

点评

是如此。主要是美国南部遭受几次飓风侵袭破坏,加州山林大火等。这些增多的自然灾害应该是同全球变暖的趋势是有相关性的。  详情 回复 发表于 2017-11-1 19:05
 楼主| 发表于 2017-11-1 19:05:05 | 显示全部楼层
周华 发表于 2017-11-1 09:28
美国今年的自然灾害比较多


是如此。主要是美国南部遭受几次飓风侵袭破坏,加州山林大火等。这些增多的自然灾害应该是同全球变暖的趋势是有相关性的。
 楼主| 发表于 2018-10-8 21:10:21 | 显示全部楼层

Two Americans win Nobel Prize in economics

By Taylor Telford
October 8 at 7:58 AM

Two American economists, William Nordhaus and Paul Romer, received the Nobel Prize for economics Monday for their work on the relationship of climate change and technological innovation to economics, which has had a lasting effect on policy around the world.

Nordhaus, a longtime professor of economics at Yale University, and Romer, a former senior vice president of World Bank and now an economics professor at New York University, were announced the winners of the $1 million prize by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

Although the two men worked independently, the academy recognized them together for work that “broadened the scope of economic analysis” through modeling methods that are used to study long-term change and shape policy practices.

“William D. Nordhaus and Paul M. Romer have designed methods for addressing some of our time’s most basic and pressing questions about how we create long-term sustained and sustainable economic growth,” the academy said in a news release.

Nordhaus, 77, began exploring the impact of environmental issues on the economy in the 1970s and was recognized for his pioneering work in applying economic analysis to climate change forecasts.

In the mid-90s, Nordhaus was the first person to create a model that “describes the global interplay between the economy and the climate,” the academy said. The model pulls theories and data from chemistry, physics and economics and is used to explore the possible effects of climate policy interventions. Nordhaus also invented the idea of a carbon tax.

Born in Albuquerque, Nordhaus studied at Yale as an undergraduate. After earning his doctorate in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge in 196, he returned to Yale to teach.

Romer, 62, was recognized for his work modeling methods for long-term economic growth and for exploring economic decisions and how market conditions can fuel technological innovation, the academy said in the release. Romer’s most influential work, published in 1990, created “endogenous growth theory”, which shows how technological development is spurred by deliberate policy-making that promotes research, growth and education. Romer’s work “has generated vast amounts of new research into the regulations and policies that encourage new ideas and long-term prosperity,” the academy said.

When his phone rang -- with a call notifying him that he’d won the prize -- Romer initially ignored it because he thought it was a spam call, the Associated Press reported. In 2016, NYU wrongly announced that he’d won the prize.
 楼主| 发表于 2018-11-24 02:48:12 | 显示全部楼层
https://public.wmo.int/en/media/ ... re-reach-new-record

Greenhouse gas levels in atmosphere reach new record

Published 20 November 2018

Levels of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have reached another new record high, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). There is no sign of a reversal in this trend, which is driving long-term climate change, sea level rise, ocean acidification and more extreme weather.

The WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin showed that globally averaged concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) reached 405.5 parts per million (ppm) in 2017, up from 403.3 ppm in 2016 and 400.1 ppm in 2015. Concentrations of methane and nitrous oxide also rose, whilst there was a resurgence of a potent greenhouse gas and ozone depleting substance called CFC-11, which is regulated under an international agreement to protect the ozone layer.

Since 1990, there has been a 41% increase in total radiative forcing – the warming effect on the climate - by long-lived greenhouse gases. CO2 accounts for about 82% of the increase in radiative forcing over the past decade, according to figures from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration quoted in the WMO Bulletin.

“The science is clear. Without rapid cuts in CO2 and other greenhouse gases, climate change will have increasingly destructive and irreversible impacts on life on Earth. The window of opportunity for action is almost closed,” said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas.

“The last time the Earth experienced a comparable concentration of CO2 was 3-5 million years ago, when the temperature was 2-3°C warmer and sea level was 10-20 meters higher than now,” said Mr Taalas.

The WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin reports on atmospheric concentrations  of greenhouse gases. Emissions represent what goes into the atmosphere. Concentrations represent what remains in the atmosphere after the complex system of interactions between the atmosphere, biosphere, lithosphere, cryosphere and the oceans. About a quarter of the total emissions is absorbed by the oceans and another quarter by the biosphere.

A separate Emissions Gap Report by UN Environment (UNEP), to be released on 27 November, tracks the policy commitments made by countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The WMO and UNEP reports come on top of the scientific evidence provided by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C. This said that net emissions of CO2 must reach zero (the amount of CO2 entering the atmosphere must equal the amount that is removed by sinks, natural and technological) around 2050 in order to keep temperature increases to below 1.5°C. It showed how keeping temperature increases below 2°C would reduce the risks to human well-being, ecosystems and sustainable development.

“CO2 remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years and in the oceans for even longer. There is currently no magic wand to remove all the excess CO2 from the atmosphere,” said WMO Deputy Secretary-General Elena Manaenkova.

“Every fraction of a degree of global warming matters, and so does every part per million of greenhouse gases,” she said.

Together, the reports provide a scientific base for decision-making at the UN climate change negotiations, which will be held from 2-14 December in Katowice, Poland. The key objective of the meeting is to adopt the implementation guidelines of the Paris Climate Change Agreement, which aims to hold the global average temperature increase to as close as possible to 1.5°C.

“The new IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C shows that deep and rapid reductions of emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases will be needed in all sectors of society and the economy. The WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin, showing a continuing rising trend in concentrations of greenhouse gases, underlines just how urgent these emissions reductions are,” said IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee.

Integrated Global Greenhouse Gas Information System

The Greenhouse Gas Bulletin is based on observations from the WMO Global Atmosphere Watch Programme, which tracks the changing levels of greenhouse gases as a result of industrialization, energy use from fossil fuel sources, intensified agricultural practices, increases in land use and deforestation. Globally averages presented in the Bulletin are representative for the global atmosphere.

The urgency of actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions requires more tools at national and sub-national level to support stakeholders in taking effective and efficient actions.

Recognizing this need, WMO has initiated the development of observational based tools that can guide the emissions reduction actions and confirm their results, for instance in the oil and gas sector.

A new Integrated Global Greenhouse Gas Information System (IG3IS) provides the framework for the development and standardization of the observational based tools. IG3IS is implemented by countries on a voluntary basis and will feed into the national emission reporting mechanism to the UN Framework on Climate Change and the annual Conference of the Parties.

Key Findings of the Greenhouse Gas Bulletin

Carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide is the main long-lived greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. Concentrations reached 405.5 ppm in 2017, 146% of the pre-industrial era (before 1750). The increase in CO2 from 2016 to 2017 was about the same as the average growth rate over the last decade. It was smaller than the record leap observed from 2015 to 2016 under the influence of a strong El Niño event, which triggered droughts in tropical regions and reduced the capacity of “sinks” like forests and vegetation to absorb CO2.  There was no El Niño in 2017.

Methane

Methane (CH4) is the second most important long-lived greenhouse gas and contributes about 17% of radiative forcing. Approximately 40% of methane is emitted into the atmosphere by natural sources (e.g., wetlands and termites), and about 60% comes from human activities like cattle breeding, rice agriculture, fossil fuel exploitation, landfills and biomass burning.

Atmospheric methane reached a new high of about 1859 parts per billion (ppb) in 2017 and is now 257% of the pre-industrial level. Its rate of increase was about equal that observed over the past decade.

Nitrous Oxide

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is emitted into the atmosphere from both natural (about 60%) and anthropogenic sources (approximately 40%), including oceans, soil, biomass burning, fertilizer use, and various industrial processes.

Its atmospheric concentration in 2017 was 329.9 parts per billion. This is 122% of pre-industrial levels. It also plays an important role in the destruction of the stratospheric ozone layer which protects us from the harmful ultraviolet rays of the sun. It accounts for about 6% of radiative forcing by long-lived greenhouse gases.

CFC-11

The Bulletin has a special section devoted to CFC-11 (trichlorofluoromethane). This is a potent greenhouse gas and a stratospheric ozone depleting substance regulated under the Montreal Protocol. Since 2012 its rate of decline has slowed to roughly two thirds of its rate of decline during the preceding decade. The most likely cause of this slowing is increased emissions associated with production of CFC-11 in eastern Asia.

This discovery illustrates the importance of long-term measurements of atmospheric composition, such as are carried out by the Global Atmosphere Watch Programme, in providing observation-based information to support national emissions inventories and to support agreements to address anthropogenic climate change, as well as for the recovery of the stratospheric ozone layer.
 楼主| 发表于 2019-4-9 06:19:27 | 显示全部楼层
有一英语谚语是说:April showers bring May flowers.
四月雨帶來五月花。(四月陣雨天,五月花似濉#
 楼主| 发表于 2023-5-18 22:02:18 | 显示全部楼层

Global temperatures set to reach new records in next five years

Geneva, 17 May 2023 (WMO) – Global temperatures are likely to surge to record levels in the next five years, fueled by heat-trapping greenhouse gases and a naturally occurring El Niño event, according to a new update issued by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
There is a 66% likelihood that the annual average near-surface global temperature between 2023 and 2027 will be more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels for at least one year.  There is a 98% likelihood that at least one of the next five years, and the five-year period as a whole, will be the warmest on record.
“This report does not mean that we will permanently exceed the 1.5°C level specified in the Paris Agreement which refers to long-term warming over many years. However, WMO is sounding the alarm that we will breach the 1.5°C level on a temporary basis with increasing frequency,” said WMO Secretary-General Prof. Petteri Taalas.
“A warming El Niño is expected to develop in the coming months and this will combine with human-induced climate change to push global temperatures into uncharted territory,” he said. “This will have far-reaching repercussions for health, food security, water management and the environment. We need to be prepared,” said Prof. Taalas.
There is only a 32% chance that the five-year mean will exceed the 1.5°C threshold, according to the Global Annual to Decadal Climate Update produced by the United Kingdom’s Met Office, the WMO lead centre for such predictions.
The chance of temporarily exceeding 1.5°C has risen steadily since 2015, when it was close to zero.  For the years between 2017 and 2021, there was a 10% chance of exceedance.
“Global mean temperatures are predicted to continue increasing, moving us away further and further away from the climate we are used to,” said Dr Leon Hermanson, a Met Office expert scientist who led the report.
Key points
The average global temperature in 2022 was about 1.15°C above the 1850-1900 average. The cooling influence of La Niña conditions over much of the past three years temporarily reined in the longer-term warming trend. But La Niña ended in March 2023 and an El Niño is forecast to develop in the coming months. Typically, El Niño increases global temperatures in the year after it develops – in this case this would be 2024.
The annual mean global near-surface temperature for each year between 2023 and 2027 is predicted to be between 1.1°C and 1.8°C higher than the 1850-1900 average. This is used as a baseline because it was before the emission of greenhouse gases from human and industrial activities.
There is a 98% chance of at least one in the next five years beating the temperature record set in 2016, when there was an exceptionally strong El Niño.
The chance of the five-year mean for 2023-2027 being higher than the last five years is also 98%.
Arctic warming is disproportionately high. Compared to the 1991-2020 average, the temperature anomaly is predicted to be more than three times as large as the global mean anomaly when averaged over the next five northern hemisphere extended winters.
Predicted precipitation patterns for the May to September 2023-2027 average, compared to the 1991-2020 average, suggest increased rainfall in the Sahel, northern Europe, Alaska and northern Siberia, and reduced rainfall for this season over the Amazon and parts of Australia.
Paris Agreement
In addition to increasing global temperatures, human-induced greenhouse gases are leading to more ocean heating and acidification, sea ice and glacier melt, sea level rise and more extreme weather.
The Paris Agreement sets long-term goals to guide all nations to substantially reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to limit the global temperature increase in this century to 2 °C while pursuing efforts to limit the increase even further to 1.5 °C, to avoid or reduce adverse impacts and related losses and damages.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says that climate-related risks for natural and human systems are higher for global warming of 1.5 °C than at present, but lower than at 2 °C.
The new report was released ahead of the World Meteorological Congress (22 May to 2 June) which will discuss how to strengthen weather and climate services to support climate change adaptation. Priorities for discussion at Congress include the ongoing Early Warnings for All initiative to protect people from increasingly extreme weather and a new Greenhouse Gas Monitoring Infrastructure to inform climate mitigation.
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