Global Warming Effects Map - Effects of Global Warming TckTckTck Is Shrinking Sea Ice Behind Chilly Spring? First it was the fault of Punxsutawney Phil, the groundhog who mistakenly forecasted a quick end to winter. Now climate scientists are saying that Arctic sea ice—or the lack of it—is a driving force behind the Northern Hemisphere's unseasonably cold spring. As Northern Hemisphere temperatures remain below normal more than a week into the official start of spring, a team of meteorologists and climate scientists are pointing to recent research that suggests sea ice cover is a likely culprit. Recent imaging from the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center showed a historic minimum in Arctic ice cover last fall, and current data reveals that sea ice cover—which recently reached its maximum for the year—is at its sixth lowest extent in the satellite record. (Related: "Arctic Sea Ice Hits Record Low—Extreme Weather to Come?") It's a tough thing to understand. But the way weather works isn't so simple. Sea Ice Culprit The problem is compounded by moisture. Wild Weather A study released by the U.S.
Climate Change - The Effect on Wildlife | Young People's Trust For the Environment Many, many species of plants and animals are likely to be affected by climate change. Let’s pick out a few examples: Polar Bears – These wonderful animals need ice to live on; it is their habitat and they are specifically adapted to hunting and breeding on and around it. Seals need ice flows too – to rest and give birth to their pups. Plankton and Krill – at the beginning of the food chain, microscopic plankton and the tiny krill provide food for a huge number of animals in the sea, from barnacles, to fish and even sharks and whales. For many animals, such as mosquitoes and egrets, global warming could be a good thing as it means they can spread further afield into parts of the world that were previously too cold. Many plants are not coping as well with climate change either. The climate is changing faster than the plants and some animals can adapt to the changes.
WWF What is climate change? Global warming – doesn’t mean we’ll all just have warmer weather in future. As the planet heats, climate patterns change. It’ll mean more extreme and unpredictable weather across the world – many places will be hotter, some wetter, others drier. We know the planet has warmed by an average of nearly 1°C in the past century. What causes climate change? Burning fossil fuels Over the past 150 years, the world’s industrialised nations have changed the balance of the carbon cycle by burning huge amounts of fossil fuels (concentrated carbon such as coal, oil and gas) Breeding cattle and cutting down forests Industrialised nations have also breeding vast numbers of methane-producing livestock and cutting down the forests that naturally absorb carbon dioxide from the air. Trapped carbon dioxide The extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere traps more of the sun’s heat, so it’s been raising global temperatures. Find out about the effects of climate change. How hot can it get?
Decline of bees forces China's apple farmers to pollinate by hand In the last 50 years, the global human population has nearly doubled, while the average calories consumed per person has increased by about 30%. To cope with the ever growing demand for food, more land has been brought into agricultural production, mainly by clearing forests, and farming has become much more intensive. Fertilisers, pesticides, and development of new plant varieties have allowed farmers to increase the average yield of food per hectare to increase by 130% in the same period. It is obvious that this pattern cannot go on for ever; we will run out of forests to clear, and we cannot squeeze ever more food from the same area of land. Globally, about 75 billion tons of soil is lost every year, washed away or blown out to sea after ploughing. Modern farming threatens to eradicate these organism, and so undermine itself. Pollination provides one of the clearest examples of how our disregard for the health of the environment threatens our own survival.
Ethiopia May Paradoxically Benefit From Climate Change Suffering from corruption, poor sanitation, malnutrition, and enormous economic inequality, Ethiopia is a troubled nation to say the least. However, a new study reveals that it may be getting a welcome boost from a most unlikely source – climate change. Writing in the journal Climatic Change, a team from Virginia Tech (VT) has concluded that the flow of water to the Ethiopian Blue Nile Basin (BNB) will likely increase as the world inexorably warms. This will allow crops to be grown throughout multiple seasons of the year, potentially rescuing its faltering agricultural sector. “For all the catastrophic impacts of climate change, there are some silver linings,” coordinating researcher Zach Easton, an associate professor of biological systems engineering at VT, said in a statement. The team’s cutting-edge hydrogeological models, based on calculations developed by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), assume that the world will continue to warm fairly rapidly.
International Polar Foundation 1-800-Recycling - Find Recycling Center Locations and How To Recycle Specific Items March 27, 2014 How to Recycle Cell Phones The average American gets a new cell phone every 18 months. Learn how you can recycle or reuse your older model when you upgrade. March 25, 2014 How to Recycle Printers Consumers have plenty of options when it comes to recycling printers, which are made of several recyclable materials. Climate change explained in six graphics Global Issues Earth's Inconstant Magnetic Field Earth's Inconstant Magnetic Field Our planet's magnetic field is in a constant state of change, say researchers who are beginning to understand how it behaves and why. Every few years, scientist Larry Newitt of the Geological Survey of Canada goes hunting. He grabs his gloves, parka, a fancy compass, hops on a plane and flies out over the Canadian arctic. His quarry is Earth's north magnetic pole. At the moment it's located in northern Canada, about 600 km from the nearest town: Resolute Bay, population 300, where a popular T-shirt reads "Resolute Bay isn't the end of the world, but you can see it from here." Right: The movement of Earth's north magnetic pole across the Canadian arctic, 1831--2001. Scientists have long known that the magnetic pole moves. The pole kept going during the 20th century, north at an average speed of 10 km per year, lately accelerating "to 40 km per year," says Newitt. Keeping track of the north magnetic pole is Newitt's job. Probably not. Feature Author: Dr.
Slow-motion wrecks: how thawing permafrost is destroying Arctic cities | Cities At first, Yury Scherbakov thought the cracks appearing in a wall he had installed in his two-room flat were caused by shoddy workmanship. But then other walls started cracking, and then the floor started to incline. “We sat on the couch and could feel it tilt,” says his wife, Nadezhda, as they carry furniture out of the flat. Yury wasn’t a poor craftsman, and Nadezhda wasn’t crazy: one corner of their five-storey building at 59 Talnakhskaya Street in the northern Russian city of Norilsk was sinking as the permafrost underneath it thawed and the foundation slowly disintegrated. In March 2015, local authorities posted notices in the stairwells that the building was condemned. Cracking and collapsing structures are a growing problem in cities like Norilsk – a nickel-producing centre of 177,000 people located 180 miles above the Arctic Circle – as climate change thaws the perennially frozen soil and increases precipitation. The city has been offering residents replacement homes elsewhere.
Energy and Global Warming Find out about what causes global warming and how you can help © 2012 This website is produced by the Student Recruitment, Admissions and International Development Division at The University of Manchester