INTRODUCTION

Global warming is in the news. While scientists agree that temperatures

are rising, they disagree as to the causes and the rate of change. How
much will temperatures rise, and how soon, and what will be the
effects? There’s a lot we still don’t understand, because climate is
enormously complicated. So are the factors that make the Earth
habitable, of which temperature is only one. For example, certain types
of air pollution cool the atmosphere and thus might act as agents to
offset global warming, but they also make the air hard to breathe.
Because climate change is so complex, scientists are using all kinds of
scientific data and models to
try to figure out what’s actually happening.

In 1957, noted climatologist Roger Ravelle described the possibility of

global warming from burning of fossil fuels. “Human beings are now
carrying out a large-scale geophysical experiment of a kind that could
not have happened in the past nor be reproduced in the future. Within a
few centuries we are returning to the atmosphere and oceans the
concentrated organic carbon stored in sedimentary rocks over hundreds
of millions of years…”.

Ravelle also encouraged climatologist Charles Keeling to measure carbon

dioxide levels in the atmosphere. The resulting so-called Keeling Curve
dramatically illustrates the rise of CO2 above pre-industrial levels, a rise
confirmed by measurements of the gases trapped in the thick layers of
ice built up over thousands of years on Greenland and Antarctica.
Perhaps more than anything else, this documented atmospheric
increase in CO2, a powerful greenhouse gas (GHG), has served to bring
home the possibility of humans warming the climate. The rise in CO2 is
largely due to the burning of fossil fuels. In fact, this rise makes warming
a certainty since the physics is well understood and GHG warming is an
observational fact.
 A Word About the So-called
“Greenhouse Effect”

The Sun is hot, and shines most of its light in short-wavelength visible
radiation (violet, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red). The Earth
responds by absorbing some of this visible radiation, heating up, and
irradiating energy back to space in the form of longer-wavelength,
invisible infrared rays. Most of the gases in the Earth’s atmosphere allow
both kinds of radiation to pass through relatively freely, but a few, called
Greenhouse Gases (GHGs), pass the incoming visible radiation but
absorb outgoing infrared radiation. This further heats the lower
atmosphere and surface of the Earth, much the way sunlight “trapped”
inside the glass of a florist’s greenhouse warms the space within.
 Water in the Atmosphere, or Why the
Earth is Warm

The main natural greenhouse gases are water vapor, carbon dioxide, and
methane. Water vapor is the most significant, and without it the average
global temperature would be well below freezing. Humans have been
adding increasing amounts of methane and CO2 to the atmosphere over
the past 100 years. When these human-produced greenhouse gases
warm the planet, evaporation increases, and more and more water
vapor is introduced into the atmosphere. Where in the atmosphere this
additional water vapor goes and what kinds of clouds it forms strongly
influence how much additional warming is caused. These kinds of
uncertainties make it hard to predict the effect of human-produced
GHGs on global warming. Much about the relationship between global
temperature and GHG levels remains unclear.
 Climate in the
Distant Past

The record of global temperatures for the past half million years can be
derived from ice and sediment cores. Scientists use a variety of records
to reconstruct past climate. Ice cores drilled from polar glaciers provide
the most detailed record, in the form of layers of dust, chemicals, and
gases which have been deposited with snow over hundreds of
thousands of years. These layers reveal past climate characteristics, and
many of their potential causes. The record clearly shows that our
present warm climate is relatively rare. Most of the time the Earth likes
to be much colder than it is now. The record of the past 11,000 years or
so, the period of time in which civilization arose, shows that the Earth
has been in a warm period, but also shows a slight but noticeable
decrease in global temperatures. This is thought to be due largely to the
combined effect of the wobble of the Earth’s rotational axis and its
elliptical orbit. The seasons are caused by the fact that the Earth’s
rotation axis is tilted with respect to the plane of its orbit around the
Sun. Over thousands of years the direction that this rotation axis points
changes. In addition, the Earth’s orbit around the Sun is not a circle, but
is slightly elliptical, causing its distance from the Sun to change during
the year. Since the Northern Hemisphere (NH) has most of the land
surface, it warms more for the same amount of sunlight than the ocean-
dominated Southern Hemisphere. Thus, when NH summer occurs as the
Earth is closest to the Sun, the climate is warmer, and 11,500 years later
when NH summer occurs farthest from the Sun, the climate is cooler.
Some 11,000 years ago, NH summer was closest to the Sun, but since
then the rotation axis direction has been continuously changing until NH
summer is occurring near the point in its orbit farthest from the Sun.
Thus, the last 11,000 years have witnessed a small but steady decline in
global temperatures. Recent CO2-induced warming is occurring on top
of what might appear to have been a natural cooling. This is a complex
interaction, and scientists don’t understand it well enough to know how
the combination will play out.
 The Strangely-Shaped Temperature Record
of the Twentieth Century

The last hundred years have seen temperatures rise to levels not
experienced on a global scale for over a thousand years. As predicted,
the twentieth century rise generally coincides with the rise in human-
produced GHGs in the atmosphere. However, while GHGs have
increased at a steady rate, the actual temperature record fluctuates far
more widely.

The warming can be divided into six parts:

1. cool temperatures until 1920
2. rapid warming from 1920–1940
3. slight cooling from 1940–1970
4. rapid warming from 1970–1985
5. slight warming from 1985–1997
6. large warming in 1998
If climate warmed simply in response to increases in GHG, the
temperature increase would be smooth, and it is not. Climatologists
have been working to explain this strangely shaped temperature record.
 GHGs, Aerosols, and Solar Activity

Because so many variables affect climate, it’s difficult to establish a firm

correlation between human activity (human produced GHG) and
warming temperatures. The challenge is to establish whether a natural
pattern exists, and then to determine what constitutes a departure from
that pattern. Fortunately, the picture is becoming clearer. At least three
separate computer simulations indicated not only that human-produced
GHG had increased, but also that the effects of industrial aerosols had to
be taken into account. (A byproduct of industrial pollution, these fine
particles in the atmosphere actually cause cooling by scattering sunlight
back into space.) These simulations have begun to explain the strangely-
shaped temperature record. In particular, they have shown
quantitatively why the global climate cooled between 1940 and 1974,
when industrial air pollution was substantial, even as CO2 levels steadily
rose. In 1974, the U.S. Congress enacted the Clean Air Act, which
resulted in a dramatic decrease in air pollution, at least by industry in
the United States. Temperatures rose. For the first time, it was apparent
that air pollution could scatter enough sunlight back into space to slow
down the GHG warming, at least temporarily. Computer simulations
have become an extremely useful tool, but they still could not entirely
account for the rapid temperature increase between 1920 and 1940.
These have since been largely attributed to increases in solar activity in
the form of sunspots. While all three factors—GHGs, aerosols, and solar
activity—have been operative to a lesser or greater extent over the past
hundred or more years, the first rise (1920–1940) was largely due to
increased solar activity, the leveling and slight decline (1940–1970) was
caused by air pollution and perhaps a slight decline in solar activity, and
the rise after 1975 is an increasingly clear signal of the effect of human-
produced GHG. Between 1985 and 1997, however, temperatures have
only risen slightly. This plateau effect is not fully understood, but
increasing worldwide air pollution may be the reason; both the
extremely rapid industrialization of the developing countries and the
massive burning of forests produce light-scattering aerosols. In 1998,
effects of a strong El Niño were linked to a large temperature increase,
causing speculation that human GHGs were amplifying the lesser
warming effect of the El Niño.
 Computer Models of Climate

Current computer models of the climate are becoming dramatically

more accurate predictors of global warming. One example is the
prediction of the global cooling and subsequent temperature rebound
due to natural aerosols injected into the stratosphere by the eruption of
Mount Pinatubo (a volcano in the Philippines) in 1991. These aerosols
took four years to dissipate, during which time they reduced sunlight
reaching the Earth’s surface and lower atmosphere.

What the Models Predict for Warming in

the Twenty-first Century
The latest computer models show that detailed prediction of warming in
the twenty-first century due to human-produced GHGs will be difficult,
because of the potentially large variations in aerosols and dust in the
atmosphere, and unknown changes in solar activity. At the current rate
of use of fossil fuel, it seems likely that CO2 in the atmosphere could
double, relative to pre-industrial levels, by the year 2050. Most
computer models agree that such an increase could cause a temperature
rise of some 2°C. The current uncertainties only heighten our concern,
because while consequences might be fairly benign, they could also be
disastrous to both humans and all other living things.
 Potential Impacts of Global Warming

During the summer of 1999, the eastern half of the United States
experienced weeks of above 90s temperatures combined with extremely
high humidity and severe droughts. This led several states to ration both
water and electrical energy (due to increased demand to run air
conditioners). The number of people whose deaths could be attributed
directly to this massive heat wave was over 200. This scenario is an
example of what we might expect in the twenty-first century as human
emissions of greenhouse gases cause additional global warming. While a
rise in temperature of about 2°C may not seem great, that rise is an
average over the entire Earth for an entire year. What we really expect is
much larger departures from the normal temperatures in smaller
regions of the Earth (half a continent) for shorter times (a month or
less). These may be quite severe, and it is their effects that cause us
concern. From such events, we expect problems such as: reduced crop
yields due to droughts, extreme storms as the Earth attempts to “cool
off,” local outbreaks of insect infestation or insect-borne diseases such
as malaria and dengue fever, and freak weather events such as massive
ice storms rather than ordinary snowfall. Another example is sea level
rise, which is predicted to be less than a meter. While that rise will be
enough to cause problems with low-lying areas, another potentially
larger impact may be that tidal surges, amplified by storms, will be much
larger and more devastating as they breach natural dune barriers and
cause destruction farther inland.
 International Response

Recognizing that early detection of possible human-produced GHG

warming of the Earth was an important but politically problematic issue,
the United Nations and the World Meteorological Organization formed
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1988. Made up
of scientists from most nations, its task has been to assess the amount of
potential warming. Scientists generally agree that organizations like the
IPCC are the best way to achieve a responsible assessment of such
emotionally charged issues. The IPCC’s first reports in 1990 indicated
that humans were probably causing some global warming, but that
nothing could be said for certain. But in its 1995 report, the IPCC
changed its position ever so slightly and caused quite a stir. In the
summary statement it wrote:

“While significant uncertainties still remain… the balance of evidence

suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.”
 Conclusion

The emerging picture of climate change, while complex, is increasingly

comprehensible. Human activity (burning fossil fuel, changes in land use,
air pollution, etc.) must be seen in relation to other factors—Earth’s
orbital changes, solar variability, and natural cycles— particularly in the
oceans.
If the stakes weren’t so high, this would be one of the most fascinating
scientific problems of our time, since it combines so many biological,
chemical, and physical processes in a great, chaotic, and complex
system. But if we are correct, the effect of human-produced GHGs is a
recognizable factor in the observed warming of the global climate.

The ultimate benefit of the research described

in this essay will be a better understanding of
the possible climate of the near future. One fact
is abundantly clear: the next quarter of a
century will be a fascinating period in the study
of climate change.

REFERENCES

1. Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
2. Global Warming 2018 Article:
https://www.livescience.com/topics/global-warming