Chapter 7 Flashcards
Adaptation
Adjustment to different or changing circumstances, such as when insurance companies modify their claims forecasting and setting of premiums with regard to future climate change conditions. The largest challenge for adaptation strategies will occur in the future when the most significant consequences from climate change will appear.
Aspirational approach
An approach emphasizing long-term but unspecific and non-binding targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Advocated by developed countries such as Canada (p 224)
Atmosphere
The layer of air surrounding the Earth (p. 202)
Bali Conference
A UN-sponsored climate change conference held in the first two weeks of December 2007 in Bali, Indonesia, to start a process to create a new framework to replace the Kyoto Protocol,which ended in 2012. There was agreement that both developed and developing countries must participate in reducing greenhouse gas emissions but reluctance from key developing countries, including Canada, to commit to binding targets (p 225)
Biochar
Created through pyrolysis of biomass, a type of charcoal used to enhance soil. In addition to sequestering carbon. it increases food security and soil biodiversity (p.235)
Cancun Summit
A meeting of representatives from 193 countries and other interests parties held in Mexico in December 2010 to seek advance mitigative action on climate change. Canada continued to be a laggard, and only incremental progress was made (p. 226)
Carbon sequestration
Reforestation and afforestation to ameliorate carbon dioxide loadings in the atmosphere because trees and shrbs use the excess CO2 (p 232)
Carbon tax
An approach in which greenhouse gas emissions by individuals or companies are taxed. The purpose is to change human behaviour towards activities that produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions (p. 231)
Climate
The long-term weather pattern of a particular region (p. 203)
Climate change
A long-term alternation in the climate of a particular location or region, or for the entire planet (p. 203)
Climate change deniers
Those who, for ideological and economic reasons, use communication tactics to question the science underlying climate change and therefore delay action to mitigate this change (p.220)
“Climategate”
The controversy surrounding leaked e-mails from a climate research centre at the university of east anglia, just weeks prior to the the Copenhagen Summit, which appeared, incorrectly, to suggest that researchers had manipulated their data to make climate change appear more severe (p.221)
Climate justice
Focuses on the interaction of environmental degradation and social, economic, and racial inequities created by climate change. It calls for resolving the disproportionate impact of climate change on poor and marginalized people (p. 235)
Climate modelling
Various mathematical and computerized approaches for determining past climate trends in an effort to build scenarios predicting future climate, which use any or all of the following factors in measurement: incoming and outgoing radiation; energy dynamics or flows around the globe; surface processes affecting climate, such as snow cover and vegetation; chemical composition of the atmosphere; and time step or resolution (time over which the model runs and the spatial scale to which it applies (.p 207)
Copenhagen Summit
A two-week meeting of world leaders, environment ministers, and other interested parties held in Copenhagen, Denmark, in late 2009, which sought unsuccessfully to advance the agenda for action on climate change. Canada showed itself at this conference to be among the greatest laggards in seeking action for improved GHG emission standards (p 225)
El Nino
A marked warming of the waters in the eastern and central portions of the tropical Pacific that trigger weather changes and events in two-thirds of the world. (p 203)
Emission credits
Credits that can be earned by a nation based on land-use or forestry (afforestation, reforestation) initiatives that reduce measurable greenhouse gas emissions (p223)
Emissions trading
Under the Kyoto Protocol, a system whereby one country that will exceed its allotted limit of greenhouse gas emissions can buy an amount of greenhouse gas emissions from another country that will not reach its own established emissions limit (p 223)
Fossil fuels
Organic (coal, natural gas, oil, tar sands, and oil shale) derived from once-living plants or animals (p 218)
General circulation models (GCMs)
The most prominent and complex type of climate modellings, which takes into account the three-dimensional nature of the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans or both (p 208)
Geo-engineering
Various technologies, from as simple as tree planting to as complex as stratospheric aerosols and space mirrors, that are used to or have been proposed to mitigate the effects of climate change (p. 226)
Global warming
Changes in average temperatures of the Earth’s surface. These changes are not uniform (i.e., some regions experience significantly higher temperatures, others only slight changes upward, and still others might experience somewhat cooler temperatures (p 203)
Greenhouse effect
A warming of the Earth’s atmosphere caused by the presence of certain gases (e.g., water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane) that absorb radiation emitted by the Earth, thereby retarding the loss of energy to space ( p 204)
Greenhouse gas (GHG)
A gas that contributes to the greenhouse effects, such as carbon dioxide (p 204)
Ice caps
An ice mass covering not more than 50,000 km2 of land area (p. 215)
Ice shelves
An ice mass extending over more than 50,000 km2 of land area (p 215)
Kyoto Protocol
An international agreement reached in Kyoto, Japan, in 1997 that targets 38 developed nations as well as the European Community to ensure that “their aggregate anthropocentric carbon dioxide equivalent emissions of the greenhouse gases (e.g. carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydro-fluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, sulphur hexafluoride) do no exceed their assigned amounts. The Protocol came into effect in 2004 when 55 countries accounting for 55 per cent of 1990 global carbon dioxide emissions had ratified it. Kyoto commitments are legally binding on nations under international law (p 222)
Mitigation
Strategies to reduce or minimize the negative consequences from a hazard such as climate change. Mitigation requires action today in order for initiatives to be able to reduce the most serious negative impacts in the future (p 223)
Montreal Protocol
Signed in 1987 by 32 nations, established a schedule for reducing use of chloro-flourocarbons and halons to reduce the rate of depletion of the ozone layer (212)
Ozone
An atmospheric gas (O3) that, when present in the stratosphere, helps to protect the Earth from UV rays. However, when present near the Earth’s surface, it is a primary component of urban smog and has detrimental effects on both vegetation and human respiratory systems (212).
Uncertainty
A situation in which the probability or odds of a future event are not known and therefore indicates the presence of doubt (p 218)
Weather
The sum total of atmospheric conditions (temperature, pressure, winds, moisture, and precipitation) in a particular place for a short period of time (p 202)
The world’s average temperature was approximately _____ at the end of the 20th century than it was at the beginning
0.6 warmer
________ gas is primarily responsible for the greenhouse effect
carbon dioxide
Of the following, _____ is not a general factor in climate change.
a) solar radiation
b) the shape of the Earth’s orbit
c) earthquakes and tsunamis
d) volcanic eruptions
e) changes in ocean currents
volcanic eruptions
The International Panel on Climate Change concluded that global increases of carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere are due to _________
fossil fuel use and land use change
Under the Kyoto Protocol, Canada was supposed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by ___________
6 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-2012
Greenhouse gas intensity is ______
the ratio of greenhouse gas emissions to economic output
Carbon sequestration is ________.
a way for nations to achieve GHG emission reduction targets
a way to trap carbon in natural systems such as forests
a challenge, as biological sinks are not permanent
Weather is a combination of ________.
temperature and precipitation, humidity, winds, air pressure
Climate represents average day-to-day weather as well as ________.
seasonal variations
. Climate change can be caused by ________.
cyclical changes in the shape of the Earth’s orbit
wobbles of the Earth’s axis
changes in the angle of tilt of the Earth on its axis
alterations in atmospheric greenhouse gases
A marked warming of eastern and central Pacific waters that triggers global weather changes is
called ________.
El Nino
Snow cover in the northern hemisphere has decreased since 1996 by ________.
10%
Caution must be exercised in interpreting sea level rise data because ________.
land is still rebounding from the weight of the last glaciation, leading to underestimation of
sea level rise
________ is being so affected by sea level rise that they are preparing to buy land in other countries
so that their citizens can move when their country is flooded.
the maldives
In general circulation models, equations are calculated in each grid zone at every layer of the
grid, dealing with ________.
conservation of momentum
conservation of energy
ideal gas law
conservation of mass
. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established by ________.
the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme
Ozone depletion was the focus of and international protocol signed in ________.
Montreal
An example of geo-engineering is ________.
iron fertilization of oceans
True or False A general circulation model of climate change using a small grid requires fewer calculations than
one using a larger grid.
F
True or False In 2007, Canada’s Conservative government rejected the Kyoto Protocol and adopted an aspirational
approach instead.
T
True or False Canada, China, and India agreed to specific targets at the 2007 Bali conference.
F
True or False Canada was labelled a “climate hypocrite” at the 2007 Bali conference.
4
True or False In 2008, British Columbia instituted a revenue-neutral carbon tax.
T
True or False Corals can indicate how climates have changed in the past.
T
True or False Global warming means uniform warming throughout the world.
F
True or False Global warming will have a beneficial effect on agriculture globally due to lengthened growing
seasons.
F
