Your seat partner starts to ask about what\'s happening with climate today: \"So
ID: 233753 • Letter: Y
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Your seat partner starts to ask about what's happening with climate today: "So what is happening to the climate today" This is your chance to summarize what scienticts have observed about how observed about how climate has been changing over the past several decades (recently and conveniently summarized in the IPCC 5^th Assessment). Identify at least five different changes underway in the Earth system associated with climate change. Remaining Time: 56 minutes, 00 seconds. Question Completion Status:Explanation / Answer
5 different changes underway in the earth system due to climate change:
1) Changes in Cryosphere -
Cryosphere is the region which has water in frozen form throughout the year. It includes permafrost, glaciers, ice-shelves and regions above snowline.
Changes - i) Antarctic and Greenland ice-sheets are losing their mass at a fast pace. The rate of decrease is around 4% per decade since 1979. This is not compensated by the rate of increase of mass which is 1.8-2% per decade.
ii) Glaciers (mountain and continental) are retreating on a global scale.
iii) The snow cover in spring in the Northern hemisphere has continued to decrease in extent. The decrease is recorded upto 12% since 1967 to 2012.
iv) Permafrost temperatures have increased in Northern Hemisphere since the early 1980s. This is corroborated by its reduced thickness and extent in many regions.
2) Rise in Eustatic sea-level
Global mean sea level has risen by 19mm in the period 1901–2010. This is attributed to melting of glaciers and permanent ice sheets of greenland and Antarctica and the thermal expansion of the oceans. The rate of increase is faster compared to the past increases in the interglacial periods.
3) Ocean acidification -
Oceanic uptake of CO2 has increased since the industrial revolution period. Oceanic pH (surface water) has decreased by 0.1 since that period. This is further exemplified by the reduction in Oxygen concentrations in the Ocean.
4) Rise in atmospheric temperatures
The last three decades have been sucessively warmer than any decade since 1850. The year 2015 was declared as the warmest since 1850. The 30 year period since 1982 was warmest in the last 800 years. The global temperature is showing an increasing trend corresponding to the rise of global CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere. Change in precipitation pattern is the outcome of this rise. Annual Precipitation amount, globally has increased since 1901.
5) Rise in oceanic temperatures
Ocean temperature has also increased alongwith atmospheric temperatures. The surface water temperature has increased by 0.11°C since 1971. The overall increase is still small but considering high specific heat capacity of water, the rise in temperatures will take many years to come.
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