Posts Tagged climate change

Natural Hazard Early Warning Systems Improved Using GPS Data

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 21, 2013

Scientists claim that the Global Positioning System (GPS) could save millions of lives by providing detailed information about upcoming natural hazards before they have occurred. As the effects of climate change are continuously accelerating, ice sheets are melting, sea level is rising and atmospheric currents are changing, we keep hearing about more and more cases [...]

The Earth Gets A Reprieve From Global Warming, For Now

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on May 20, 2013

Climatologists are breathing a collective sigh of relief. New data suggests that over the coming decade, the Earth will warm more slowly than previously thought. However, scientists stress that this is not a long-term reprieve – and temperatures are currently rising faster than they have been for the past 11, 000 years. The Earth warmed [...]

Scientists Optimistic About Temperature Rise Rates

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 20, 2013

Lower rates of global warming over the past few years do not indicate slower increase in temperatures in a long-term, according to a recent study in Nature Geoscience. An international team of scientists conducted a detailed study, which indicates that the lower rates are associated with the absorption of heat by the Earth’s oceans. Using [...]

Climate Change Ruining the Earth’s Food Supply

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on May 18, 2013

Climate change is drastically affecting the ingredients in our daily meals, including the maple syrup on our pancakes, wine in our glass, chocolate in our desserts, and the salmon on our dinner plates. The moister and warmer air in many of the Earth’s locations, mixed with extreme drought conditions in others, is wreaking havoc on [...]

Climate Change is Man-Made, Scientists Unanimously Agree

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 17, 2013

Scientists from the University of Queensland conducted a survey based on 30,000 scientific peer-reviewed papers published over the past 20 years, identifying that 97.1% of the studies found climate change to be caused by human activities. The findings were published in the journal Environmental Research Letters earlier this week. It was concluded that among scientists, [...]

Climate Change Affects Insurance Companies, Carbon Tax Taken Seriously

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change, Green Policy on May 15, 2013

As climate change becomes more apparent and the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events become higher, insurance companies are having to face additional and very often unforeseen losses. It is surprising that although the insurance industry is heavily dependant on scientific predictions and research, the sector has not been involved in any discussions related [...]

Vegetarian Diet Key to Curbing Global Warming

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on May 10, 2013

A recent Cornell University concluded that a global shift toward a vegetarian diet is extremely important in order to combat the worst effects of climate change. Environmentalists stress the need for the general public to understand the connection between land use and the environment. The United Nations has declared that raising animals for food is [...]

Natural Disturbancies Included in Climate Mitigation Strategies

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 9, 2013

A study by researchers at the Joint Global Change Research Institute at Maryland determined that successful climate mitigation strategies in the future should take into account natural disturbances such as fires and hurricanes, which have impact on world’s forested areas. Forests and other ecosystems that control the global carbon cycle are these that are affected by [...]

Impact of Methane Emissions On Climate Understated

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 9, 2013

The impact of methane as a greenhouse gas has been severely understated, as the amount that can be released through fracking has been projected for an 100-year period. Considering that emitted methane can last in the environment for just over eight years, governmental decisions about shale gas exploration have been highly criticised. Politicians are said [...]

Behavior of Marine Microbes Reveals Changes in Global Carbon Cycle

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on May 1, 2013

A team of scientists from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) was granted $1 million by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Marine Microbiology Initiative, to study changes in the carbon cycle due to food, consumed by marine microbes. The method, which will be tested by Xavier Mayali, Jennifer Pett-Ridge, both from LLNL, and a team [...]

Sunlit Snow Predominant Reason for Arctic Atmosphere Changes

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on April 26, 2013

In the Arctic, sunlit snow is the predominant source of atmospheric bromine, the key to unique chemical reactions that purge pollutants and destroy ozone. National Science Foundation-funded researchers at Purdue University have also determined that surface snowpack above Arctic sea ice may have dramatically disruptive effects on the balance of high-latitude atmospheric chemistry. Researchers believe [...]

Keystone XL Oil Pipeline Worse for Environment than Previously Understood

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on April 18, 2013

The environmental group Oil Change International (OCI) analyzed the climate change impacts of the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline and discovered that it would move so much tar sands oil that 181 million metric tons of greenhouse gases would be emitted annually. In stark contrast, US State Department consultants had previously maintained that completing the pipeline [...]

Sea Level Rise Reduced by Cutting Short-Lived Climate Pollutants

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on April 15, 2013

New research published in the journal Nature Climate Change, shows that cutting down short-lived climate pollutants, such as methane and soot, could greatly reduce the rate of sea level rise. The study led by Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, estimates that 30 to 60% reduction in emissions of these pollutants by [...]

NOAA Study Demonstrates Global Warming Over Land is Real

Posted by Leigh Kim in Climate Change on April 15, 2013

A new study by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) demonstrates that concerns about global warming over land are legitimate. Gilbert Compo, a scientist at NOAA’s University of Colorado Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences used a physically-based data assimilation system, 20th Century Reanalysis (20CR) to evaluate the accuracy of global warming theories. [...]

Increased Clear-Air Turbulence Due to Climate Change Will Cost Airline Companies Millions

Posted by Mila Luleva in Climate Change on April 10, 2013

Scientists from University of Reading, UK, claim that air-turbulence over Europe will increase as a result of global warming. Paul Williams, the lead author of the study published in the latest issue of Nature Climate Change, and his team, established that changes in weather systems and more particularly, the jet streams, will be the cause for [...]