OUR UNCERTAIN CLIMATE FUTURE

Dr, Thrivikramji.K.P.
thrivikramji@gmil.com
We haumans take for granted many of the natural processes, like for
example the sunrise and sunset, the new moon and full moon, the
seasons, weather and even climate. Yet we also know of unpredictable
natural phenomena like, earthquakes, volcanic eruption, tsunamis, to
some degree tornadoes,floods and storm surges. However, in spite of
the steady growth of scientific knowledge, the graph of our
understanding of many of the earths/atmosphericuncertainties,show
an uptrend. Climate is one of those. An uncertain climate future has
deep implications in respect of future of mankind for the simplest
reason that the current life style is evolved from designed and built
around a domain of steady climate state or invariant climate state.
Now, for example, let us take a peek at the nature/needfor steady
state climate. It is simple and obvious that most of the human
activities/responses/plans, like school and college reopening and
closure, both summer and winter Olympics, US open or Australian
open, Football season, manufacturing and mining, farming and
harvesting, tourist and sporting season etc. are planned/designed /
scheduled by factoring in the of climate (assumed as steady state
phenomenon) per se. Any departure from the norm(of seasons rooted
on climate zones of the earth), is beyond human comprehension.
Again amongothers, only Geoscientists have come to terms with the
question of climate shifts or climate change in the geologic past. The
planet earth had gone through three periods or phases glaciations
including the latest one the Pleistocene glaciation. During glacial
phases the surface temperature of the earth was frigid and most of
the surface waters remained frozen. Earth also had gone through
extreme aridity regionally. Such climate departures are encrypted in
the isotopic, rock or fossil record in the different continents and
oceanic sediemnts
Yet, all the finer research about the climate of the geologic past was a
nonissue among scientists and justifiably so among the heads of states
and nations and hence for the commoners. Now the picture is
different. The GHGs (green house gases, like water vapour, CO2, CH4,
N2O and O3 )blanket around the planet earth and absorb the IR
radiation but prevents it from getting back to the atmosphere
resulting in slow warming of the earths atmosphere. The prediction is
that by the end of his century the surface temperature might reach
1.5 2.0 C if the emission of GHGs continue to rise and CO2 rises
beyond 400 pm.

The potential risks of future global climate change due to GHG

buildup is a matter of concerninternationally and is now in the center
stage, by the creation of IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change) under the auspices of the United Nations. Now we need to
worry a bit about the history.
Say in mid 19thcentury,Joseph Fourier, a great scientific mind, argued
about the likelihood of Green House effect manifesting as
warming/heating of troposphere. Experimental research of John
Tyndall (1859),followed by and later work of Prof. Svante Arrhenius, a
Swedish Nobel laureate in Chemistry, reaffirmed the phenomenon of
Green house effect.
Quite interestingly, as early as 1917, Alexander Grahambellproposed
that unchecked burning of fossil fuels like coal and oil and consequent
accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere would lead to greenhouse
effect and possibly the net result would be translation of green
house to a hot house. As a remedy, Mr. Bell recommended use of
solar energy to meet the energy needs.
During the day, Sun supplies light and heat energy to the planet earth.
Similar to sun, an incandescent bulb though a poor but useful
analogy- or a filament lamp for example on switching on provides both
heat and light.
Now take for instance a car parked in the open during daytime with
the windows rolled up.Obviously it would be very hot inside like a
hot house. Why is it so? Well, because, heat radiating from the sun,
on hitting opaque metallic car-body, is conducted into the passenger
cabin. But the transparent glass freely transmits heat radiation
(waves) into the car. Heat from these pathways, is sort of trapped
inside the car to finally heat up the passenger cabin. As the glass
windows of a car are transparent only to the visible spectral colours
(e.g., blue, green and red) and not to the trapped heat radiation at a
longer wavelength. So heat radiation fails to go through the glass
barriers. In a similar manner the most of the heat energy that
reaches the earth are trapped in the troposphere by the GHGs.
School/college age kids living in the developed world and to some
degree in the developing world know the basics of whys and whats of
global climate change phenomenon. The chief driver of the
phenomenon is the steadilyrising emission of GHGs and their
accumulation in the lower atmosphere or troposphere.By definition
Green house gas (in the atmosphere) is one that absorbs and emits
radiation in the thermal infrared range.

Also keep in mind that it is the presence of GHGs in the atmosphere

that made our earth livable. On the contrary without GHGs, the
average temperature would have been far lower than what it is today.
By the dawn of industrial revolution in 1750, consumption of huge
volumes of coal for energizing steam engines, released CO2. Others
like cement manufacturing,burning of natural fuels like petroleum and
natural gas too, released CO2 adding to the CO2 content in the
atmosphere on a daily basis. The preindustrial revolution (i.e., 1750)
level of 280 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere touched of 400 ppm this
year. This rise is despite the natural sinks of CO2 like seawater and
forest vegetation to name a few.Since 1950s, the observatory
founded (by Prof. Keeling of USC), atop Mauna Loa Is (one of the
Hwaiian Is) in Pacific Ocean has been monitoring the atmospheric
CO2 level.
Consequences CO2 build up in the warming scenario are chiefly
melting of ice in the continents (including polar regions and
Greenland), entry of the melt water into the oceans and consequent
rise in sea level, change in the climate we have been enjoying till now.
The complete melting of Greenland ice sheet may raise the global sea
level by several meters. Secondly, another consequence of warming
atmosphere will be expansion of volume of seawater and rise of sea
level. Thirdly the warmer earth will go through a shift in the
atmospheric circulation pattern and consequent change in the
weather pattern we enjoy now. The wet regions of the globe will
become wetter and the hot regions hotter. And such large-scale
changes in weather ultimately will create climate refugees. Shifting of
population on a massive scale to more livable regions. The extreme
weather, like severe droughts, heavy rainfall and catastrophic floods
of the recent past, according to climate change scientists, are the
manifestations of the changing climate due to GHG build up.
The climate change will modify food availability, security and scale of
food production. According to one scenario the droughts, floods and
famine will be on the rise in the tropics and will be les so in the
temperate zones of the earth. Tropical zone will expand at the
expense of the temperate and the temperate zone will migrate further
to higher latitudes as a result of the shifting climate. And that too in
the backdrop of world population hitting 9 billion by the end of this
century.
Table 1summarisesthe consequences of global climate change and the
level probabilities.

Table 1, Effects, degree of likelihood and manifesting impacts of Global Climate Change
(Gilman et al, 2007)
Geophysical effect
Higher max. Temp.,
more hot days, and heat
waves over nearly all
landmasses

Probabil
ity
Very
likely
(9099%)

Higher min. temp.,

fewer cold days, frost
days and cold waves
nearly over all the area.

Very
likely
(9099%)

More intense
precipitation events

Very
likely
(9099%)
Likely
(6790%)

Increased summer
drying over most of midlatitude continental
interiors & associated
risk of drought.
Increase in tropical
cyclone peak intensities,
mean and peak
precipitation intensities
Increased droughts and
floods associated with El
Nino events

Likely
(6790%)

Likely
(6790%)

Likely Impacts
Increased deaths and serious illness in older age
groups & urban poor; increased heat stress in
livestock & wildlife; increased risk of damage to
a number of crops; increased electric cooling
demand & reduced energy supply reliability.
Decreased cold related morbidity & mortality;
decreased risk of damage to a number of crops &
increased risk to others; extended range &
activity of pests & other disease vectors; reduced
heating energy demand.
Increased flood, landslide, mudslide & avalanche
damage; increased soil erosion; increased flood
run off; increased recharge of some flood plain
aquifers
Decreased crop yields, increased damage to
building foundations caused by ground
shrinkage; decreased water resource quantity
and quality; increased risk of forest fire.
Increased risk to human life and risk of increased
infectious disease epidemics; increased coastal
erosion and damage to coastal buildings and
infrastructure; increased damage to coastal
ecosystems such as coral reefs and mangrove
swamps.
Decreased agricultural & rangeland productivity
in drought and flood prone regions; Decreased
hydropower potential in drought prone regions

Are there exits out of this potential calamity?

Obviously, reducing the GHG emission and especially that of CO2 to
the preindustrial levels. How? By cutting down the consumption of
fossil fuels like coal, petroleum and gas. Or a shift toward renewable
alternatives like solar and wind energy. There is a global mission to
switch over to such renewables. Also making more efficient
technologies to replace existing inefficient ones guzzling fossil fuels.
The capture of emitted CO2 from the fossil fuel burning factories or
atmosphere and sequestering the CO2 in the geological formations
and also in the seawater at depth. Oil companies have been pumping
down CO2 into oil wells to enable tertiary recovery and it is a proven
technology. There is a factory in Texas, USA, that captures CO2 and
uses it manufacture of sodium carbonate and Hydrochloric acid
commercially for sale internationally.
The forests of the world are also huge carbon sinks. So conserving
and preserving the forest and forest health and expanding the forest
cover are measures of capturing atmospheric CO2. The vegetation

during photosynthesis makes use of C of CO2 and releases the Oxygen

back to atmosphere.
The unicellular algae giving a greenish sheen to water in the ponds
and lakes,are also efficient in trapping C from CO2 and hence great
Carbon sinks. There are millions ponds of varying sizes in the
continents supporting together huge crops of algae a simple Carbon
trap for stocking atmospheric CO2. The dark colour of muck at the
bottom of these ponds and lakes are due to sequestered Carbon. The
famous shale gas in the USA, had a similar origin in
geologicallyancient sedimentary environments but of a different scale.
----------Refernces
Gilman,N, Randall,D and Schuarty, P, 2007, Impacts of climate change :A system vulnerability
approach: Global Business Network, 25p.
Thrivikramji, K.P., 2008, Climate change catastrophe: Insulating Kerala?-A discussion note,
Kerala Environment Congress, Center For Environment and Development, Thrissur, 5p.