IPCC finds humans are dominant cause of recent climate change

The UN panel has issued part one of its 60 year update on the state of the Earths climate. The IPCC has revealed that there is 95% certainty that humans are the dominant cause of climate change since the 1950s.

 

We are seeing changes in the climate system unprecedented in records spanning hundreds of years.

 

Here are some of the main points and findings:

GREENHOUSE GASES
 
The atmospheric concentration of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) has increased by 40% since pre-industrial times. And the mean rates of rise in concentrations of CO2, methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N20) in the last 100 years are "with very high confidence" unprecedented in the last 22,000 years, the authors say.

TEMPERATURE

The period from 1983-2012 in the Northern Hemisphere was likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1,400 years. Temperatures are set to continue to rise, influenced by greenhouse gases.


OCEANS

In addition, it is "virtually certain" that the upper 700m of the Earth's oceans have warmed during the period from 1971 and 2010. The deep ocean, below 3,000m in depth, "likely" warmed between 1992 and 2005, with the largest warming observed in the Southern Ocean.

Waters are expected to rise by between 26cm and 82cm, dependant on greenhouse emissions this century. It will be a much faster rate than seen in previous decades and may cause coastal flooding and erosion.

Problems

There remain inconsistencies between observed changes in the climate system and the conditions simulated by computers and many scientists have different theories and believe of different and sometimes opposing sequential patterns.

The slowdown in warming since 1998 could be due to unpredictable variability in the climate and over-sensitive responses to greenhouse gases in some climate models.

 

Overall, it can be seen that the climate is far more complex than first thought and it is definitely hard to predict and model.

 

 

There are still things being discussed currently and the Impacts and Mitigation methods for what is predicted will be discussed next year by the IPCC.