Global Climate Change: Introduction



Key Messages:

  • Human activities have led to large increases in heat-trapping gases over the past century.
  • Global average temperature and sea level have increased, and precipitation patterns have changed.
  • The global warming of the past 50 years is due primarily to human-induced increases in heat-trapping gases. Human “fingerprints” also have been identified in many other aspects of the climate system, including changes in ocean heat content, precipitation, atmospheric moisture, and Arctic sea ice.
  • are projected to continue to rise over this century; by how much and for how long depends on a number of factors, including the amount of heat-trapping gas emissions and how sensitive the climate is to those emissions.

This introduction to global explains very briefly what has been happening to the world's climate and why, and what is projected to happen in the future. While This Series focuses on climate change impacts in the United States, understanding these changes and their impacts requires an understanding of the global climate system.

Many changes have been observed in global climate over the past century. The nature and causes of these changes have been comprehensively chronicled in a variety of recent reports, such as those by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the

U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP). This section does not intend to duplicate these comprehensive efforts, but rather to provide a brief synthesis, and to integrate more recent work with the assessments of the IPCC, CCSP, and others.

800,000 Year Record of Concentration

800 000 Year Record of Carbon Dioxide Concentration

Analysis of air bubbles trapped in an Antarctic ice core extending back 800,000 years documents the Earth's changing carbon dioxide concentration. Over this long period, natural factors have caused the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration to vary within a range of about 170 to 300 parts per million (ppm). Temperature-related data make clear that these variations have played a central role in determining the global climate. As a result of human activities, the present carbon dioxide concentration of about 385 ppm is about 30 percent above its highest level over at least the last 800,000 years. In the absence of strong control measures, emissions projected for this century would result in the carbon dioxide concentration increasing to a level that is roughly 2 to 3 times the highest level occurring over the glacial-interglacial era that spans the last 800,000 or more years.

Human activities have led to large increases in heat-trapping gases over the past century.

The Earth's climate depends on the functioning of a natural “greenhouse effect.” This effect is the result of heat-trapping gases (also known as ) like water vapor, carbon dioxide, ozone, methane, and nitrous oxide, which absorb heat radiated from the Earth's surface and lower atmosphere and then radiate much of the energy back toward the surface. Without this natural greenhouse effect, the average surface temperature of the Earth would be about 60°F colder. However, human activities have been releasing additional heat-trapping gases, intensifying the natural greenhouse effect, thereby changing the Earth's climate.

Climate is influenced by a variety of factors, both human-induced and natural. The increase in the carbon dioxide concentration has been the principal factor causing warming over the past 50 years. Its concentration has been building up in the Earth's atmosphere since the beginning of the industrial era in the mid-1700s, primarily due to the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas) and the clearing of forests. Human activities have also increased the emissions of other greenhouse gases, such as methane, nitrous oxide, and halocarbons.

These emissions are thickening the blanket of heat-trapping gases in Earth's atmosphere, causing surface temperatures to rise.

2,000 Years of Concentrations

2 000 Years of Greenhouse Gas Concentrations

Increases in concentrations of these gases since 1750 are due to human activities in the industrial era. Concentration units are parts per million (ppm) or parts per billion (ppb), indicating the number of molecules of the greenhouse gas per million or billion molecules of air.