NationMaster - Encyclopedia: Effects of global warming

The predicted effects of global warming on the environment and for human life are numerous and varied. It is generally difficult to attribute specific natural phenomena to long-term causes, but some effects of recent climate change may already be occurring. Raising sea levels, glacier retreat, Arctic shrinkage, and altered patterns of agriculture are cited as direct consequences, but predictions for secondary and regional effects include extreme weather events, an expansion of tropical diseases, changes in the timing of seasonal patterns in ecosystems, and drastic economic impact. Concerns have led to political activism advocating proposals to mitigate, eliminate, or adapt to it. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (650x686, 55 KB) Description Predicted changes in average surface temperature according to a range of global climate models assuming no significant action is taken to combat global warming. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (650x686, 55 KB) Description Predicted changes in average surface temperature according to a range of global climate models assuming no significant action is taken to combat global warming. ... The IPCC Third Assessment Report is a product of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is based in Geneva Switzerland, and was established in 1988 by two United Nations organisations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). ... IPCC is the science authority for the UNFCCC The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established in 1988 by two United Nations organizations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), to evaluate the risk of climate change brought on by humans, based mainly on... Global warming refers to the increase in the average temperature of the Earths near-surface air and oceans in recent decades and its projected continuation. ... Central New York City. ... Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 450,000 years For current global climate change, see Global warming. ... Sea level measurements from 23 long tide gauge records in geologically stable environments show a rise of around 20 centimeters per century (2 mm/year). ... A view down the Whitechuck Glacier in North Cascades National Park in 1973 The same view as seen in 2006, where this branch of glacier retreated 1. ... Arctic shrinkage refers to the marked decrease in arctic ice levels in recent years. ... Trends in natural disasters, Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times UNEP/GRID-Arendal Extreme weather includes weather phenomena that are at the extremes of the historical distribution, especially severe or unseasonal weather. ... Tropical diseases are infectious diseases that either occur uniquely in tropical and subtropical regions (which is rare) or, more commonly, are either more widespread in the tropics or more difficult to prevent or control. ... Phenology is the study of the times of recurring natural phenomena. ... As recent estimates of the rate of global warming have increased, so have the financial estimates of the damage costs. ... The politics of global warming looks at the current political issues relating to global warming, as well as the historical rise of global warming as a political issue. ... Global carbon dioxide emissions 1800â€“2000 Global average surface temperature 1850 to 2006 Mitigation of global warming involves taking actions aimed at reducing the extent of global warming. ... A low-carbon economy is an economy in which carbon dioxide emissions from the use of carbon based fuels (coal, oil and gas) are significantly reduced. ... Adaptation to global warming covers all actions aimed at reducing the negative effects of global warming. ...

The 2007 Fourth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) includes a summary of the expected effects. Climate Change 2007, the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is the fourth in a series of such reports. ... IPCC is the science authority for the UNFCCC The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established in 1988 by two United Nations organizations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), to evaluate the risk of climate change brought on by humans, based mainly on...

Overview

Projected climate changes due to global warming have the potential to lead to future large-scale and possibly irreversible effects at continental and global scales. The likelihood, magnitude, and timing is uncertain and controversial, but some examples of projected climate changes include significant slowing of the ocean circulation that transports warm water to the North Atlantic, large reductions in the Greenland and West Antarctic Ice Sheets, accelerated global warming due to carbon cycle feedbacks in the terrestrial biosphere, and releases of terrestrial carbon from permafrost regions and methane from hydrates in coastal sediments. Global warming refers to the increase in the average temperature of the Earths near-surface air and oceans in recent decades and its projected continuation. ... The global warming controversy is a dispute regarding the nature and consequences of global warming. ... Atlantic and North Atlantic redirect here. ... The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) blankets the continent of Antarctica west of the Transantarctic Mountains, covering the area called Lesser Antarctica. The WAIS is classified as a marine-based ice sheet, meaning that its bed lies well below sea level and its edges flow into floating ice shelves. ... For other uses, see Biosphere (disambiguation). ... While these two men dig in Alaska to study soil, the hard permafrost requires the use of a jackhammer In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0 Â°C or 32 Â°F) for two or more years. ...

The probability of one or more of these changes occurring is likely to increase with the rate, magnitude, and duration of climate change. Additionally, the United States National Academy of Sciences has warned, "greenhouse warming and other human alterations of the earth system may increase the possibility of large, abrupt, and unwelcome regional or global climatic events. . . . Future abrupt changes cannot be predicted with confidence, and climate surprises are to be expected."^[1] President Harding and the National Academy of Sciences at the White House, Washington, DC, April 1921 The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine. ...

The IPCC finds that the effects of global warming will be mixed across regions. For smaller values of warming (1 to 3 °C), changes are expected to produce net benefits in some regions and for some activities, and net costs for others. Greater warming may produce net costs (or to reduce the benefits from smaller warming) in all regions. Developing countries are vulnerable to reduced economic growth as a result of warming.^[2] For other uses, see Celsius (disambiguation). ...

Most of the consequences of global warming would result from one of three physical changes: sea level rise, higher local temperatures, and changes in rainfall patterns. Sea level is generally expected to rise 18 to 59 cm (7.1 to 23.2 inches) by the end of the century.^[3] Sea level measurements from 23 long tide gauge records in geologically stable environments show a rise of around 20 centimeters per century (2 mm/year). ...

Physical impacts

Effects on weather

Increasing temperature is likely to lead to increasing precipitation ^[4]^[5] but the effects on storms are less clear. Extratropical storms partly depend on the temperature gradient, which is predicted to weaken in the northern hemisphere as the polar region warms more than the rest of the hemisphere.^[6] Image File history File links Size of this preview: 645 Ã— 600 pixel Image in higher resolution (1100 Ã— 1023 pixel, file size: 275 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times, www. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 645 Ã— 600 pixel Image in higher resolution (1100 Ã— 1023 pixel, file size: 275 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times, www. ... Trends in natural disasters, Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times UNEP/GRID-Arendal Extreme weather includes weather phenomena that are at the extremes of the historical distribution, especially severe or unseasonal weather. ... The temperature gradient in a given direction from a given spatial starting point is the rate at which temperature changes relative to distance in that direction from that point. ...

Extreme weather

Storm strength leading to extreme weather is increasing, such as the power dissipation index of hurricane intensity.^[7] Kerry Emanuel writes that hurricane power dissipation is highly correlated with temperature, reflecting global warming.^[8]. However, a further study by Emanuel using current model output has concluded that the increase in power dissipation in recent decades cannot be completely attributed to global warming^[9]. Hurricane modeling has produced similar results, finding that hurricanes, simulated under warmer, high-CO₂ conditions, are more intense; there is less confidence in projections of a global decrease in numbers of hurricanes. Worldwide, the proportion of hurricanes reaching categories 4 or 5 – with wind speeds above 56 metres per second – has risen from 20% in the 1970s to 35% in the 1990s.^[10] Precipitation hitting the US from hurricanes has increased by 7% over the twentieth century.^[11]^[12]^[13] The extent to which this is due to global warming as opposed to the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation is unclear. Some studies have found that the increase in sea surface temperature may be offset by an increase in wind shear, leading to little or no change in hurricane activity.^[14] Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (700x708, 30 KB)[edit] Description This figure, which reproduces one of the key conclusions of Knutson & Tuleya (2004), shows a prediction for how hurricanes and other tropical cyclones may intensify as a result of global warming. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (700x708, 30 KB)[edit] Description This figure, which reproduces one of the key conclusions of Knutson & Tuleya (2004), shows a prediction for how hurricanes and other tropical cyclones may intensify as a result of global warming. ... Trends in natural disasters, Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times UNEP/GRID-Arendal Extreme weather includes weather phenomena that are at the extremes of the historical distribution, especially severe or unseasonal weather. ... Kerry Emanuel is an American Professor of Meteorology currently working at MIT in Boston. ... This article is about weather phenomena. ... The Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale is a scale classifying most Western Hemisphere tropical cyclones that exceed the intensities of tropical depressions and tropical storms, and thereby become hurricanes. ... Upper: AMO index: the ten-year running mean of detrended Atlantic sea surface temperature anomaly (SSTA, Â°C) north of the equator. ...

Increases in catastrophes resulting from extreme weather are mainly caused by increasing population densities, and anticipated future increases are similarly dominated by societal change rather than climate change ^[15]. The World Meteorological Organization^[16] and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency^[17] have linked increasing extreme weather events to global warming, as have Hoyos et al.^[18], writing that the increasing number of category 4 and 5 hurricanes is directly linked to increasing temperatures. Thomas Knutson and Robert E. Tuleya of NOAA stated in 2004 that warming induced by greenhouse gas may lead to increasing occurrence of highly destructive category-5 storms.^[19] Vecchi and Soden find that wind shear, the increase of which acts to inhibit tropical cyclones, also changes in model-projections of global warming. There are projected increases of wind shear in the tropical Atlantic and East Pacific associated with the deceleration of the Walker circulation, as well as decreases of wind shear in the western and central Pacific.^[20] The study does not make claims about the net effect on Atlantic and East Pacific hurricanes of the warming and moistening atmospheres, and the model-projected increases in Atlantic wind shear. ^[21] Trends in natural disasters, Pascal Peduzzi (2004) Is climate change increasing the frequency of hazardous events? Environment Times UNEP/GRID-Arendal Extreme weather includes weather phenomena that are at the extremes of the historical distribution, especially severe or unseasonal weather. ... WMO flag The World Meteorological Organization (WMO, French: , OMM) is an intergovernmental organization with a membership of 188 Member States and Territories. ... The mission of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is to protect human health and to safeguard the natural environment: air, water, and land. ... Thomas Knutson is a climate modeller at the US Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). ... The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is a scientific agency of the United States Department of Commerce focused on the conditions of the oceans and the atmosphere. ... Top: Increasing atmospheric levels as measured in the atmosphere and ice cores. ... For the Marvel Comics character, see Windshear (comics). ... This article is about weather phenomena. ... For the Marvel Comics character, see Windshear (comics). ... The Walker circulation is an atmospheric circulation of air at the equatorial Pacific Ocean, responsible for creating ocean upwelling off the coasts of Peru and Ecuador. ...

A substantially higher risk of extreme weather does not necessarily mean a noticeably greater risk of slightly-above-average weather.^[22] However, the evidence is clear that severe weather and moderate rainfall are also increasing. Increases in temperature are expected to produce more intense convection over land and a higher frequency of the most severe storms.^[23]

Stephen Mwakifwamba, national co-ordinator of the Centre for Energy, Environment, Science and Technology - which prepared the Tanzanian government's climate change report to the UN - says that change is happening in Tanzania right now. "In the past, we had a drought about every 10 years", he says. "Now we just don't know when they will come. They are more frequent, but then so are floods. The climate is far less predictable. We might have floods in May or droughts every three years. Upland areas, which were never affected by mosquitoes, now are. Water levels are decreasing every day. The rains come at the wrong time for farmers and it is leading to many problems"^[24].

Greg Holland, director of the Mesoscale and Microscale Meteorology Division at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, said on April 24, 2006, "The hurricanes we are seeing are indeed a direct result of climate change," and that the wind and warmer water conditions that fuel storms when they form in the Caribbean are, "increasingly due to greenhouse gases. There seems to be no other conclusion you can logically draw." Holland said, "The large bulk of the scientific community say what we are seeing now is linked directly to greenhouse gases." ^[25] (See also "Global warming?" in tropical cyclone) NCAR, Boulder, Colorado National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is a U.S.-based institute whose stated mission is: NCARs flagship Mesa Laboratory is located in the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado, in a dramatic complex of buildings designed by architect I.M. Pei. ... Cyclone Catarina, a rare South Atlantic tropical cyclone viewed from the International Space Station on March 26, 2004 Hurricane and Typhoon redirect here. ...

Increased evaporation

Over the course of the 20th century, evaporation rates have reduced worldwide ^[26]; this is thought by many to be explained by global dimming. As the climate grows warmer and the causes of global dimming are reduced, evaporation will increase due to warmer oceans. Because the world is a closed system this will cause heavier rainfall, with more erosion. This erosion, in turn, can in vulnerable tropical areas (especially in Africa) lead to desertification due to deforestation. On the other hand, in other areas, increased rainfall lead to growth of forests in dry desert areas. Stratospheric water vapor 1% increase. ... Stratospheric water vapor 1% increase. ... Global dimming is the gradual reduction in the amount of global direct irradiance at the Earths surface that was observed for several decades after the start of systematic measurements in 1950s. ... Vaporization redirects here. ... In meteorology, precipitation is any kind of water that falls from the sky as part of the weather. ... For morphological image processing operations, see Erosion (morphology). ... Ship stranded by the retreat of the Aral Sea Desertification is the degradation of land in arid, semi arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various climatic variations, but primarily from human activities. ... Deforestation is the conversion of forested areas to non-forested. ...

Scientists have found evidence that increased evaporation could result in more extreme weather as global warming progresses. The IPCC Third Annual Report says: "...global average water vapor concentration and precipitation are projected to increase during the 21st century. By the second half of the 21st century, it is likely that precipitation will have increased over northern mid- to high latitudes and Antarctica in winter. At low latitudes there are both regional increases and decreases over land areas. Larger year to year variations in precipitation are very likely over most areas where an increase in mean precipitation is projected."^[4]^[27] For the geological process, see Weathering or Erosion. ...

Cost of more extreme weather

It's predicted that each 1% increase in annual precipitation would enlarge the cost of catastrophic storms by 2.8%^[28]

The Association of British Insurers has stated that limiting carbon emissions would avoid 80% of the projected additional annual cost of tropical cyclones by the 2080s. The cost is also increasing partly because of building in exposed areas such as coasts and floodplains. The ABI claims that reduction of the vulnerability to some inevitable effects of climate change, for example through more resilient buildings and improved flood defences, could also result in considerable cost-savings in the longterm.^[29]

Destabilization of local climates

In the northern hemisphere, the southern part of the Arctic region (home to 4,000,000 people) has experienced a temperature rise of 1 °C to 3 °C (1.8 °F to 5.4 °F) over the last 50 years. Canada, Alaska and Russia are experiencing initial melting of permafrost. This may disrupt ecosystems and by increasing bacterial activity in the soil lead to these areas becoming carbon sources instead of carbon sinks ^[30]. A study (published in Science) of changes to eastern Siberia's permafrost suggests that it is gradually disappearing in the southern regions, leading to the loss of nearly 11% of Siberia's nearly 11,000 lakes since 1971 ^[31]. At the same time, western Siberia is at the initial stage where melting permafrost is creating new lakes, which will eventually start disappearing as in the east. Furthermore, permafrost melting will eventually cause methane release from melting permafrost peat bogs. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (4000x4000, 2519 KB) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Cyclone Catarina 2003-04 Southern Hemisphere tropical cyclone season List of South America tropical cyclones Portal:Tropical cyclones... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (4000x4000, 2519 KB) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Cyclone Catarina 2003-04 Southern Hemisphere tropical cyclone season List of South America tropical cyclones Portal:Tropical cyclones... Cyclone Catarina was an extremely rare South Atlantic tropical cyclone. ... For the ships, see USS Arctic, SS Arctic, MV Arctic The red line indicates the 10Â°C isotherm in July, sometimes used to define the Arctic region border Artificially coloured topographical map of the Arctic region The Arctic is the region around the Earths North Pole, opposite the Antarctic... For other uses, see Alaska (disambiguation). ... While these two men dig in Alaska to study soil, the hard permafrost requires the use of a jackhammer In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0 Â°C or 32 Â°F) for two or more years. ... A carbon dioxide sink or CO2 sink is the opposite of a carbon source. ... This article is about Siberia as a whole. ... While these two men dig in Alaska to study soil, the hard permafrost requires the use of a jackhammer In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0 Â°C or 32 Â°F) for two or more years. ... Graphical description of risks and impacts from global warming from the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. ...

Hurricanes were thought to be an entirely North Atlantic phenomenon. In late March 2004, the first Atlantic cyclone to form south of the equator hit Brazil with 40 m/s (144 km/h) winds, although some Brazilian meteorologists deny that it was a hurricane.^[32] Monitoring systems may have to be extended 1,600 km (1,000 miles) further south. There is no agreement as to whether this hurricane is linked to climate change, ^[33] but at least one climate model exhibits increased tropical cyclone genesis in the South Atlantic under global warming by the end of the 21st century.^[34] Cyclone Catarina, a rare South Atlantic tropical cyclone viewed from the International Space Station on March 26, 2004 Hurricane and Typhoon redirect here. ... Cyclone Catarina was an extremely rare South Atlantic tropical cyclone. ... World map showing the equator in red For other uses, see Equator (disambiguation). ...

Glacier retreat and disappearance

In historic times, glaciers grew during a cool period from about 1550 to 1850 known as the Little Ice Age. Subsequently, until about 1940, glaciers around the world retreated as the climate warmed. Glacier retreat declined and reversed in many cases from 1950 to 1980 as a slight global cooling occurred. Since 1980, glacier retreat has become increasingly rapid and ubiquitous, and has threatened the existence of many of the glaciers of the world. This process has increased markedly since 1995. ^[35] A view down the Whitechuck Glacier in North Cascades National Park in 1973 The same view as seen in 2006, where this branch of glacier retreated 1. ... Image File history File links Glacier_Mass_Balance_Map. ... Image File history File links Glacier_Mass_Balance_Map. ... Image File history File links Lewist. ... Image File history File links Lewist. ... The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer era known as the Medieval climate optimum. ... A view down the Whitechuck Glacier in North Cascades National Park in 1973 The same view as seen in 2006, where this branch of glacier retreated 1. ...

Excluding the ice caps and ice sheets of the Arctic and Antarctic, the total surface area of glaciers worldwide has decreased by 50% since the end of the 19th century ^[36]. Currently glacier retreat rates and mass balance losses have been increasing in the Andes, Alps, Himalayas, Rocky Mountains and North Cascades. An ice cap is a dome-shaped ice mass that covers less than 50,000 kmÂ² of land area (usually covering a highland area). ... An ice sheet is a mass of glacier ice that covers surrounding terrain and is greater than 50,000 kmÂ² (19,305 mileÂ²).[1] The only current ice sheets are in Antarctica and Greenland; during the last ice age at Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) the Laurentide ice sheet covered much... Perito Moreno Glacier Patagonia Argentina Aletsch Glacier, Switzerland Icebergs breaking off glaciers at Cape York, Greenland This article is about the geological formation. ... This article is about the mountain system in South America. ... Alp redirects here. ... For the movie Himalaya, see Himalaya (film). ... For individual mountains named Rocky Mountain, see Rocky Mountain (disambiguation). ... Mount Adams in Washington state The Cascade Range is a mountainous region famous for its chain of tall volcanos called the High Cascades that run north-south along the west coast of North America from British Columbia to the Shasta Cascade area of northern California. ...

The loss of glaciers not only directly causes landslides, flash floods and glacial lake overflow^[37], but also increases annual variation in water flows in rivers. Glacier runoff declines in the summer as glaciers decrease in size, this decline is already observable in several regions ^[38]. Glaciers retain water on mountains in high precipitation years, since the snow cover accumulating on glaciers protects the ice from melting. In warmer and drier years, glaciers offset the lower precipitation amounts with a higher meltwater input ^[36]. The Seven Rila Lakes in Rila, Bulgaria are typical representatives of lakes with glacial origin A glacial lake is a lake with origins in a melted glacier. ...

Of particular importance are the Hindu Kush and Himalayan glacial melts that comprise the principal dry-season water source of many of the major rivers of the South, East and Southeast Asian mainland. Increased melting would cause greater flow for several decades, after which "some areas of the most populated regions on Earth are likely to 'run out of water'" as source glaciers are depleted. ^[39] The Hindu Kush or Hindukush (هندوکش in Persian) is a mountain range in Afghanistan as well as in the Northern Areas of Pakistan. ... Perspective view of the Himalaya and Mount Everest as seen from space looking south-south-east from over the Tibetan Plateau. ... Map of South Asia (see note on Kashmir). ... This article is about the geographical region. ... Location of Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is a subregion of Asia. ...

According to a UN climate report, the Himalayan glaciers that are the sources of Asia's biggest rivers - Ganges, Indus, Brahmaputra, Yangtze, Mekong, Salween and Yellow - could disappear by 2035 as temperatures rise.^[40] Approximately 2.4 billion people live in the drainage basin of the Himalayan rivers.^[41] India, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Myanmar could experience floods followed by droughts in coming decades. In India alone, the Ganges provides water for drinking and farming for more than 500 million people.^[42]^[43]^[44] For the movie Himalaya, see Himalaya (film). ... For other uses, see Asia (disambiguation). ... Ganga redirects here. ... The Indus is a river; the Indus River. ... The Brahmaputra is one of the major rivers of Asia. ... Length 6,380 km Elevation of the source ? m Average discharge 31,900 m³/s Area watershed 1,800,000 km² Origin Qinghai Province and Tibet Mouth East China Sea Basin countries China The Chang Jiang (Simplified Chinese: 长江; Traditional Chinese: 長江; pinyin: Cháng Jiāng; Wade-Giles: Chang Chiang... The Mekong is one of the worldâ€™s major rivers. ... The Salween River (also spelt Salwin, a. ... This article is about the color. ... A drainage basin is the area within the drainage basin divide (blue outline), and drains the surface runoff and river discharge (green lines) of a contiguous area. ... Anthem Kaba Ma Kyei Capital Naypyidaw Largest city Yangon Official languages Burmese Demonym Burmese Government Military junta - Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council Than Shwe - Prime Minister Soe Win - Acting Prime Minister Thein Sein Establishment - Bagan 849â€“1287 - Taungoo Dynasty 1486â€“1752 - Konbaung Dynasty 1752â€“1885 - Colonial rule... A drought is an extended period where water availability falls below the statistical requirements for a region. ...

The recession of mountain glaciers, notably in Western North America, Franz-Josef Land, Asia, the Alps, Indonesia and Africa, and tropical and sub-tropical regions of South America, has been used to provide qualitative support to the rise in global temperatures since the late 19th century. Many glaciers are being lost to melting further raising concerns about future local water resources in these glacierized areas. The Lewis Glacier, North Cascades pictured at right after melting away in 1990 is one of the 47 North Cascade glaciers observed and all are retreating ^[45].

Despite their proximity and importance to human populations, the mountain and valley glaciers of temperate latitudes amount to a small fraction of glacial ice on the earth. About 99% is in the great ice sheets of polar and subpolar Antarctica and Greenland. These continuous continental-scale ice sheets, 3 km (1.8 miles) or more in thickness, cap the polar and subpolar land masses. Like rivers flowing from an enormous lake, numerous outlet glaciers transport ice from the margins of the ice sheet to the ocean. Map of countries by population â€” China and India, the only two countries to have a population greater than one billion, together possess more than a third of the worlds population. ...

Glacier retreat has been observed in these outlet glaciers, resulting in an increase of the ice flow rate. In Greenland the period since the year 2000 has brought retreat to several very large glaciers that had long been stable. Three glaciers that have been researched, Helheim, Jakobshavns and Kangerdlugssuaq Glaciers, jointly drain more than 16% of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Satellite images and aerial photographs from the 1950s and 1970s show that the front of the glacier had remained in the same place for decades. But in 2001 it began retreating rapidly, retreating 7.2 km (4.5 miles) between 2001 and 2005. It has also accelerated from 20 m (65 ft)/day to 32 m (104 ft)/day.^[46] Jakobshavn Isbræ in west Greenland is generally considered the fastest moving glacier in the world. It had been moving continuously at speeds of over 24 m (78 ft)/day with a stable terminus since at least 1950. The glacier's ice tongue began to break apart in 2000, leading to almost complete disintegration in 2003, while the retreat rate doubled to over 30 m (98 ft)/day.^[47] Image File history File links Size of this preview: 373 Ã— 600 pixelsFull resolution (540 Ã— 868 pixel, file size: 158 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Retreat of Greenlands Helheim Glacier from 2001 to 2005 File historyClick on a date/time to view the file as it appeared at that time. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 373 Ã— 600 pixelsFull resolution (540 Ã— 868 pixel, file size: 158 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Retreat of Greenlands Helheim Glacier from 2001 to 2005 File historyClick on a date/time to view the file as it appeared at that time. ... Outline Map of Greenland with ice sheet depths. ... Satellite image of Jakobshavn IsbrÃ¦. The coloured lines show the retreat of the calving front of the Jakobshavn IsbrÃ¦ since 1850. ...

Glacier retreat and acceleration is also apparent on two important outlet glaciers of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Pine Island Glacier, which flows into the Amundsen Sea thinned 3.5 ± 0.9 m (11.5 ± 3 ft) per year and retreated five kilometers (3.1 miles) in 3.8 years. The terminus of the glacier is a floating ice shelf and the point at which it is afloat is retreating 1.2 km/year. This glacier drains a substantial portion of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and has been referred to as the weak underbelly of this ice sheet.^[48] This same pattern of thinning is evident on the neighboring Thwaites Glacier cliff. The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) blankets the continent of Antarctica west of the Transantarctic Mountains, covering the area called Lesser Antarctica. The WAIS is classified as a marine-based ice sheet, meaning that its bed lies well below sea level and its edges flow into floating ice shelves. ... Pine Island Glacier (75Â°10â€²S 100Â°0â€²W) is a broad glacier flowing west-northwest along the south side of the Hudson Mountains into Pine Island Bay, Amundsen Sea. ... The Amundsen Sea, named for Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen, is an arm of the Southern Ocean off Marie Byrd Land in western Antarctica. ... A glacial terminus Satellite view of changing glacier termini in the Bhutan-Himalaya. ...

Oceans

The role of the oceans in global warming is a complex one. The oceans serve as a sink for carbon dioxide, taking up much that would otherwise remain in the atmosphere, but increased levels of CO₂ have led to ocean acidification. Furthermore, as the temperature of the oceans increases, they become less able to absorb excess CO₂. Global warming is projected to have a number of effects on the oceans. Ongoing effects include rising sea levels due to thermal expansion and melting of glaciers and ice sheets, and warming of the ocean surface, leading to increased temperature stratification. Other possible effects include large-scale changes in ocean circulation. Change in sea surface pH caused by anthropogenic CO2 between the 1700s and the 1990s Ocean acidification is the name given to the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earths oceans, caused by their uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. ...

Sea level rise

With increasing average global temperature, the water in the oceans expands in volume, and additional water enters them which had previously been locked up on land in glaciers, for example, the Greenland and the Antarctic ice sheets. An increase of 1.5 to 4.5 °C is estimated to lead to an increase of 15 to 95 cm (IPCC 2001). Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Sea level measurements from 23 long tide gauge records in geologically stable environments show a rise of around 20 centimeters per century (2 mm/year). ... This tidal gauge is ready to be installed underwater in a marina. ... Sea level measurements from 23 long tide gauge records in geologically stable environments show a rise of around 20 centimeters per century (2 mm/year). ... Impact from a water drop causes an upward rebound jet surrounded by circular capillary waves. ... A satellite composite image of Antarctica The Antarctic ice sheet is the largest single mass of ice on Earth. ...

The sea level has risen more than 120 metres since the peak of the last ice age about 18,000 years ago. The bulk of that occurred before 6000 years ago. From 3000 years ago to the start of the 19th century, sea level was almost constant, rising at 0.1 to 0.2 mm/yr; since 1900, the level has risen at an average of 1.7 mm/yr ^[49]; since 1993, satellite altimetry from TOPEX/Poseidon indicates a rate of about 3 mm/yr^[49]. Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 400 000 years For the animated movie, see Ice Age (movie). ... A millimetre (American spelling: millimeter, symbol mm) is an SI unit of length that is equal to one thousandth of a metre. ... This article is about artificial satellites. ... The TOPEX/Poseidon satellite altimeter is a science project to measure the ocean surface topography. ...

In a paper published 18th May 2007^[50], the climatologist, James Hansen presented new evidence. George Monbiot, a British journalist, summarises his findings as follows:

"The IPCC predicts that sea levels could rise by as much as 59 cm this century. ^[51] Hansen’s paper argues that the slow melting of ice sheets the panel expects doesn’t fit the data. The geological record suggests that ice at the poles does not melt in a gradual and linear fashion, but flips suddenly from one state to another. When temperatures increased to 2-3 degrees above today’s level 3.5 million years ago, sea levels rose not by 59 centimetres but by 25 metres. The ice responded immediately to changes in temperature."^[52]

Temperature rise

From 1961 to 2003, the global ocean temperature has risen by 0.10°C from the surface to a depth of 700 m. There is variability both year-to-year and over longer time scales, with global ocean heat content observations showing high rates of warming for 1991 to 2003, but some cooling from 2003 to 2007.^[49] The temperature of the Antarctic Southern Ocean rose by 0.17 °C (0.31 °F) between the 1950s and the 1980s, nearly twice the rate for the world's oceans as a whole ^[53]. As well as having effects on ecosystems (e.g. by melting sea ice, affecting algae that grow on its underside), warming reduces the ocean's ability to absorb CO₂.

Acidification

The world’s oceans soak up much of the carbon dioxide produced by living organisms, either as dissolved gas, or in the skeletons of tiny marine creatures that fall to the bottom to become chalk or limestone. Oceans currently absorb about one tonne of CO₂ per person per year. It is estimated that the oceans have absorbed around half of all CO₂ generated by human activities since 1800 (120,000,000,000 tonnes or 120 petagrams of carbon) ^[54]. Change in sea surface pH caused by anthropogenic CO2 between the 1700s and the 1990s Ocean acidification is the name given to the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earths oceans, caused by their uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. ... A petagram (symbol: Pg) is an SI unit of mass. ...

But in water, carbon dioxide becomes a weak carbonic acid, and the increase in the greenhouse gas since the industrial revolution has already lowered the average pH (the laboratory measure of acidity) of seawater by 0.1 units, to 8.2. Predicted emissions could lower it by a further 0.5 by 2100, to a level not seen for millions of years.^[55] Carbonic acid (ancient name acid of air or aerial acid) has the formula H2CO3. ... A Watt steam engine, the steam engine that propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the world. ... For other uses, see PH (disambiguation). ...

There are concerns that increasing acidification could have a particularly detrimental effect on corals ^[56] (16% of the world's coral reefs have died from bleaching caused by warm water in 1998, ^[57] which coincidentally was the warmest year ever recorded ^[58]) and other marine organisms with calcium carbonate shells ^[59]. Extant Subclasses and Orders Alcyonaria Alcyonacea Helioporacea Zoantharia Antipatharia Corallimorpharia Scleractinia Zoanthidea [1][2] See Anthozoa for details For other uses, see Coral (disambiguation). ... Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound, with the chemical formula CaCO3. ...

Shutdown of thermohaline circulation

There is some speculation that global warming could, via a shutdown or slowdown of the thermohaline circulation, trigger localized cooling in the North Atlantic and lead to cooling, or lesser warming, in that region. This would affect in particular areas like Scandinavia and Britain that are warmed by the North Atlantic drift. More significantly, it could lead to an oceanic anoxic event. Shutdown or slowdown of the thermohaline circulation is a possible effect of global warming. ... For other uses, see Scandinavia (disambiguation). ... The North Atlantic drift is a powerful warm ocean current that continues the Gulf Stream northeast. ... Oceanic anoxic events occur when the Earths oceans become completely depleted of oxygen (O2) below the surface levels. ...

The chances of this near-term collapse of the circulation are unclear; there is some evidence for the short-term stability of the Gulf Stream and possible weakening of the North Atlantic drift. However, the degree of weakening, and whether it will be sufficient to shut down the circulation, is under debate. As yet, no cooling has been found in northern Europe or nearby seas.

Abrupt and irreversible effects

The scientific consensus in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report is that "Anthropogenic warming could lead to some effects that are abrupt or irreversible, depending upon the rate and magnitude of the climate change." Climate Change 2007, the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is the fourth in a series of such reports. ...

Abrupt effects

Partial loss of ice sheets on polar land could imply metres of sea level rise, major changes in coastlines and inundation of low-lying areas, with greatest effects in river deltas and low-lying islands. Such changes are projected to occur over millennial time scales, but more rapid sea level rise on century time scales cannot be excluded.

Irreversible effects

Climate change is likely to lead to some irreversible effects. There is medium confidence that approximately 20- 30% of species assessed so far are likely to be at increased risk of extinction if increases in global average warming exceed 1.5-2.5°C (relative to 1980-1999). As global average temperature increase exceeds about 3.5°C,model projections suggest significant extinctions (40-70% of species assessed) around the globe. At the scale of 7°C temperature increase, emissions of hydrogen sulfide caused by sulfate-reducing bacteria may cause by a severe anoxic event. This will adversely affect marine ecologies. Hydrogen sulfide (or hydrogen sulphide) is the chemical compound with the formula H2S. This colorless, toxic and flammable gas is responsible for the foul odour of rotten eggs and flatulence. ... Sulfate-reducing bacteria comprise several groups of bacteria that use sulfate as an oxidizing agent, reducing it to sulfide. ... Oceanic Anoxic Events occur when the Earths oceans become completely depleted of O2 below the surface levels. ...

Positive feedback effects

Some of the observed and potential effects of global warming are positive feedbacks, contributing directly to further global warming. Positive feedback is a feedback system in which the system responds to the perturbation in the same direction as the perturbation (It is sometimes referred to as cumulative causation). ...

Methane release from melting permafrost peat bogs

Western Siberia is the world's largest peat bog, a one million square kilometer region of permafrost peat bog that was formed 11,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age. The melting of its permafrost is likely to lead to the release, over decades, of large quantities of methane. As much as 70,000 million tonnes of methane, an extremely effective greenhouse gas, might be released over the next few decades, creating an additional source of greenhouse gas emissions ^[60]. Similar melting has been observed in eastern Siberia ^[61]. Image File history File links WikiNews-Logo. ... Wikinews is a free-content news source and a project of the Wikimedia Foundation. ... Virgin boreal acid bogs at Browns Lake Bog, Ohio A bog is a wetland type that accumulates peat, a deposit of dead plant material. ... While these two men dig in Alaska to study soil, the hard permafrost requires the use of a jackhammer In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0 Â°C or 32 Â°F) for two or more years. ... Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 400 000 years For the animated movie, see Ice Age (movie). ... Methane is a chemical compound with the molecular formula . ... This article is about the metric tonne. ... This article is about Siberia as a whole. ...

Methane release from hydrates

Methane clathrate, also called methane hydrate, is a form of water ice that contains a large amount of methane within its crystal structure. Extremely large deposits of methane clathrate have been found under sediments on the ocean floors of Earth. The sudden release of large amounts of natural gas from methane clathrate deposits, in a runaway greenhouse effect, has been hypothesized as a cause of past and possibly future climate changes. The release of this trapped methane is a potential major outcome of a rise in temperature; it is thought that this might increase the global temperature by an additional 5° in itself, as methane is much more powerful as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. The theory also predicts this will greatly affect available oxygen content of the atmophere. This theory has been proposed to explain the most severe mass extinction event on earth known as the Permian-Triassic extinction event. The clathrate gun hypothesis states that as sea temperatures rise the sudden release of methane from methane clathrate compounds buried in the seabeds will cause a drastic alteration of the ocean enviornment and the atmosphere of earth, as recent analysis concerning the Permian extinction event indicates may have happened in... Burning ice. Methane, released by heating, burns; water drips (USGS). ... This article is about the properties of water. ... This article is about water ice. ... Methane is a chemical compound with the molecular formula . ... For other uses, see Crystal (disambiguation). ... The greenhouse effect, first discovered by Joseph Fourier in 1824, and quantified by Svante Arrhenius in 1896, is the process by which an atmosphere warms a planet. ... The Permian-Triassic (P-T or PT) extinction event, sometimes informally called the Great Dying, was an extinction event that occurred approximately 251 million years ago (mya), forming the boundary between the Permian and Triassic geologic periods. ...

Carbon cycle feedbacks

There have been predictions, and some evidence, that global warming might cause loss of carbon from terrestrial ecosystems, leading to an increase of atmospheric CO₂ levels. Several climate models indicate that global warming through the 21st century could be accelerated by the response of the terrestrial carbon cycle to such warming ^[62]. All 11 models in the C4MIP study found that a larger fraction of anthropogenic CO₂ will stay airborne if climate change is accounted for. By the end of the twenty-first century, this additional CO₂ varied between 20 and 200 ppm for the two extreme models, the majority of the models lying between 50 and 100 ppm. The higher CO₂ levels led to an additional climate warming ranging between 0.1° and 1.5 °C. However, there was still a large uncertainty on the magnitude of these sensitivities. Eight models attributed most of the changes to the land, while three attributed it to the ocean ^[63]. The strongest feedbacks in these cases are due to increased respiration of carbon from soils throughout the high latitude boreal forests of the Northern Hemisphere. One model in particular (HadCM3) indicates a secondary carbon cycle feedback due to the loss of much of the Amazon rainforest in response to significantly reduced precipitation over tropical South America^[64]. While models disagree on the strength of any terrestrial carbon cycle feedback, they each suggest any such feedback would accelerate global warming. C4MIP (more fully, Coupled Carbon Cycle Climate Model Intercomparison Project) is a joint project between IGBP-GAIM and WCRP-WGCM. It is a model intercomparison project along the lines of AMIP, but for carbon cycle models inside global climate models . ... For other uses, see Taiga (disambiguation). ... HadCM3 (Hadley Centre Coupled Model, version 3) is a coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) developed at the Hadley Centre in the United Kingdom and described by Gordon et al (2000) and Pope et al (2000). ... Map of the Amazon rainforest ecoregions as delineated by the WWF. Yellow line encloses the Amazon rainforest. ...

Observations show that soils in England have been losing carbon at the rate of four million tonnes a year for the past 25 years^[65] according to a paper in Nature by Bellamy et al. in September 2005, who note that these results are unlikely to be explained by land use changes. Results such as this rely on a dense sampling network and thus are not available on a global scale. Extrapolating to all of the United Kingdom, they estimate annual losses of 13 million tons per year. This is as much as the annual reductions in carbon dioxide emissions achieved by the UK under the Kyoto Treaty (12.7 million tons of carbon per year).^[66]

Forest fires

The IPCC Fourth Assessment Report predicts that many mid-latitude regions, such as Mediterranean Europe, will experience decreased rainfall and an increased risk of drought, which in turn would allow forest fires to occur on larger scale, and more regularly. This releases more stored carbon into the atmosphere than the carbon cycle can naturally re-absorb, as well as reducing the overall forest area on the planet, creating a positive feedback loop. Part of that feedback loop is more rapid growth of replacement forests and a northward migration of forests as northern latitudes become more suitable climates for sustaining forests. There is a question of whether the burning of renewable fuels such as forests should be counted as contributing to global warming.^[67]^[68]^[69]

Retreat of sea ice

The sea absorbs heat from the sun, while the ice largely reflects the sun rays back to space. Thus, retreating sea ice will allow the sun to warm the now exposed sea water, contributing to further warming. The mechanism is the same as when a black car heats up faster in sunlight than a white car. This albedo change is also the main reason why IPCC predict polar temperatures in the northern hemisphere to rise up to twice as much as those of the rest of the world. In September 2007, the Arctic sea ice area reached about half the size of the average summer minimum area between 1979 to 2000. ^[70]^[71] Based on the accelerated loss, predictions are that by 2030 the Arctic could be ice-free part of the year. ^[72] Also in September 2007, Arctic sea ice retreated far enough for the Northwest Passage to become navigable to shipping for the first time in recorded history.^[73] The polar amplification of global warming is not predicted to occur in the southern hemisphere.^[74] The Antarctic sea ice reached its greatest extent on record since the beginning of observation in 1979,^[75] but the gain in ice in the south is exceeded by the loss in the north. The trend for global sea ice, northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere combined is clearly a decline.^[76] For other uses, see Albedo (disambiguation). ... IPCC is science authority for the UNFCCC The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established in 1988 by two United Nations organizations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to assess the risk of human-induced climate change. The Panel is open to all... NOAA Projected arctic changes Polar ice packs are large areas of pack ice formed from seawater in the Earths polar regions, known as polar ice caps: the Arctic ice pack (or Arctic ice cap) of the Arctic Ocean and the Antarctic ice pack of the Southern Ocean, fringing the...

Negative feedback effects

Following Le Chatelier's principle, the chemical equilibrium of the Earth's carbon cycle will shift in response to anthropogenic CO₂ emissions. The primary driver of this is the ocean, which absorbs anthropogenic CO₂ via the so-called solubility pump. At present this accounts for only about one third of the current emissions, but ultimately most (~75%) of the CO₂ emitted by human activities will dissolve in the ocean over a period of centuries: "A better approximation of the lifetime of fossil fuel CO₂ for public discussion might be 300 years, plus 25% that lasts forever"^[77]. However, the rate at which the ocean will take it up in the future is less certain, and will be affected by stratification induced by warming and, potentially, changes in the ocean's thermohaline circulation. Image File history File links Question_book-3. ... In chemistry, Le Chateliers principle, also called the Le Chatelier-Braun principle, can be used to predict the effect of a change in conditions on a chemical equilibrium. ... For the thermonuclear reaction involving carbon that helps power stars, see CNO cycle. ... In oceanic biogeochemistry, the solubility pump is a physico-chemical process that transports carbon (as dissolved inorganic carbon) from the oceans surface to its interior. ... Water stratification occurs when water of high and low salinity (halocline), as well as cold and warm water (thermocline), forms layers that act as barriers to water mixing. ... A simplified summary of the path of the Thermohaline Circulation. ...

Also, the thermal radiation of the Earth rises in proportion to the fourth power of temperature, increasing the amount of outgoing radiation as the Earth warms. The impact of this negative feedback effect is included in global climate models summarized by the IPCC. Radiant heat redirects here. ... General Circulation Models (GCMs) are a class of computer-driven models for weather forecasting and predicting climate change, where they are commonly called Global Climate Models. ... IPCC is science authority for the UNFCCC The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established in 1988 by two United Nations organizations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to assess the risk of human-induced climate change. The Panel is open to all...

Other consequences

Image File history File linksMetadata No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File linksMetadata No higher resolution available. ...

Economic

Many estimates of aggregate net economic costs of damages from climate change across the globe, the social cost of carbon (SCC), expressed in terms of future net benefits and costs that are discounted to the present, are now available. Peer-reviewed estimates of the SCC for 2005 have an average value of US$43 per tonne of carbon (tC) (i.e., US$12 per tonne of carbon dioxide) but the range around this mean is large. For example, in a survey of 100 estimates, the values ran from US$-10 per tonne of carbon (US$-3 per tonne of carbon dioxide) up to US$350/tC (US$95 per tonne of carbon dioxide.)^[2] As recent estimates of the rate of global warming have increased, so have the financial estimates of the damage costs. ...

Nicholas Stern, the former Chief Economist and Senior Vice-President of the World Bank, states in an October 29, 2006, review that climate change could affect growth, which could be cut by one-fifth unless drastic action is taken. ^[79] Stern has warned that one percent of global GDP is required to be invested in order to mitigate the effects of climate change, and that failure to do so could risk a recession worth up to twenty percent of global GDP.^[80] Stern’s report^[81] suggests that climate change threatens to be the greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen. The report has had significant political effects: Australia reported two days after the report was released that they would allott AU$60 million to projects to help cut greenhouse gas emissions.^[82] Nicholas Stern Sir Nicholas Stern, FBA (born 22 April 1946) is a British economist and academic. ... The position of World Bank Chief Economist is one of the most influential in economics. ... The World Bank logo The World Bank (the Bank) is a part of the World Bank Group (WBG), is a bank that makes loans to developing countries for development programs with the stated goal of reducing poverty. ... is the 302nd day of the year (303rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Sir Nicholas Stern, author of the report. ... World GDP/capita changed very little for most of human history before the industrial revolution. ... GDP is an acronym which can stand for more than one thing: (in economics) an abbreviation for Gross Domestic Product. ... In macroeconomics, a recession is a decline in a countrys real gross domestic product (GDP), or negative real economic growth, for two or more successive quarters of a year. ... GDP is an acronym which can stand for more than one thing: (in economics) an abbreviation for Gross Domestic Product. ...

The Stern Review has been criticized by some economists, saying that Stern did not consider costs past 2200, that he used an incorrect discount rate in his calculations, and that stopping or significantly slowing climate change will require deep emission cuts everywhere.^[83] Other economists have supported Stern's approach ^[84] ^[85], or argued that Stern's estimates are reasonable, even if the method by which he reached them is open to criticism. ^[86]. The discount rate is a financial concept based on the future cash flow in lieu of the present value of the cash flow. ...

In a 2004 comment on the economic effect of global warming in Copenhagen Consensus, Professor Robert O. Mendelsohn of Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, stated that Copenhagen Consensus is a project which seeks to establish priorities for advancing global welfare using methodologies based on the theory of welfare economics. ... Robert O. Mendelsohn is an American environmental economist. ...

Effects on agriculture

For some time it was hoped that a positive effect of global warming would be increased agricultural yields, because of the role of carbon dioxide in photosynthesis, especially in preventing photorespiration, which is responsible for significant destruction of several crops. In Iceland, rising temperatures have made possible the widespread sowing of barley, which was untenable twenty years ago. Some of the warming is due to a local (possibly temporary) effect via ocean currents from the Caribbean, which has also affected fish stocks.^[88] This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ... Photosynthesis splits water to liberate O2 and fixes CO2 into sugar The leaf is the primary site of photosynthesis in plants. ... Photorespiration(or photo-respiration)is the alternate pathway for production of glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate (G3P) by RuBisCO, the main enzyme of the light-independent reactions of photosynthesis (also known as the Calvin cycle or the Primary Carbon Reduction (PCR) cycle). ... For other uses, see Barley (disambiguation). ...

While local benefits may be felt in some regions (such as Siberia), recent evidence is that global yields will be negatively affected. "Rising atmospheric temperatures, longer droughts and side-effects of both, such as higher levels of ground-level ozone gas, are likely to bring about a substantial reduction in crop yields in the coming decades, large-scale experiments have shown" ^[89]. This article is about Siberia as a whole. ...

Moreover, the region likely to be worst affected is Africa, both because its geography makes it particularly vulnerable, and because seventy per cent of the population rely on rain-fed agriculture for their livelihoods. Tanzania's official report on climate change suggests that the areas that usually get two rainfalls in the year will probably get more, and those that get only one rainy season will get far less. The net result is expected to be that 33% less maize—the country's staple crop—will be grown.^[90] A world map showing the continent of Africa Africa is the worlds second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. ...

Climate change may be one of the causes of the Darfur conflict. The combination of decades of drought, desertification and overpopulation are among the causes of the conflict, because the Arab Baggara nomads searching for water have to take their livestock further south, to land mainly occupied by farming peoples.^[91] Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 450,000 years For current global climate change, see Global warming. ... Combatants JEM factions NRF alliance Janjaweed SLM (Minnawi) Sudan African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) United Nations African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) Commanders Ibrahim Khalil Ahmed Diraige Omar al-Bashir Minni Minnawi Luke Aprezi Strength N/A N/A 7,000 The Darfur conflict is a crisis in the... Fields outside Benambra, Victoria, Australia suffering from drought conditions A drought is an extended period of months or years when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply. ... Ship stranded by the retreat of the Aral Sea Desertification is the degradation of land in arid, semi arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various climatic variations, but primarily from human activities. ... Map of countries by population density (See List of countries by population density. ... For other uses, see Arab (disambiguation). ... The Baggara or Baqqarah (Arabic: Ø§Ù„Ø¨Ù‚Ø§Ø±Ø©) are a nomadic Bedouin people inhabiting Africa from between Lake Chad and the Nile, in the states of Sudan (particularly Darfur), Niger, Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria, and the Central African Republic. ... Communities of nomadic people move from place to place, rather than settling down in one location. ...

In 2007, higher incentives for farmers to grow non-food biofuel crops^[93] combined with other factors (such as rising transportation costs, climate change, growing consumer demand in China and India, and population growth)^[94] to cause food shortages in Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Mexico, as well as rising food prices around the globe.^[95]^[96] As of December 2007, 37 countries faced food crises, and 20 had imposed some sort of food-price controls. Some of these shortages resulted in food riots and even deadly stampedes.^[97]^[98]^[99] For other uses, see Darfur (disambiguation). ... Klaus Töpfer, UNEP Exec. ... Bio-energy redirects here. ... Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 450,000 years For current global climate change, see Global warming. ... Theoretical Human population increase from 10,000 BC â€“ AD 2000. ... Crude oil price in 2004-2006 Average US retail price of regular unleaded gasoline Oil prices from 1861-2006 in dollars of the day and 2006 dollars. ... For other uses, see Asia (disambiguation). ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... A world map showing the continent of Africa Africa is the worlds second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. ...

Insurance

An industry very directly affected by the risks is the insurance industry; the number of major natural disasters has tripled since the 1960s, and insured losses increased fifteenfold in real terms (adjusted for inflation).^[100] According to one study, 35–40% of the worst catastrophes have been climate change related. Over the past three decades, the proportion of the global population affected by weather-related disasters has doubled in linear trend, rising from roughly 2% in 1975 to 4% in 2001. ^[101] Insurance, in law and economics, is a form of risk management primarily used to hedge against the risk of a contingent loss. ...

According to a 2005 report from the Association of British Insurers, limiting carbon emissions could avoid 80% of the projected additional annual cost of tropical cyclones by the 2080s.^[102] A June 2004 report by the Association of British Insurers declared "Climate change is not a remote issue for future generations to deal with. It is, in various forms, here already, impacting on insurers' businesses now."^[103] It noted that weather risks for households and property were already increasing by 2-4 % per year due to changing weather, and that claims for storm and flood damages in the UK had doubled to over £6 billion over the period 1998–2003, compared to the previous five years. The results are rising insurance premiums, and the risk that in some areas flood insurance will become unaffordable for some. National Flood Insurance Program In 1968, Congress created the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) in response to the rising cost of taxpayer funded disaster relief for flood victims and the increasing amount of damage caused by floods. ...

Financial institutions, including the world's two largest insurance companies, Munich Re and Swiss Re, warned in a 2002 study that "the increasing frequency of severe climatic events, coupled with social trends" could cost almost US$150 billion each year in the next decade.^[104] These costs would, through increased costs related to insurance and disaster relief, burden customers, taxpayers, and industry alike. Headquarters in Munich Munich Re AG, in German MÃ¼nchener RÃ¼ck AG, is one of the worlds largest reinsurance companies with over 5000 customers in 160 countries and has its headquarters in Munich, Germany. ... 30 St Mary Axe - at 180 m, Swiss Res London headquarters is the 6th tallest building in London Swiss Re is the worlds second-largest reinsurance company (after Munich Re/ MÃ¼nchener RÃ¼ck), and the worlds largest life and health reinsurer. ... The United States dollar is the official currency of the United States. ...

In the United States, insurance losses have also greatly increased. According to Choi and Fisher (2003) each 1% increase in annual precipitation could enlarge catastrophe loss by as much as 2.8%.^[28] Gross increases are mostly attributed to increased population and property values in vulnerable coastal areas, though there was also an increase in frequency of weather-related events like heavy rainfalls since the 1950s ^[105].

Transport

Roads, airport runways, railway lines and pipelines, (including oil pipelines, sewers, water mains etc) may require increased maintenance and renewal as they become subject to greater temperature variation. Regions already adversely affected include areas of permafrost, which are subject to high levels of subsidence, resulting in buckling roads, sunken foundations, and severely cracked runways. ^[106] An elevated section of the Alaska Pipeline Pipeline transport is a transportation of goods through a tube. ... For the art of stitching, see Sewing. ... A municipal water system is a large system of reservoirs and large-scale piping which supplies fresh water, suitable for human consumption, to houses and other residences. ... While these two men dig in Alaska to study soil, the hard permafrost requires the use of a jackhammer In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0 Â°C or 32 Â°F) for two or more years. ... A road destroyed by subsidence and shear. ...

Flood defense

For historical reasons to do with trade, many of the world's largest and most prosperous cities are on the coast, and the cost of building better coastal defenses (due to the rising sea level) is likely to be considerable. Some countries will be more affected than others — low-lying countries such as Bangladesh and the Netherlands would be worst hit by any sea level rise, in terms of floods or the cost of preventing them. This article is about economic exchange. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Coastal management. ... A flood (in Old English flod, a word common to Teutonic languages; compare German Flut, Dutch vloed from the same root as is seen in flow, float) is an overflow of water, an expanse of water submerging land, a deluge. ...

In developing countries, the poorest often live on flood plains, because it is the only available space, or fertile agricultural land. These settlements often lack infrastructure such as dykes and early warning systems. Poorer communities also tend to lack the insurance, savings or access to credit needed to recover from disasters.^[107]

Migration

Some Pacific Ocean island nations, such as Tuvalu, are concerned about the possibility of an eventual evacuation, as flood defense may become economically unviable for them. Tuvalu already has an ad hoc agreement with New Zealand to allow phased relocation.^[108]

In the 1990s a variety of estimates placed the number of environmental refugees at around 25 million. (Environmental refugees are not included in the official definition of refugees, which only includes migrants fleeing persecution.) The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which advises the world’s governments under the auspices of the UN, estimated that 150 million environmental refugees will exist in the year 2050, due mainly to the effects of coastal flooding, shoreline erosion and agricultural disruption (150 million means 1.5% of 2050’s predicted 10 billion world population).^[109]^[110] Map of countries by population â€” China and India, the only two countries to have a population greater than one billion, together possess more than a third of the worlds population. ...

Northwest Passage

Melting Arctic ice may open the Northwest Passage in summer, which would cut 5,000 nautical miles (9,000 km) from shipping routes between Europe and Asia. This would be of particular benefit for supertankers which are too big to fit through the Panama Canal and currently have to go around the tip of South America. According to the Canadian Ice Service, the amount of ice in Canada's eastern Arctic Archipelago decreased by 15% between 1969 and 2004.^[111] Image File history File links Arctic_Ice_Thickness. ... Image File history File links Arctic_Ice_Thickness. ... The Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) is a laboratory in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)/Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR). ... ... For the ships, see USS Arctic, SS Arctic, MV Arctic The red line indicates the 10Â°C isotherm in July, sometimes used to define the Arctic region border Artificially coloured topographical map of the Arctic region The Arctic is the region around the Earths North Pole, opposite the Antarctic... For other uses, see Northwest Passage (disambiguation). ... A nautical mile or sea mile is a unit of length. ... A supertanker is an unofficial nickname that applies to a certain class of tanker ship built to transport very large quantities of liquids; in practice this typically refers to crude oil. ... The Panama Canal is a waterway in Central America which joins the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. ... World map depicting Canadian Arctic Archipelago Polar projection map of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago Reference map of Canadian Arctic Archipelago The Canadian Arctic Archipelago, also known as just the Arctic Archipelago, is an archipelago north of the Canadian mainland in the Arctic. ...

In September 2007, the Arctic Ice Cap retreated far enough for the Northwest Passage to become navigable to shipping for the first time in recorded history.^[112]

Development

The combined effects of global warming may have particularly harsh effects on people and countries without the resources to mitigate those effects. This may slow economic development and poverty reduction, and make it harder to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.^[113] Global carbon dioxide emissions 1800â€“2000 Global average surface temperature 1850 to 2006 Mitigation of global warming involves taking actions aimed at reducing the extent of global warming. ... Economic development is the development of economic wealth of countries or regions for the well-being of their inhabitants. ... Poverty reduction (or poverty alleviation) is any process which seeks to reduce the level of poverty in a community, or amongst a group of people or countries. ... The Millenium Development Goals The Millennium Development Goals are eight goals that 192 United Nations member states have agreed to try to achieve by the year 2015. ...

In October 2004 the Working Group on Climate Change and Development, a coalition of development and environment NGOs, issued a report Up in Smoke on the effects of climate change on development. This report, and the July 2005 report Africa - Up in Smoke? predicted increased hunger and disease due to decreased rainfall and severe weather events, particularly in Africa. These are likely to have severe impacts on development for those affected. NGO redirects here. ... A world map showing the continent of Africa Africa is the worlds second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. ...

Ecosystems

Unchecked global warming could affect most terrestrial ecoregions. Increasing global temperature means that ecosystems will change; some species are being forced out of their habitats (possibly to extinction) because of changing conditions, while others are flourishing. Secondary effects of global warming, such as lessened snow cover, rising sea levels, and weather changes, may influence not only human activities but also the ecosystem. Studying the association between Earth climate and extinctions over the past 520 million years, scientists from University of York write, "The global temperatures predicted for the coming centuries may trigger a new ‘mass extinction event’, where over 50 per cent of animal and plant species would be wiped out."^[114] Ecoregions are defined by the World Wildlife Fund as relatively large units of land or water containing a distinct assemblage of natural communities and species, with boundaries that approximate the original extent of natural communities prior to major land-use change. Terrestrial ecoregions are land ecoregions, as distinct from freshwater... For other uses, see Species (disambiguation). ... The extinction risk of climate change -- that is, the expected number of species expected to become extinct due to the effects of global warming -- has been estimated in a 2004 Nature study to be between 15 and 37 percent of known species by 2050. ... A coral reef near the Hawaiian islands is an example of a complex marine ecosystem. ... This article is about the British university. ...

Many of the species at risk are Arctic and Antarctic fauna such as polar bears^[115] and emperor penguins^[116]. In the Arctic, the waters of Hudson Bay are ice-free for three weeks longer than they were thirty years ago, affecting polar bears, which prefer to hunt on sea ice.^[117]. Species that rely on cold weather conditions such as gyrfalcons, and snowy owls that prey on lemmings that use the cold winter to their advantage may be hit hard.^[118] ^[119]Marine invertebrates enjoy peak growth at the temperatures they have adapted to, regardless of how cold these may be, and cold-blooded animals found at greater latitudes and altitudes generally grow faster to compensate for the short growing season.^[120] Warmer-than-ideal conditions result in higher metabolism and consequent reductions in body size despite increased foraging, which in turn elevates the risk of predation. Indeed, even a slight increase in temperature during development impairs growth efficiency and survival rate in rainbow trout.^[121] This article is about the animal. ... Binomial name Gray, 1844 The Emperor Penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) is the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species. ... New York Harbor, the outflow for Hudson River, is sometimes called Hudsons Bay. Hudson Bay, Canada. ... This article is about the animal. ... For other uses, see Gyrfalcon (disambiguation). ... Binomial name (Linnaeus, 1758) Synonyms Strix scandiaca Linnaeus, 1758 Nyctea scandiaca Stephens, 1826 The Snowy Owl (Bubo scandiacus) is a large owl of the typical owl family Strigidae. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... This article is about the geographical term. ... Altitude is the elevation of an object from a known level or datum. ... Structure of the coenzyme adenosine triphosphate, a central intermediate in energy metabolism. ... Predator and Prey redirect here. ... It has been suggested that Steelhead be merged into this article or section. ...

Rising temperatures are beginning to have a noticeable impact on birds^[122], and butterflies have shifted their ranges northward by 200 km in Europe and North America. Plants lag behind, and larger animals' migration is slowed down by cities and highways. In Britain, spring butterflies are appearing an average of 6 days earlier than two decades ago ^[123]. Superfamilies and families Superfamily Hedyloidea: Hedylidae Superfamily Hesperioidea: Hesperiidae Superfamily Papilionoidea: Papilionidae Pieridae Nymphalidae Lycaenidae Riodinidae A butterfly is an insect of the order Lepidoptera. ...

A 2002 article in Nature^[124] surveyed the scientific literature to find recent changes in range or seasonal behaviour by plant and animal species. Of species showing recent change, 4 out of 5 shifted their ranges towards the poles or higher altitudes, creating "refugee species". Frogs were breeding, flowers blossoming and birds migrating an average 2.3 days earlier each decade; butterflies, birds and plants moving towards the poles by 6.1 km per decade. A 2005 study concludes human activity is the cause of the temperature rise and resultant changing species behaviour, and links these effects with the predictions of climate models to provide validation for them ^[125]. Scientists have observed that Antarctic hair grass is colonizing areas of Antarctica where previously their survival range was limited. ^[126] Nature is a prominent scientific journal, first published on 4 November 1869. ... Climate models use quantitative methods to simulate the interactions of the atmosphere, oceans, land surface, and ice. ... Binomial name Deschampsia antarctica Due to a recent warming trend, more seeds are germinating, creating a large number of seedlings and plants. ...

Mechanistic studies have documented extinctions due to recent climate change: McLaughlin et al. documented two populations of Bay checkerspot butterfly being threatened by precipitation change.^[127] Parmesan states, "Few studies have been conducted at a scale that encompasses an entire species"^[128] and McLaughlin et al. agreed "few mechanistic studies have linked extinctions to recent climate change."^[127] Daniel Botkin and other authors in one study believe that projected rates of extinction are overestimated.^[129] Trinomial name Euphydryas editha bayensis Sternitsky, 1937 & Dos Passos, 1964 The Bay checkerspot butterfly (Euphydryas editha bayensis) is a federally threatened insect species which is native to the U.S. State of California. ...

Many species of freshwater and saltwater plants and animals are dependent on glacier-fed waters to ensure a cold water habitat that they have adapted to. Some species of freshwater fish need cold water to survive and to reproduce, and this is especially true with Salmon and Cutthroat trout. Reduced glacier runoff can lead to insufficient stream flow to allow these species to thrive. Ocean krill, a cornerstone species, prefer cold water and are the primary food source for aquatic mammals such as the Blue whale^[130]. Alterations to the ocean currents, due to increased freshwater inputs from glacier melt, and the potential alterations to thermohaline circulation of the worlds oceans, may affect existing fisheries upon which humans depend as well. For other uses, see Salmon (disambiguation). ... Binomial name Oncorhynchus clarki (Richardson, 1836) Subspecies See text. ... Families Euphausiidae Euphausia Dana, 1852 Meganyctiphanes Holt and W. M. Tattersall, 1905 Nematobrachion Calman, 1905 Nematoscelis G. O. Sars, 1883 Nyctiphanes G. O. Sars, 1883 Pseudeuphausia Hansen, 1910 Stylocheiron G. O. Sars, 1883 Tessarabrachion Hansen, 1911 Thysanoessa Brandt, 1851 Thysanopoda Latreille, 1831 Bentheuphausiidae Bentheuphausia amblyops Krill are shrimp-like marine... Binomial name (Linnaeus, 1758) Blue Whale range Subspecies B. m. ... An ocean current is any more or less permanent or continuous, directed movement of ocean water that flows in one of the Earths oceans. ... A simplified summary of the path of the Thermohaline Circulation. ...

Forests

Pine forests in British Columbia have been devastated by a pine beetle infestation, which has expanded unhindered since 1998 at least in part due to the lack of severe winters since that time; a few days of extreme cold kill most mountain pine beetles and have kept outbreaks in the past naturally contained. The infestation, which will have killed 50% of the lodgepole pines by 2008 ^[131] has passed to Alberta and will spread further East and eventually into America given continued milder winters. Besides the immediate ecological and economic impact, the huge dead forests provide a fire risk as well. Motto: Splendor sine occasu (Latin: Splendour without diminishment) Capital Victoria Largest city Vancouver Official languages English (de facto) Government Lieutenant-Governor Steven Point Premier Gordon Campbell (BC Liberal) Federal representation in Canadian Parliament House seats 36 Senate seats 6 Confederation July 20, 1871 (6th province) Area Ranked 5th Total 944... Binomial name Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins, 1905 Wikispecies has information related to: Mountain pine beetle The mountain pine beetle, Dendroctonus ponderosae, is a species of bark beetle native to the forests of western North America from Mexico to central British Columbia. ...

Forests in some regions potentially face an increased risk of forest fires. The 10-year average of boreal forest burned in North America, after several decades of around 10,000 km² (2.5 million acres), has increased steadily since 1970 to more than 28,000 km² (7 million acres) annually.^[132]. This change may be due in part to changes in forest management practices. In the western U. S., since 1986, longer, warmer summers have resulted in a fourfold increase of major wildfires and a sixfold increase in the area of forest burned, compared to the period from 1970 to 1986. A similar increase in wildfire activity has been reported in Canada from 1920 to 1999.^[133] Fire in San Bernardino, California Mountains (image taken from the International Space Station) A wildfire, also known as a forest fire, vegetation fire, grass fire, or bushfire (in Australasia), is an uncontrolled fire in wildland often caused by lightning; other common causes are human carelessness and arson. ...

Also note forest fires since 1997 in Indonesia. The fires are started to clear forest for agriculture. These occur from time to time and can set fire to the large peat bogs in that region. The CO₂ released by these peat bog fires has been estimated, in an average year, to release 15% of the quantity of CO₂ produced by fossil fuel combustion. ^[134]

Mountains

Mountains cover approximately 25 percent of earth's surface and provide a home to more than one-tenth of global human population. Changes in global climate pose a number of potential risks to mountain habitats^[135]. Researchers expect that over time, climate change will affect mountain and lowland ecosystems, the frequency and intensity of forest fires, the diversity of wildlife, and the distribution of water. Mount Cook, a mountain in New Zealand A mountain is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain in a limited area. ... Fire in San Bernardino, California Mountains (image taken from the International Space Station) A wildfire, also known as a forest fire, vegetation fire, grass fire, or bushfire (in Australasia), is an uncontrolled fire in wildland often caused by lightning; other common causes are human carelessness and arson. ...

Studies suggest that a warmer climate in the United States would cause lower-elevation habitats to expand into the higher alpine zone.^[136] Such a shift would encroach on the rare alpine meadows and other high-altitude habitats. High-elevation plants and animals have limited space available for new habitat as they move higher on the mountains in order to adapt to long-term changes in regional climate.

Changes in climate will also affect the depth of the mountains snowpacks and glaciers. Any changes in their seasonal melting can have powerful impacts on areas that rely on freshwater runoff from mountains. Rising temperature may cause snow to melt earlier and faster in the spring and shift the timing and distribution of runoff. These changes could affect the availability of freshwater for natural systems and human uses.^[137] Runoff flowing into a stormwater drain Surface runoff is water, from rain, snowmelt, or other sources, that flows over the land surface, and is a major component of the water cycle[1][2]. Runoff that occurs on surfaces before reaching a channel is also called overland flow. ...

Ecological productivity

Increasing average temperature and carbon dioxide may have the effect of improving ecosystems' productivity. In photorespiration, carbon dioxide that oxygen can enter a plant's chloroplasts and take the place of carbon dioxide in the Calvin cycle. This causes the sugars being made to be destroyed, suppressing growth. Higher carbon dioxide concentrations tend to reduce photorespiration. Satellite data shows that the productivity of the northern hemisphere has increased since 1982 (although attribution of this increase to a specific cause is difficult). Photorespiration(or photo-respiration)is the alternate pathway for production of glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate (G3P) by RuBisCO, the main enzyme of the light-independent reactions of photosynthesis (also known as the Calvin cycle or the Primary Carbon Reduction (PCR) cycle). ... Chloroplasts are organelles found in plant cells and eukaryotic algae which conduct photosynthesis. ... Overview of the Calvin cycle and carbon fixation The Calvin cycle (or Calvin-Benson cycle or carbon fixation) is a series of biochemical reactions that takes place in the stroma of chloroplasts in photosynthetic organisms. ...

IPCC models predict that higher CO₂ concentrations would only spur growth of flora up to a point, because in many regions the limiting factors are water or nutrients, not temperature or CO₂; after that, greenhouse effects and warming would continue but there would be no compensatory increase in growth.

Research done by the Swiss Canopy Crane Project suggests that slow-growing trees only are stimulated in growth for a short period under higher CO₂ levels, while faster growing plants like liana benefit in the long term. In general, but especially in rain forests, this means that liana become the prevalent species; and because they decompose much faster than trees their carbon content is more quickly returned to the atmosphere. Slow growing trees incorporate atmospheric carbon for decades. Liana tangle across a forest in the Western Ghats Woman swinging on a liana in Aokigahara forest, Japan A canopy that has formed over Monkey Ladder Vine A liana is a woody climber [1] that starts at ground level, and uses trees to climb up to the canopy where it... A rainforest is a forested biome with high annual rainfall. ...

Environmental

Secondary evidence of global warming — reduced snow cover, rising sea levels, weather changes — provides examples of consequences of global warming that may influence not only human activities but also ecosystems. Increasing global temperature means that ecosystems may change; some species may be forced out of their habitats (possibly to extinction) because of changing conditions, while others may flourish. Few of the terrestrial ecoregions on Earth could expect to be unaffected. A coral reef near the Hawaiian islands is an example of a complex marine ecosystem. ... For other uses, see Species (disambiguation). ... Ecoregions are defined by the World Wildlife Fund as relatively large units of land or water containing a distinct assemblage of natural communities and species, with boundaries that approximate the original extent of natural communities prior to major land-use change. Terrestrial ecoregions are land ecoregions, as distinct from freshwater...

Increasing carbon dioxide may increase ecosystems' productivity to a point. Ecosystems' unpredictable interactions with other aspects of climate change makes the possible environmental impact of this is unclear, though. An increase in the total amount of biomass produced may not be necessarily positive: biodiversity can still decrease even though a relatively small number of species are flourishing. Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 450,000 years For current global climate change, see Global warming. ... For the use of the term in ecology, see Biomass (ecology). ... Rainforests are among the most biodiverse ecosystems on earth Biodiversity is the variation of life forms within a given ecosystem, biome or for the entire Earth. ...

Water scarcity

Sea level rise is projected to increase salt-water intrusion into groundwater in some regions, affecting drinking water and agriculture in coastal zones.^[138] Increased evaporation will reduce the effectiveness of reservoirs. Increased extreme weather means more water falls on hardened ground unable to absorb it, leading to flash floods instead of a replenishment of soil moisture or groundwater levels. In some areas, shrinking glaciers threaten the water supply.^[139] The continued retreat of glaciers will have a number of different effects. In areas that are heavily dependent on water runoff from glaciers that melt during the warmer summer months, a continuation of the current retreat will eventually deplete the glacial ice and substantially reduce or eliminate runoff. A reduction in runoff will affect the ability to irrigate crops and will reduce summer stream flows necessary to keep dams and reservoirs replenished. This situation is particularly acute for irrigation in South America, where numerous artificial lakes are filled almost exclusively by glacial melt.^(BBC) Central Asian countries have also been historically dependent on the seasonal glacier melt water for irrigation and drinking supplies. In Norway, the Alps, and the Pacific Northwest of North America, glacier runoff is important for hydropower. Higher temperatures will also increase the demand for water for the purposes of cooling and hydration. Deforestation of the Madagascar Highland Plateau has led to extensive siltation and unstable flows of western rivers. ... Groundwater is water located beneath the ground surface in soil pore spaces and in the fractures of lithologic formations. ... Irrigation is the artificial application of water to the soil usually for assisting in growing crops. ...

In the Sahel, there has been on average a 25% decrease in annual rainfall over the past 30 years. This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...

Health

Direct effects of temperature rise

The most direct effect of climate change on humans might be the impacts of hotter temperatures themselves. Extreme high temperatures increase the number of people who die on a given day for many reasons: people with heart problems are vulnerable because one's cardiovascular system must work harder to keep the body cool during hot weather, heat exhaustion, and some respiratory problems increase. Global warming could mean more cardiovascular diseases, doctors warn^[140]. Higher air temperature also increase the concentration of ozone at ground level. In the lower atmosphere, ozone is a harmful pollutant. It damages lung tissues and causes problems for people with asthma and other lung diseases. ^[141] Cardiovascular disease refers to the class of diseases that involve the heart or blood vessels (arteries and veins). ...

Rising temperatures have two opposing direct effects on mortality: higher temperatures in winter reduce deaths from cold; higher temperatures in summer increase heat-related deaths.

The net local impact of these two direct effects depends on the current climate in a particular area. Palutikof et al calculate that in England and Wales for a 1 °C temperature rise the reduced deaths from cold outweigh the increased deaths from heat, resulting in a reduction in annual average mortality of 7000,^[142] and a government report shows decreased mortality due to recent warming and predicts increased mortality due to future warming in the United Kingdom.^[143] The European heat wave of 2003 killed 22,000–35,000 people, based on normal mortality rates^[144]. Peter A. Stott from the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research estimated with 90% confidence that past human influence on climate was responsible for at least half the risk of the 2003 European summer heat-wave.^[145] In the United States, more than 1000 people die from the cold each year, while twice that number die from the heat.^[146] The summer of 2003 was one of the hottest ever in Europe; this led to a health crisis in certain countries as well as considerable impact on crops. ... The Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research, which is part of the Met Office and based at its headquaters in Exeter, provides a focus in the United Kingdom for the scientific issues associated with climate change. ...

Spread of disease

Global warming is expected to extend the favourable zones for vectors conveying infectious disease such as dengue fever^[147] and malaria^[148]^[149] In poorer countries, this may simply lead to higher incidence of such diseases. In richer countries, where such diseases have been eliminated or kept in check by vaccination, draining swamps and using pesticides, the consequences may be felt more in economic than health terms. The World Health Organisation (WHO) says global warming could lead to a major increase in insect-borne diseases in Britain and Europe, as northern Europe becomes warmer, ticks - which carry encephalitis and lyme disease - and sandflies - which carry visceral leishmaniasis - are likely to move in. ^[150] The World Health Organisation estimates 150,000 deaths annually "as a result of climate change", of which half in the Asia-Pacific region.^[151] In April 2008, it reported that, as a result of increased temperatures, malaria is appearing in the highland areas of Papua New Guinea, where it has always been too cold for disease-spreading mosquitoes.^[152] Tropical diseases are infectious diseases that either occur uniquely in tropical and subtropical regions (which is rare) or, more commonly, are either more widespread in the tropics or more difficult to prevent or control. ... In epidemiology, a vector is an organism that does not cause disease itself but which spreads infection by conveying pathogens from one host to another. ... This false-colored electron micrograph shows a malaria sporozoite migrating through the midgut epithelia. ... Dengue Fever redirects here. ... Malaria is a vector-borne infectious disease caused by protozoan parasites. ... A vial of the vaccine against influenza. ... For other meanings of the acronym WHO, see WHO (disambiguation) WHO flag Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Health Organization (WHO) is an agency of the United Nations, acting as a coordinating authority on international public health. ... Encephalitis is an acute inflammation of the brain, commonly caused by a viral infection. ... Lyme disease, or borreliosis, is an emerging infectious disease caused by at least three species of bacteria from the genus Borrelia. ... Sandfly biting a humans little finger Sandfly is a colloquial name for any species or genus of flying, biting, blood-sucking Dipteran encountered in sandy areas. ... Visceral leishmaniasis (VL), also known as kala-azar and black fever, is the most severe form of leishmaniasis, a disease caused by parasites of the Leishmania genus. ... For other uses, see Asia (disambiguation). ... For other meanings of Pacific, see Pacific (disambiguation). ... April 2008 is the fourth month of the current leap year. ... Malaria is a vector-borne infectious disease caused by protozoan parasites. ... Location Geography Area Ranked 1st - Total 30,659 kmÂ² - % Water ? Admin HQ Inverness ISO 3166-2 GB-HLD ONS code 00QT Demographics Population Ranked 7th - Total (2005) 213,590 - Density 8 / kmÂ² Politics The Highland Council http://www. ...

Security

The Military Advisory Board, a panel of retired U.S. generals and admirals released a report entitled "National Security and the Threat of Climate Change." The report predicts that global warming will have security implications, in particular serving as a "threat multiplier" in already volatile regions.^[153] Britain's Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett argues that “An unstable climate will exacerbate some of the core drivers of conflict, such as migratory pressures and competition for resources.”^[154] And several weeks earlier, U.S. Senators Chuck Hagel (R-NB) and Richard Durbin (D-IL) introduced a bill in the U.S. Congress that would require federal intelligence agencies to collaborate on a National Intelligence Estimate to evaluate the security challenges presented by climate change.^[155] The Military Advisory Board is a defense advisory group composed of eleven retired three-star and four-star generals and admirals who were convened to study the implications of global warming for U.S. national security. ... The Military Advisory Board is a defense advisory group composed of eleven retired three-star and four-star generals and admirals who were convened to study the implications of global warming for U.S. national security. ... The title of Foreign Secretary has been traditionally used to refer to the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. ... Margaret Mary Beckett (nÃ©e Jackson; born 15 January 1943) is a British Labour politician and Member of Parliament (MP) for Derby South. ... Charles Timothy Chuck Hagel (born October 4, 1946) is the senior United States Senator from Nebraska. ... Richard Joseph Dick Durbin, (born November 21, 1944) is currently the senior United States Senator from Illinois and Democratic Whip, the second highest position in the party leadership in the Senate. ... National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs), produced by the National Intelligence Council, express the coordinated judgments of the US Intelligence Community made up of 16 intelligence agencies, and thus represent the most authoritative assessment of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) with respect to a particular national security issue. ...

In November 2007, two Washington think tanks, the established Center for Strategic and International Studies and the newer Center for a New American Security, published a report analysing the worldwide security implications of three different global warming scenarios. The report considers three different scenarios, two over a roughly 30 year perspective and one covering the time up to 2007. Its general results include:^[156] The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is a Washington, D.C.-based foreign policy think tank. ... The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) is a Washington, D.C.-based national security think tank established in 2007. ...

Children

On 2008-04-29, a UNICEF UK Report found that global warming is already reducing the quality of the world's most vulnerable children's lives and making it more difficult to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals. Global warming will reduce access to clean water and food supplies, particularly in Africa and Asia. Disasters, violence and disease are expected to be more frequent and intense, making the future of the world's poorest children more bleak. ^[157] 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 119th day of the year (120th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... UNICEF Logo The United Nations Childrens Fund or UNICEF (Arabic: ; French: ; Spanish: ) was established by the United Nations General Assembly on December 11, 1946. ... The Millenium Development Goals The Millennium Development Goals are eight goals that 192 United Nations member states have agreed to try to achieve by the year 2015. ... Drinking water Mineral Water Drinking water is water that is intended to be drank by humans. ... Food distribution is a vital factor in public nutrition. ...

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^ ^a ^b ^c Bindoff, N.L., J. Willebrand, V. Artale, A, Cazenave, J. Gregory, S. Gulev, K. Hanawa, C. Le Quéré, S. Levitus, Y. Nojiri, C.K. Shum, L.D. Talley and A. Unnikrishnan (2007). Solomon, S., D. Qin, M. Manning, Z. Chen, M. Marquis, K.B. Averyt, M. Tignor and H.L. Miller:Observations: Oceanic Climate Change and Sea Level. In: Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (PDF). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA.. Retrieved on 2007-12-29.
^ Hansen, James; et al. (2007). "Climate change and trace gases" (PDF). Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc. A 365: 1925 - 1954.
^ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (February 2007). Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis - Summary for Policymakers. Table SPM-3..
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^ Sabine, C. L. et al (16 July 2004). "The Oceanic Sink for Anthropogenic CO₂". Science 385: 367-371.
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^ Global warming and coral reefs. Open Democracy (May 30, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-12-29.
^ Walther, Gian-Reto, et al (March 28, 2002). "Ecological responses to recent climate change". Nature 416: 389-395.
^ Rhett A. Butler (December 16, 2005). 2005 is second warmest day on record. Mongabay.com. Retrieved on 2007-12-29.
^ Larry O'Hanlon (July 5, 2006). Rising Ocean Acidity Threatens Reefs. Discovery News. Retrieved on 2007-12-29.
^ Fred Pearce (August 11, 2005). Climate warning as Siberia melts. New Scientist. Retrieved on 2007-12-30.
^ Ian Sample (August 11, 2005). Warming Hits 'Tipping Point'. Guardian. Retrieved on 2007-12-30.
^ Cox, Peter M.; Richard A. Betts, Chris D. Jones, Steven A. Spall and Ian J. Totterdell (November 9, 2000). "Acceleration of global warming due to carbon-cycle feedbacks in a coupled climate model". Nature 408. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Friedlingstein, P.; P. Cox, R. Betts, L. Bopp, W. von Bloh, V. Brovkin, P. Cadule, S. Doney, M. Eby, I. Fung, G. Bala, J. John, C. Jones, F. Joos, T. Kato, M. Kawamiya, W. Knorr, K. Lindsay, H.D. Matthews, T. Raddatz, P. Rayner, C. Reick, E. Roeckner, K.G. Schnitzler, R. Schnur, K. Strassmann, A.J. Weaver, C. Yoshikawa, and N. Zeng (2006). "Climate–Carbon Cycle Feedback Analysis: Results from the C4MIP Model Intercomparison". Journal of Climate 19: 3337-3353. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ 5.5C temperature rise in next century. The Guardian (May 29, 2003). Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Tim Radford (September 8, 2005). Loss of soil carbon 'will speed global warming'. The Guardian. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Schulze, E. Detlef; Annette Freibauer (September 8, 2005). "Environmental science: Carbon unlocked from soils". Nature 437: 205-206. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Climate Change and Fire. David Suzuki Foundation. Retrieved on 2007-12-02.
^ Global warming : Impacts : Forests. United States Environmental Protection Agency (2000-01-07). Retrieved on 2007-12-02.
^ Feedback Cycles: linking forests, climate and landuse activities. Woods Hole Research Center. Retrieved on 2007-12-02.
^ The cryosphere today. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne Polar Research Group. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Arctic Sea Ice News Fall 2007. National Snow and Ice Data Center. Retrieved on 2008-01-02..
^ David Adam (September 5 2007). Ice-free Arctic could be here in 23 years. The Guardian. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ "Arctic ice levels at record low opening Northwest Passage", Wikinews, September 16, 2007, <http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Arctic_ice_levels_at_record_low_opening_Northwest_Passage>
^ Eric Steig and Gavin Schmidt. Antarctic cooling, global warming?. RealClimate. Retrieved on 2008-01-20.
^ Southern hemisphere sea ice area. Cryosphere Today. Retrieved on 2008-01-20.
^ Global sea ice area. Cryosphere Today. Retrieved on 2008-01-20.
^ Archer, David (2005). "Fate of fossil fuel CO₂ in geologic time". Journal of Geophysical Research 110. doi:10.1029/2004JC002625.
^ Adapted from a portion of Figure 1 in Tol and Yohe (2006) "A Review of the Stern Review" World Economics 7(4): 233-50.
^ Robert Peston (October 29, 2006). Report's stark warning on climate. BBC News. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ At-a-glance: The Stern Review. BBC News (October 30, 2006). Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Nicholas Stern (30 October 2006). Stern Review executive summary. New Economics Foundation. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ $60m to help cut emissions. News.com.au (November 1, 2006). Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Tol and Yohe (2006) "A Review of the Stern Review" World Economics 7(4): 233-50. See also other critiques in World Economics 7(4).
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^ John Quiggin (December 20, 2006). Stern and the critics on discounting. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Martin Weitzman (April 2007). The Stern Review of the Economics of Climate Change. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Robert Mendelsohn. Opponent paper on climate change. Copenhagen Consensus 2004. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Paul Brown (June 30, 2005). Frozen assets. The Guardian. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ The Independent, April 27, 2005, "Climate change poses threat to food supply, scientists say" - report on this event
^ John Vidal (June 30, 2005). In the land where life is on hold. The Guardian. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Nina Brenjo (July 30, 2007). Looking to water to find peace in Darfur. Reuters AlertNet. Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ Climate change - only one cause among many for Darfur conflict. IRIN (June 28, 2007). Retrieved on 2008-01-22.
^ 2008: The year of global food crisis
^ The global grain bubble
^ The cost of food: Facts and figures
^ The World's Growing Food-Price Crisis
^ Already we have riots, hoarding, panic: the sign of things to come?
^ Riots and hunger feared as demand for grain sends food costs soaring
^ Feed the world? We are fighting a losing battle, UN admits
^ Viewpoint American Association of Insurance Services
^ Climate change (html version) www.odi.org.uk
^ Association of British Insurers (2005) "Financial Risks of Climate Change" summary report
^ Association of British Insurers (June 2005) "A Changing Climate for Insurance: A Summary Report for Chief Executives and Policymakers"
^ UNEP (2002) "Key findings of UNEP’s Finance Initiatives study" CEObriefing
^ Board on Natural Disasters (1999). "Mitigation Emerges as Major Strategy for Reducing Losses Caused by Natural Disasters". Science 284: 1943-1947.
^ Studies Show Climate Change Melting Permafrost Under Runways in Western Arctic Weber, Bob Airportbusiness.com October 2007
^ The World Bank’s Approach to Clean Energy & Climate Change
^ Unnatural disasters Andrew Simms The Guardian October 2003
^ Hidden statistics: environmental refugees
^ Hidden statistics: environmental refugees Archived version
^ www.washingtontimes.com
^ "Arctic ice levels at record low opening Northwest Passage", Wikinews, <http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Arctic_ice_levels_at_record_low_opening_Northwest_Passage>
^ Richards, Michael. Poverty Reduction, Equity and Climate Change: Global Governance Synergies or Contradictions?. Overseas Development Institute. Retrieved on 2007-12-01.
^ Mayhew, Peter J; Gareth B. Jenkins, Timothy G. Benton (October 23, 2007). "A long-term association between global temperature and biodiversity, origination and extinction in the fossil record". Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Royal Society Publishing. doi:10.1098/rspb.2007.1302. Retrieved on 2007-10-30.
^ Amstrup, Steven C.; Ian Stirling, Tom S. Smith, Craig Perham, Gregory W. Thiemann (2006-04-27). "Recent observations of intraspecific predation and cannibalism among polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea". Polar Biology 29 (11): 997–1002. doi:10.1007/s00300-006-0142-5.
^ Le Bohec, Céline; Joël M. Durant, Michel Gauthier-Clerc, Nils C. Stenseth, Young-Hyang Park, Roger Pradel, David Grémillet, Jean-Paul Gendner, and Yvon Le Maho (2008-02-11). "King penguin population threatened by Southern Ocean warming". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. doi:10.1073/pnas.0712031105. Retrieved on 2008-02-13.
^ On Thinning Ice Michael Byers London Review of Books January 2005
^ Pertti Koskimies (compiler) (1999). International Species Action Plan for the Gyrfalcon Falco rusticolis. BirdLife International. Retrieved on 2007-12-28.
^ Snowy Owl. University of Alaska (2006). Retrieved on 2007-12-28.
^ Arendt, J.D. (1997). "Adaptive intrinsic growth rates: an integration across taxa". Q. Rev. Biol. 72 (2): 149-177.
^ Biro, P.A., et al. (June 2007). "Mechanisms for climate-induced mortality of fish populations in whole-lake experiments". Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. 104 (23): 9715-9719. doi:10.1073/pnas.0701638104. ISSN 1091-6490.
^ Time Hirsch (October 5, 2005). Animals 'hit by global warming'. BBC News. Retrieved on 2007-12-29.
^ Walther, Gian-Reto; Eric Post, Peter Convey, Annette Menzel, Camille Parmesan, Trevor J. C. Beebee, Jean-Marc Fromentin, Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, Franz Bairlein (March 28, 2002). "Ecological responses to recent climate change". Nature 416: 389-395.
^ Root, Terry L.; Jeff T. Price, Kimberly R. Hall, Stephen H. Schneider, Cynthia Rosenzweig & Alan Pounds (2003-01-02). "Fingerprints of global warming on animals and plants". Nature 421 (6918): 57-59. Retrieved on 2008-02-13.
^ www.stanford.edu
^ Grass flourishes in warmer Antarctic originally from The Times, December 2004
^ ^a ^b McLaughlin, John F.; et al. (2002-04-30). "Climate change hastens population extinctions" (PDF). PNAS 99 (9): 6070–6074. doi:10.1073/pnas.052131199. Retrieved on 2007-03-29.
^ Permesan, Camille (2006-08-24). "Ecological and Evolutionary Responses to Recent Climate Change" (PDF). Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 37: 637–669. doi:10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.37.091305.110100. Retrieved on 2007-03-30.
^ Botkin, Daniel B.; et al. (March 2007). "Forecasting the Effects of Global Warming on Biodiversity". BioScience 57 (3): 227–236. doi:10.1641/B570306. Retrieved on 2007-11-30.
^ Lovell, Jeremy. "Warming Could End Antarctic Species", CBS News, September 9, 2002. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
^ Natural Resources Canada
^ US National Assessment of the Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change Regional Paper: Alaska
^ Science Magazine - August 2006 "Is Global Warming Causing More, Larger Wildfires?" - Steven W. Running
^ BBC News: Asian peat fires add to warming
^ Exposure of global mountain systems to climate warming during the 21st Century Science Direct
^ The Potential Effects Of Global Climate Change On The United States Report to Congress Editors: Joel B. Smith and Dennis Tirpak US-EPA December 1989
^ United Nations (2002-12-12). "Freshwater Issues at ‘Heart of Humankind’S Hopes for Peace and Development’". Press release. Retrieved on 2008-02-13.
^ http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/GlobalWarming.nsf/content/ResourceCenterPublicationsSeaLevelRiseIndex.html
^ Kazakhstan: glaciers and geopolitics Stephan Harrison Open Democracy May 2005
^ Global warming could mean more heart problems, doctors warn September 2007 Associated Press
^ McMichael, A.J., Campbell-Lendrum, D.H., Corvalán, C.F., Ebi, K.L., Githeko, A., Scheraga, J.D. and Woodward, A. (2003). Climate Change and Human Health – Risk and Responses. World Health Organization, Geneva.
^ J.P. Palutikof, S. Subak and M.D. Agnew (1996). "Impacts of the exceptionally hot weather in 1995 in the UK". Climate Monitor 25.
^ Department of Health and Health Protection Agency (12 February 2008), Health effects of climate change in the UK 2008: an update of the Department of Health report 2001/2002, <http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Publicationsandstatistics/Publications/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidance/DH_080702>
^ Schär, C.; Jendritzky, G. (2004). "Hot news from summer 2003". Nature 432 (7017): 559-60. Retrieved on 2007-06-24.
^ Peter A. Stott; D.A. Stone, M.R. Allen (2004). "Human contribution to the European heatwave of 2003". Nature 432: 610-614. doi:10.1038/nature03089. ISSN 0028-0836. Retrieved on 2007-06-24.
^ Climate Change - Health and Environmental Effects US-EPA
^ Hales, Simon; et al. (2002-09-14). "Potential effect of population and climate changes on global distribution of dengue fever: an empirical model" (PDF). The Lancet 360 (9336): 830-834. Retrieved on 2007-05-02.
^ Rogers, D.; S. Randolph (2000-09-08). "The global spread of malaria in a future warmer world". Science 289 (5485): 1763-6. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
^ Boseley, Sarah. "Health hazard", The Guardian, June 2005. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
^ BBC News: Global Warming disease warning
^ "Malaria found in PNG highlands", ABC Radio Australia, April 8, 2008
^ ibid
^ "National Security and the Threat of Climate Change". Military Advisory Board, April 15, 2007.
^ Reuters. U.N. Council Hits Impasse Over Debate on Warming. The New York Times, April 17, 2007. Retrieved on May 29, 2007.
^ Will global warming threaten national security?. Salon, April 9, 2007. Retrieved on May 29, 2007.
^ Kurt M. Campbell, Jay Gulledge, J.R. McNeill, John Podesta, Peter Ogden, Leon Fuerth, R. James Woolsey, Alexander T.J. Lennon, Julianne Smith, Richard Weitz, Derek Mix (Oktober 2007). The Age of Consequences: The Foreign Policy and National Security Implications of Global Climate Change (PDF). Retrieved on 2007-11-06.
^ http://www.unicef.org.uk/press/news_detail_full_story.asp?news_id=1120

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Nature is a prominent scientific journal, first published on 4 November 1869. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... The David Suzuki Foundation is an environmental organization based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 336th day of the year (337th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... EPA redirects here. ... Year 2000 (MM) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ... is the 7th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 336th day of the year (337th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... The Woods Hole Research Center was established in 1985 in the village of Woods Hole, Massachusetts by Dr. George M. Woodwell. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 336th day of the year (337th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 20th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 20th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 20th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Journal of Geophysical Research is a publication of the American Geophysical Union. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... This article refers to the news department of the British Broadcasting Corporation, for the BBC News Channel see BBC News (TV channel). ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... This article refers to the news department of the British Broadcasting Corporation, for the BBC News Channel see BBC News (TV channel). ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 303rd day of the year (304th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The New Economics Foundation is a British think-tank, or, in their own description, a think-and-do tank. The groups goal is to promote their progressive view of welfare economics and environmentalism. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... J. Bradford DeLong (b. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... John Quiggin (b. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... For other uses, see Guardian. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... For other uses, see The Independent (disambiguation). ... is the 117th day of the year (118th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... For other uses, see Guardian. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... A magnet levitating above a high-temperature superconductor demonstrates the Meissner effect. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 335th day of the year (336th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 303rd day of the year (304th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Ian Stirling is a scientist with the Canadian Wildlife Service who studies polar bears. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 117th day of the year (118th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 42nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, usually referred to as PNAS, is the official journal of the United States National Academy of Sciences. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 44th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 362nd day of the year (363rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 362nd day of the year (363rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... The Quarterly Review of Biology or QRB is a scientific review of current and historical topics in biology as well as a source of book reviews. ... The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, usually referred to as PNAS, is the official journal of the United States National Academy of Sciences. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... ISSN, or International Standard Serial Number, is the unique eight-digit number applied to a periodical publication including electronic serials. ... For other uses, see BBC (disambiguation). ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 363rd day of the year (364th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Nature is a prominent scientific journal, first published on 4 November 1869. ... Year 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Nature is a prominent scientific journal, first published on 4 November 1869. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 44th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... The Times is a national newspaper published daily in the United Kingdom (and the Kingdom of Great Britain before the United Kingdom existed) since 1788 when it was known as The Daily Universal Register. ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... is the 120th day of the year (121st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... â€œPDFâ€ redirects here. ... The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, usually referred to as PNAS, is the official journal of the United States National Academy of Sciences. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 88th day of the year (89th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 236th day of the year (237th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... â€œPDFâ€ redirects here. ... The Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics is published yearly by Annual Reviews. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 89th day of the year (90th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Biology studies the variety of life (clockwise from top-left) E. coli, tree fern, gazelle, Goliath beetle Biology is the science of life (from the Greek words bios = life and logos = word). ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 334th day of the year (335th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... UN redirects here. ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... is the 346th day of the year (347th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... For information on Wikipedia press releases, see Wikipedia:Press releases. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 44th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... WHO redirects here. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 175th day of the year (176th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... ISSN, or International Standard Serial Number, is the unique eight-digit number applied to a periodical publication including electronic serials. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 175th day of the year (176th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... is the 257th day of the year (258th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... â€œPDFâ€ redirects here. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 122nd day of the year (123rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2000 (MM) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ... is the 251st day of the year (252nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 4th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance to the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 4th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 310th day of the year (311th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...

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