1. …in less than 20 minutes! More than you wanted to know about Climate change… Bruce Larson Stratham Memorial School Stratham, NH 03885

2. In February 2007, an international panel of experts (the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change) concluded: -Global warming is occurring. -Increase in global temperature is a result of human activities. -Given current trends, temperature extremes, heat waves, and heavy rains will continue to escalate in frequency. -The Earth’s temperature and seas will continue to rise into the next millennium.

3. Understanding climate change Involves understanding A budget more complex than Secretary Geithner’s…

4. Energy budget basics: more coming in than going out.

5. The budget is out of balance for two reasons directly related to humans: We are heating from below the atmosphere with the energy stored in fossil and nuclear fuel and human activity gives off gases which act as a heat trapping blanket.

6. Climate is generally defined as average weather, and as such, climate change and weather are intertwined. Observations can show that there have been changes in weather, and it is the statistics of changes in weather over time that identify climate change.

7. Instrumental observations over the past 157 years show that temperatures at the surface have risen globally, with important regional variations.

8. Did the sun do it?

9. This diagram shows the three ways the Earth can ‘jiggle’ in its trip around the Sun. This graph spans a million years. Each color is a wiggle, and the bottom is a pretty regular glacial period.

10. On Mauna Loa, something was making the CO2 graph rise in a steady sawtoothed graph - rising in the spring, and dropping in the fall.

12. Human activities contribute to climate change by causing changes in Earth’s atmosphere in the amounts of greenhouse gases, aerosols (small particles), and cloudiness.

13. Glaciers and ice caps are melting…

15. February 2009 (average surface temperature) These maps are compiled monthly and are excellent to look at during hurricane season to see the extent of surface warming.

16. “The Earth’s climate is tracking into uncharted territory.” Andrew Glikson Canberra, Australia (Andrew Glikson undertakes earth and paleo-climate research at the Research School of Earth Science, Australian National University.)

17. The IPCC has an excellent FAQ about the science of climate at the following location: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-faqs.pdf Or you can Google ‘IPCC’ and see the entire package!

18. Ocean currents Solar cycles Plant transpiration Comet impacts Cows, horses, pigs Volcanoes Burning fossil fuels Glaciers and ice caps store/release fresh water Fluorocarbons Orbit variations Cloud cover