turn down the heat: state of the climate (and australia) february 2014

Turn Down the Heat:State of the Climate (and Australia)February 2014

Damien Lockie

State of the Climate (AR5, WG1, Synthesis Report) IPCC, 2013: Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate

Change [Stocker, T.F., D. Qin, G.-K. Plattner, M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Boschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xia, V. Bex and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge,

United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA,

Impact – Observed changes in climate system

• “Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the

observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia. The atmosphere

and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea level

has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased.”

• “Each of the last three decades has been successively warmer at the Earth’s surface

than any preceding decade since 1850… In the Northern Hemisphere, 1983–2012

was likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1400 years (medium confidence).”

• “The globally averaged combined land and ocean surface temperature data as calculated by a linear trend, show a warming of 0.85 [0.65 to 1.06] °C, over the period 1880 to 2012.”

http://www.ipcc.ch/

Figure SPM .1




Impact - Atmosphere

• “Changes in many extreme weather and climate events have been observed since

about 1950… It is very likely that the number of cold days and nights has decreased

and the number of warm days and nights has increased on the global scale. It is likely

that the frequency of heat waves has increased in large parts of Europe, Asia and

Australia. There are likely more land regions where the number of heavy precipitation

events has increased than where it has decreased. The frequency or intensity of

heavy precipitation events has likely increased in North America and Europe. In other

continents, confidence in changes in heavy precipitation events is at most medium.”

http://www.ipcc.ch/




Impact – Ocean and Sea-level

• “Ocean warming dominates the increase in energy stored in the climate system,

accounting for more than 90% of the energy accumulated between 1971 and 2010

(high confidence). It is virtually certain that the upper ocean (0−700 m) warmed from

1971 to 2010 … and it likely warmed between the 1870s and 1971.”

• “The rate of sea level rise since the mid-19th century has been larger than the mean

rate during the previous two millennia (high confidence). Over the period 1901 to

2010, global mean sea level rose by 0.19 [0.17 to 0.21] m.”

Impact - Cryosphere

• “Over the last two decades, the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets have been losing

mass, glaciers have continued to shrink almost worldwide, and Arctic sea ice and

Northern Hemisphere spring snow cover have continued to decrease in extent (high

confidence).”

http://www.ipcc.ch/




Impact – Greenhouse gases

• “The atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide have

increased to levels unprecedented in at least the last 800,000 years. Carbon dioxide

concentrations have increased by 40% since pre-industrial times, primarily from fossil

fuel emissions and secondarily from net land use change emissions. The ocean has

absorbed about 30% of the emitted anthropogenic carbon dioxide, causing ocean

acidification.”

• “The atmospheric concentrations of the greenhouse gases carbon dioxide (CO2),

methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O) have all increased since 1750 due to human activity. In 2011 the concentrations of these greenhouse gases were 391 ppm, 1803 ppb, and 324 ppb, and exceeded the pre-industrial levels by about 40%, 150%, and 20%, respectively.”

http://www.ipcc.ch/

Figure SPM .4




Impact – Detection and attribution of climate change

• “Human influence has been detected in warming of the atmosphere and the ocean, in

changes in the global water cycle, in reductions in snow and ice, in global mean sea

level rise, and in changes in some climate extremes... This evidence for human

influence has grown since AR4. It is extremely likely that human influence has been

the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century.”

• “There has been further strengthening of the evidence for human influence on

temperature extremes since the SREX. It is now very likely that human influence has contributed to observed global scale changes in the frequency and intensity of daily temperature extremes since the mid-20th century, and likely that human influence has more than doubled the probability of occurrence of heat waves in some locations.”

http://www.ipcc.ch/

AUSTRALIA’S GHG PERFORMANCE

1990 GHG emissions = 546,327,620 t CO2-e



2008 GHG emissions = 553 Mt CO2-e

2012 GHG emissions = 545.5 Mt CO2-e

Estimated 2008-2012 annual GHG emissions =

~ 566 Mt CO2-e TOTAL

= 104% of 1990 emissions

= 1.5% of global GHG

AUSTRALIA’S AA = 2,990,378.53 AAUs

Department of Climate ChangeTracking to the Kyoto Target (2007)

National Inventory Report 2007 (2009)Tracking to Kyoto and 2020 (2009)

Department of the EnvironmentAustralian National Greenhouse Accounts: Quarterly Update of Australia’s National

Greenhouse Gas Inventory, September Quarter 2013




Projections

• “Continued emissions of greenhouse gases will cause further warming and changes

in all components of the climate system. Limiting climate change will require

substantial and sustained reductions of greenhouse gas emissions.”

• “Global surface temperature change for the end of the 21st century is likely to exceed

1.5°C relative to 1850 to 1900 for all RCP scenarios except RCP2.6. It is likely to

exceed 2°C for RCP6.0 and RCP8.5, and more likely than not to exceed 2°C for

RCP4.5… Warming will continue to exhibit interannual-to-decadal variability and will

not be regionally uniform.”

• “The global ocean will continue to warm during the 21st century. Heat will penetrate

from the surface to the deep ocean and affect ocean circulation.”

• “Global mean sea level will continue to rise during the 21st century…”

http://www.ipcc.ch/

Figure SPM .7

Figure SPM .9




Projections, cont’d

• “Climate change will affect carbon cycle processes in a way that will exacerbate the

increase of CO2 in the atmosphere (high confidence). Further uptake of carbon by the

ocean will increase ocean acidification.”

• “Ocean uptake of anthropogenic CO2 will continue under all four RCPs through to 2100, with higher uptake for higher concentration pathways (very high

confidence). The future evolution of the land carbon uptake is less certain.”• “Cumulative emissions of CO2 largely determine global mean surface

warming by the late 21st century and beyond… Most aspects of climate change will persist for many centuries even if emissions of CO2 are stopped. This represents a substantial multi-century climate change commitment created by past, present and future emissions of CO2.”

http://www.ipcc.ch/

Figure SPM .10

UN sources

UNwww.un.org

UNEPwww.unep.org

IPCChttp://www.climatechange2013.org/

World Bank

www.worldbank.org

Climate-L.org

Climate Change Gateway

www.un.org/wcm/content/site/climatechange/gateway

http://www.un.org/

http://www.un.org/

http://www.unep.org/

http://www.unep.org/

http://www.climatechange2013.org/



http://www.worldbank.org/climatechange

http://www.worldbank.org/climatechange

http://www.climate-l.org/

http://www.climate-l.org/

http://www.un.org/wcm/content/site/climatechange/gateway



turn down the heat: state of the climate (and australia) february 2014

Documents

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