This is what's going on right now and it isn't good news
Credit WIRED |
The Paris Agreement was implemented as a collaborative global response to climate change, with a goal of reducing emissions. It aims to keep the global temperature rise to just 1.5°C, which would significantly reduce the risks and the impacts associated with climate change. President Donald Trump later decided to pull the U.S. out of the agreement, describing the move as "a reassertion of America’s sovereignty".
While a dwindling band of refuseniks still insist that is doesn't exist, climate change is already here, and it's only going to get worse, with some of the severe effects having already started to take hold.
1. Temperatures are breaking records around the world
The 21st century has seen the most temperature records broken in recorded history. Last year was the hottest year on record since 1880, according to NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), with average temperatures measuring 1.78 degrees Fahrenheit (0.99 degrees Celsius) warmer than the mid-20th century mean. This makes 2016 the third year in a row to set a new record for global average surface temperatures. Since the 1950s, every continent has warmed substantially, with hot days becoming far more common than cold ones. Nasa's latest visualisations, above, make that reality stark.
2. There is no scientific debate about the reality of climate change
Multiple studies show that a massive 97 per cent of researchers believe global warming is happening and that they agree that trends observed over the last past century are probably due to human activity. However, climate change is considered only the third most serious issue facing the world by the world's population, behind international terrorism and poverty, hunger and the lack of drinking water, according to YouGov research.
3. Arctic sea ice and glaciers are melting
Arctic sea ice coverage has shrunk every decade since 1979 by 3.5 to 4.1 percent. Glaciers have also been in retreat almost everywhere in the world, including major mountain ranges like the Alps, Himalayas and Rockies. In 2017, arctic sea ice reached a record low for the third straight running, according to scientists from the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) and NASA.
4. Sea levels are rising at their fastest rate in 2,000 years
Credit Jonas Gratzer/Getty |
5. Climate change will lead to a refugee crisis
Credit Getty / Scott Nelson / Staff |
6. We will consume all of Earth's 2017 resources by August
Credit Global Footprint Network |
The world's superpowers – including China, the US, the UK, Germany and Japan – already use more than double the amount of resources they produce.
7. Two-thirds of the Great Barrier Reef has been damaged as a result of climate change
Credit mevans / iStock |
8. The ocean is 26 percent more acidic than before the Industrial Revolution
The pH of ocean surface water has decreased by 0.1, which makes them 26 percent more acidic now than at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The waters are more acidic now that at any other point in the last 300,000 years.
9. Global flooding could triple by 2030
Credit Getty / Matt Cardy / Stringer |
10. More greenhouse gases are in our atmosphere than any time in human history
The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere reached the milestone of 400 parts per million for the first time in 2015 and surged again to new records in 2016, according to the World Meteorological Organization's annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin.
11. Earth could warm by 6 degrees this century
The Earth's temperature will continue to rise so long as we continue to produce greenhouse gases. The estimates for how much temperatures will increase by 2100 range from 2 degrees Celsius to as much as 6 degrees Celsius.
Links
- The Uninhabitable Earth
- Does Doom And Gloom Convince Anyone About Climate Change?
- The Climate Change Scare Campaign Most Politicians Won't Go Near
- Climate Change Doomsday Warning Of 'Rolling Death Smog' And 'Perpetual War' Criticised By Scientists
- Earth Could Become 'Practically Ungovernable' If Sea Levels Keep Rising, Says Former NASA Climate Chief
- Backlash Against Doomsday Article That Predicts A Climate Change Induced Apocalypse
- 'The Models Are Too Conservative': Paleontologist Peter Ward on What Past Mass Extinctions Can Teach Us About Climate Change Today
- Climate Change Is Killing Us Right No
- The World May Have Less Time To Address Climate Change Than Scientists Thought
- How China is leading the world in solar energy production
- Climate Change and Business departments merged in cabinet reshuffle
- Energy minister had to ask if climate change was real
- Ice Flows climate change game puts the fate of Antarctic penguins in your hands
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