The World Bank has issued a devastating report on the impacts of global warming. The executive summary alone is enough to illustrate the depth of the problem.
Here is a brief summation from the executive summary:
The 4°C scenarios are devastating: the inundation of coastal cities; increasing risks for food production potentially leading to higher malnutrition rates; many dry regions becoming dryer, wet regions wetter; unprecedented heat waves in many regions, especially in the tropics; substantially exacerbated water scarcity in many regions; increased frequency of high-intensity tropical cyclones; and irreversible loss of biodiversity, including coral reef systems.
And most importantly, a 4°C world is so different from the current one that it comes with high uncertainty and new risks that threaten our ability to anticipate and plan for future adaptation needs.
The lack of action on climate change not only risks putting prosperity out of reach of millions of people in the developing world, it threatens to roll back decades of sustainable development.
It is clear that we already know a great deal about the threat before us. The science is unequivocal that humans are the cause of global warming, and major changes are already being observed: global mean warming is 0.8°C above pre industrial levels; oceans have warmed by 0.09°C since the 1950s and are acidifying; sea levels rose by about 20 cm since pre-industrial times and are now rising at 3.2 cm per decade; an exceptional number of extreme heat waves occurred in the last decade; major food crop growing areas are increasingly affected by drought.
Despite the global community’s best intentions to keep global warming below a 2°C increase above pre-industrial climate, higher levels of warming are increasingly likely. Scientists agree that countries’ current United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change emission pledges and commitments would most likely result in 3.5 to 4°C warming. And the longer those pledges remain unmet, the more likely a 4°C world becomes.
Data and evidence drive the work of the World Bank Group. Science reports, including those produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, informed our decision to ramp up work on these issues, leading to, a World Development Report on climate change designed to improve our understanding of the implications of a warming planet; a Strategic Framework on Development and Climate Change, and a report on Inclusive Green Growth. The World Bank is a leading advocate for ambitious action on climate change, not only because it is a moral imperative, but because it makes good economic sense.
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9 comments:
Because it is. The anti-AGW cult is widespead, but it IS a cult, characterised by the total disregard of scientific evidence and the substitution of their own "facts". It exists because many people simply don't want AGW to exist because it would inconvenience them, and conclude that therefore it doesn't.
Dear Endzeit
Your comments have been deleted because you are stupid.
Please do not reproduce.
Here is a link to the statements from, well, everybody that man made global warming is real: http://www.ucsusa.org/ssi/climate-change/scientific-consensus-on.html
Hale-
Thanks for posting this piece. As an atmospheric scientist who reads your blog for economic analysis, I am glad when I see analysis regarding global warming effects from an economic perspective.
From my personal perspective, I think it is very important to emphasize the shift to high uncertainty and new, unknown risks. As a species and as multiple societies, we will end up spending money as a result of global warming one way or another. When we spend it and how we spend it is, in my view, largely up to us for now, but this becomes less true in the future.
I know there is a nearly endless list of things you could blog about, but I wondered if you could occasionally look at carbon markets in the future, especially with many to come online internationally in the next 2-3 years. Perhaps something on carbon taxes as policy instruments as well.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
in the late 1970s it was a fear of global cooling. Now it is warming. what difference is it at the arctic circle if -20C is then -16C even on a warm front day? All this over <.02% carbon dioxide in the atmosphere after all of the carbon tonnage emitted? Whatever.
I have yet to see solid evidence that gives a scientific reason for picking manmade carbon emissions as THE factor amongst the hundreds on inputs that determine climate and long term trends therein. All I see are blanket statements by scientific societies stating that climate change is manmade. That is hardly science at all.
Furthermore, heat waves, droughts, hurricanes, etc. of the past decade may have zero to do with carbon emissions. There were heat waves, droughts, hurricanes, etc. before industrialization, some of which nearly wiped out entire societies. It is beyond shortsighted to look at one decade and proclaim manmade global warming.
So much ignorance and stupidity, so little time.
Yes, in the 1970s a few newsmagazine had cover stories raising concerns about global cooling. I read a few of them myself at the time. But even then, this was a MINORITY opinion among climate scientists. The majority of climate scientists at that time only knew that massive effects were likely to happen, but the climate models of the day were too crude to accurately decide whether the effects of increasing CO2 would overpower the effects of particulates.
Since then, particulate emissions (which tend to lower temperatures) have plummeted, while CO2 emissions are much higher than in the 1970s. There is no longer any room among honest scientists for doubt about the reality of AGW.
The climate record supports this. Despite what the previous poster claims, the instrumental record of global warming is unequivocal, when not looked at through denialist goggles. The record in no way matches what we would see in the absence of AGW.
Instead of "it is real cuz scientists said so", how about listing hard data that proves carbon emissions as causation for supposed global warming. The argument is still heavily opinion and bias based. Just because there is a correlation of carbon emissions with a fractional increase of temperature does not prove that carbon is the cause. Anybody with an elementary understanding of math and science understands that mathematical correlations are not necessarily unequivocal fact.
As an engineer with a deep appreciation and love of science, I am not convinced of manmade global warming despite what scientists say. Scientists have been wrong before, and nobody convinced of manmade global warming is ever able to reproduce hard data or scientific studies proving that this stuff is fact whenever I ask. I would love to be convinced with real scientific reports using data and actual scientific methods. But I have yet to see anything other than the prior comment: its true because scientists say so and you are living in denial. Bs
Good lord
Let's start with basic logic. For the last 150 years the population of the planet has increased sharply and that population has powered itself with fuel that emits carbon dioxide. This substance also traps heat. We have also seen an increase in temperatures for the last few decades. Global warming caused by man is the logical conclusion
Then there's the fact that people who specialize in this science say it's man made. This is far more compelling than anonymous claiming scientific qualifications.
Of course, you can look at the drought hitting the United States, the two spikes in the entire grains complex over the last five years, the increase in bizarre weather and you have more odd confluences
Let's say it is man made and it's real and we do nothing. We might become extinct as a result of that stupidity
On the other hand, we could develop alternate energy, create good paying jobs, and create a healthier environment.
So, we do nothing and die or solve the problem and have a better economic and environmental situation. That's called a no-brainer.
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