A Brief Introduction to Climate Change

Wind turbine near Wellington, New Zealand, February 2014
Renewable energy is important if we want to stop Climate Change

Climate change is real and it is quite possibly the biggest threat to life as we know it. However it’s not inevitable. If we really want to the world’s population can slow Climate Change down and even stop it, but we will need governments, global industries, multi-national businesses and everyone else to pull all the stops out.

So, this week I want to take a look at Climate Change and first of all I want to look at what Climate Change is and why it’s a bad thing.

What is Climate Change?

Climate Change means that the climate of our whole planet is changing and that is making our weather more extreme. Climate Change is already happening, but it will get a whole lot worse if we don’t make some big changes in the way we all behave.

Some people use the term Climate Chaos because many of the changes in our weather are chaotic and dangerous.

We are already seeing a rise in the number of more intense major storms in many parts of the world.

Some parts of the world are experiencing heavier rainfall, which can then be followed by longer and drier droughts, which makes it harder to grow crops for food or anything else.

The effects of climate change are already being felt in southern Africa, in countries such as Swaziland, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia and Zimbabwe. Drought disasters in the region resulted in massive crop failures and the death of hundreds of thousands of cattle. This in turn put over 40 million people at risk of starvation and in need of humanitarian assistance.

Climate Change is having a devastating effect on people all over the world including in Europe and the US.

Extreme weather events in the US in recent years made the main headlines. Hurricane Sandy in 2012, killed at least 233 people and inflicted close to $69 billion worth of damage as it swept a path through eight countries, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 killed at least 1,245 people, while the resulting damage was estimated to be worth in the region of $125 billion and, last but not least, Hurricane Harvey in 2017 which killed 108 people and caused $125 billion worth of damage.

When Hurricane Harvey struck Texas up to 40 inches (100cm) of rain fell on Houston and its surrounding towns in just three days. Now, scientists have calculated that those record rains were made at least three times more likely by climate change.

Show of Hand's haunting song "Katrina" paints a vivid picture of the human cost of extreme weather events like Hurricane Katrina.

Drought and extremely dry weather create a greater risk of serious large scale wildfires.

In 2011 Texas experienced the most destructive wildfire in its history, which swept through the east of the city of Bastrop destroying 1,673 homes and inflicting an estimated $325 million of insured property damage.

Only last summer a series of four wildfires erupted across central Portugal in June 2017 within minutes of each other, resulting in at least 66 deaths and 204 injured people.

According to the Guardian a 2009 report from the Global Humanitarian Forum said that Global Warming causes 300,000 deaths a year.  Many people are already suffering as a result of Global Warming. Many more will suffer if we don’t do something now to reverse it.

Many plants and animals are being stressed by the change in the temperature ranges in which they have to live. Loss of water supplies that have historically come from glaciers is causes additional strains to species under threat from Climate Change. Many plants and animals could become extinct if we don’t do something now to reverse it.  Elephants, tigers, sea turtles and the monarch butterfly are just a few animals threatened by Climate Change.

The Great Barrier Reef is also under threat from Climate Change and Global warming.

Now, with concentrations of greenhouse gases rising, Earth's remaining ice sheets (such as Greenland and Antarctica) are starting to melt too, endangering polar bears and penguins. The extra water could potentially raise sea levels significantly. Many coastal areas could be under water if we don’t do something now to reverse Climate Change.

If it sounds like really bad news, that's because it is. Bad things are already happening because of Climate Change. If we do nothing, some really terrible things are going to happen, but we can stop them if we really want to!

I've tried to keep this short and simple. If you want a bit more information click on the links.

If you want to find out more you could start with A Very Short Introduction to Climate Change, which is also available on Kindle.

Next time I want to look at Global Warming and what is causing Climate Change and later in the week I want to look at what we can do to slow Climate Change down and even stop it altogether.