Climate

Online units conversion site.

Overheads, tables, instructor notes:

• Forinash's PowerPoints on Global Warming.
• In a nutshell: Why we know global warming is real and caused by humans.
• Figures from text (Fundamentals of Environmental Physics, Forinash).

Useful web sites:

• Reports of the IPCC.
• RealClimate.org.
• How to Reply to Climate Skeptics.
• edGCM (downloadable educational Global Climate Model).

Things that affect climate:

• List of things that affect climate on earth.
• Milancovic cycle: one, two.
• Ocean circulation: one.
• History of earth's atmosphere.
• Structure of earth's atmosphere: one, two.
• Atmospheric circulation: one, two.
  • Coriolis effect, animations, YouTube: one, two.
• Albedo feedback.
• Short term oscillations: ENSO, ENSO, ENSO, Map of effects, effect on temperature, NAO, NAO.
  • Technical explanation of ENSO.
  • NOA site on ENSO.
  • Information on NAO.
• Insolation and the "greenhouse effect":
  • Electromagnetic spectra, an applet that shows spectral lines of all elements.
  • Variation of insolation at the poles.
  • Solar variations over time; long term, short term, shorter term, NASA sunspot page.
  • Radiation balance calculations: one, two, three, four, five, Venus, Venus IR.
  • Notes from the text on the greenhouse effect.
  • Solar atmosphere transmission data, SORCE.
  • Solar atmsophere transmission data, ASTM.
  • Solar atmosphere transmission data, HITRAN.
  • Insolation data, paleological (paper in Astronomy and Astrophysics).
  • Nationa Acadamies press report on radiative forcing, 2005.
• Aerosols: one.
• Earth's magnetic reversal (probably no effect on climate but ..).

The data:

• What are the sources of climate data?
• Historical climate: proxies, proxy locations, other proxy locations, 650,000 years, 12,000 years.
• Gas emissions, carbon cycle, carbon cycle 2, Carbon emissions by sector, CO₂ and temp, CO₂, recent CO₂.
• Keeling curve.
• Carbon dating of emissions (RealClimate.org).
• List of links to climate data by the British Atmospheric Data Centre.
• NASA surface solar radiation data page.
• Sea surface temperatures from NOAA.
• Ice level changes from the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
• World Data Centre for Greenhouse Gases.
• Temperature and CO₂ graphs.
• Review of scientific data (American Geophysical Union- look for climate topics in the list).
• Plant Hardiness zones for US (USDA).
• Human caused forcing: one, history.
• Computer models:
  • History 1, history 2, current.
  • Accuracy: one, two, three.

Other sources of information:

• IPCC 2001 Report, 4th Report.
• US Global Change Research Information Office.
• US Climate Change Science Program.
• US EPA on Climate Change.
• National Research Council 2010 report: Stabilization Targets for Atmospheric Greenhouse Gas Concentrations.
• UN climate page.
• naturalSCIENCE, Volume 1, Article 9, 1997 (note the date!).
• Climate Change and Greenhouse Gases (American Geophysical Union).
• Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison (data and modeling tools).
• NSF 10 year plan for climate research (2003).
• History of the discovery of climate change.
• Check out the web links and published papers of Dr. James Hanson (leanding climatologist in the US).

Effects of climate change:

• Effects: one, two.
• Climate hot map (shows effects of climate change).
• Photo of receding glacier in Alaska.
• Nasa video of artic ice change
• Model predictions: one, two.
• Conclusions of the IPCC: one.
• Ted Talk by Jame Balog showing time laps glacier melting (does not qualify as scientific evidence but is interesting).

• Comments about climate skeptics.

Articles:

NOTE: It is impossible to list all of the articles on climate change and its effects (there are literally thousands). I have listed a few here which are particularly interesting. Journals where you can find reliable and readable articles about climate change are: Scientific American, American Scientist, Physics Today, Nature, Science. If you see something interesting let me know.

• 'Rapid Climate Change' by K. Taylor American Scientist vol. 87 No. 4 July-August (1999) p320.
• 'How Will Climate Change Affect Human Health?' Pim Martens American Scientist vol. 87 No. 6 November-December (1999) p.
• 'An introduction to Global Warming' J. R. Barker, M. H. Ross, American Journal of Physics, Vol. 67, No. 12 (1999) p1216.
• 'Climate Shock: Abrupt Changes over Millennial Time Scales' by E. Bard Physics Today vol. 55 No. 12 December (2002) p32.
• 'Advanced technology paths to Global Climate Stability', M Hoffert et. al. Science vol. 298 Nov.1 (2002) p981.
• 'The Discovery of Rapid Climate Change' by S. Weart Physics Today vol. 56 No. 8 August (2003) p30. Online version.
• 'Abrupt Climate Change' R. B. Alley et. al. Science vol. 299 March (2003) p2005.
• Satellite-Observed Changes in the Arctic', Comiso and Parkinson, Physics Today, vo1. 57 no. 8 August (2004) p38.
• 'Stabilization Wedges: Solving the climate problem for the next 50 years with current technologies, S. Pacala, R. Socolow, Science vol. 305, August 13 (2004) p968.
• Climate Protection Strategies for the 21st Century: Kyoto and Beyond. German Advisory Council on Global Climate Change. 2003
• 'Living with a variable sun' J. Lean, Physics Today, vol. 58. No. 6 June (2005) p32.
• 'Is Climate Sensitive to Solar Variability' N. Scaffetta, B. West, Physics Today, vol. 61, no. 3 (2008) p50.
• 'Solar variability does not explain late-20th century warming' P. B. Duffy, B. D. Santer, T. M. L. Wigley, Physics Today, vol. 62, no. 1 (2009) p48.
• Reports of the IPCC on global warming.