Lesson 8 Scientific Collaboration on Climate Change
The Study of Climate
What do we know about the study of climate?
D8.14 All hands needed to help fight climate change
Weather data has only been collected for a few hundred years. It was collected in only a few places on Earth. In most places, weather is constantly changing, and climate changes as well. A few hundred years is a very tiny sample of climate data.
More extensive weather data has been collected in the past few decades. There are more weather stations on Earth collecting more types of data. Satellites use remote sensing to collect data from vast area of the globe, and have produce huge amounts of data. Remote sensing is increasing and improving to make our knowledge of Earths climate related systems more complete. Weather stations, satellite data, weather balloons and undersea sensors are all direct ways of obtaining the data that we use to determine trends in climate.
Historical climate date is indirectly obtained from ice core data, varves, tree rings and coral growth, and many other ways. This gives us a picture of climate for up to 800 000 years. Inferences made from fossil evidence give us some ideas about Earths climate over the last 3 billion years.
There are many natural factors that affect climate. Climate models are mathematical models with many variables. We know they are not perfect, but they are improving. Huge amounts of direct and indirect data have been collected and are processed by powerful computers that run the mathematical models. Advances in computers are making the study of climate more efficient.
Science judges the reliability of climate models by how well they make predictions. The models are sometimes test by putting in historical date to see if they predicted the changes in climate, which we already know. Overall, it seems that climate models reliably predict broad changes over large areas, but do not predict specific changes over smaller areas.
Most evidence agrees that climate has been warming over the past 100 years. What is concerning to most people is that the rate of change seems to be greater than at any time in the past 800 000 years.
Analysis of many kinds of data indicate that the change seems to be man-made. This is called anthropogenic climate change. There are many scientific organizations that believe this is true and try to inform and find ways to fight climate change.
Climate changes will be very damaging to human civilization and change the natural world. (This will be further explored in the next lesson.) It has become a very important issue. While scientific evidence for climate change is extensive and growing, it is not complete. Conclusions about climate change seem more and more valid, they still have shortcomings.
In spite of the shortcomings, most governments collaborate through the UNFCCC and the two current agreements created from the UNFCCC. These agreements, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, have countries working together to meet common goals and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These types of agreements can be difficult to uphold, as countries often have a hard time working with each other.
In the next lesson, you will study the potential impacts of climate change and some potential solutions.
More extensive weather data has been collected in the past few decades. There are more weather stations on Earth collecting more types of data. Satellites use remote sensing to collect data from vast area of the globe, and have produce huge amounts of data. Remote sensing is increasing and improving to make our knowledge of Earths climate related systems more complete. Weather stations, satellite data, weather balloons and undersea sensors are all direct ways of obtaining the data that we use to determine trends in climate.
Historical climate date is indirectly obtained from ice core data, varves, tree rings and coral growth, and many other ways. This gives us a picture of climate for up to 800 000 years. Inferences made from fossil evidence give us some ideas about Earths climate over the last 3 billion years.
There are many natural factors that affect climate. Climate models are mathematical models with many variables. We know they are not perfect, but they are improving. Huge amounts of direct and indirect data have been collected and are processed by powerful computers that run the mathematical models. Advances in computers are making the study of climate more efficient.
Science judges the reliability of climate models by how well they make predictions. The models are sometimes test by putting in historical date to see if they predicted the changes in climate, which we already know. Overall, it seems that climate models reliably predict broad changes over large areas, but do not predict specific changes over smaller areas.
Most evidence agrees that climate has been warming over the past 100 years. What is concerning to most people is that the rate of change seems to be greater than at any time in the past 800 000 years.
Analysis of many kinds of data indicate that the change seems to be man-made. This is called anthropogenic climate change. There are many scientific organizations that believe this is true and try to inform and find ways to fight climate change.
Climate changes will be very damaging to human civilization and change the natural world. (This will be further explored in the next lesson.) It has become a very important issue. While scientific evidence for climate change is extensive and growing, it is not complete. Conclusions about climate change seem more and more valid, they still have shortcomings.
In spite of the shortcomings, most governments collaborate through the UNFCCC and the two current agreements created from the UNFCCC. These agreements, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, have countries working together to meet common goals and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These types of agreements can be difficult to uphold, as countries often have a hard time working with each other.
In the next lesson, you will study the potential impacts of climate change and some potential solutions.