SREE3001

Sustainable and Renewable Energy Sources

Climate Change
Material for this lecture is from the text The No-Nonsense Guide to Climate Change by D. Chivers
(2011) who states in his introduction that to most climate justice activists economic growth based
on the destruction of forests, land, rivers and ecosystems is a catastrophe for people and the planet;
that corporate greed and entrenched power are major obstacles to action to halt climate change; that
false ideas of progress founded on the endless consumption and production of stuff is not the same
as happiness and living well.
How do we know that Climate Change is Happening?
There are five key points that, taken together, show us that climate change is both real and serious:
(1) Carbon dioxide or CO2 is a greenhouse gas,
(2) As a species we have placed a lot of carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases) into the
atmosphere,
(3) The average temperature of the planet has been rising ... and rapidly,
(4) We have already seen many other climate change effects, and
(5) All of these things are connected.
Carbon Dioxide is a Greenhouse Gas
The French mathematician Joseph Fourier had realized in the 1820s that there must be something
in the air that prevented the Suns heat from just reflecting off of the Earth and vanishing back into
space.[1] In the 1860s, the Irish-born physicist John Tyndall experimented with a number of gases
to see which were best at trapping heat and subsequently discovered that carbon dioxide had the
intriguing property of letting visible light pass through while holding onto heat.[2] His work was
taken further by the Swedish Nobel prize winner Svante Arrhenius in 1896 who linked the amount
of carbon dioxide in the air to changes in global temperature.[3]
Thus, the basic science behind climate change has been known for over a hundred years and
scientists have collected a large amount of data to better understand this phenomenon. Light from
the Sun passes through the atmosphere, some reflects off the Earth and heads back towards space,
a portion is absorbed and re-emitted at longer wavelengths while another portion is simply absorbed
by the Earth and converted into heat. Carbon dioxide, water vapour, methane and other heattrapping gases hold back some of that reflected energy as heat and thus the atmosphere and the planet
warms up. Seemingly small changes in the levels of these greenhouse gases can lead to large
changes in the Earths temperature. Prehistoric records show that a shift in greenhouse gas levels
from 0.02% of the atmosphere to 0.03% (that is, from 200 to 300 parts per million or PPM) can be
the difference between an ice age and what we think of as a normal climate. At this point, one
should also note that the long-term cooling and warming of the Earth over millions of years has been
caused by a number of influences (e.g. such as fluctuations in the Suns radiation output,
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perturbations in the Earths orbit and gradual geological shifts) and not just by greenhouse gas levels.
This is all well-established, non-controversial material.
Obviously, without the atmosphere and greenhouse effect, the Earth would be a hostile (for life)
planet like the Moon ... frozen when facing away from the Sun and baked to extreme temperatures
during the Sun lite periods. At the other end of the scale is Venus. Its atmosphere is 96% carbon
dioxide, which, combined with its proximity to the Sun gives it a balmy average surface temperature
of about 480oC and when it rains the water is very acidic carbonic acid that would dissolve your
bones within a short period of time.
Water vapour is the most abundant greenhouse gas in our atmosphere and it makes the major
contribution to the natural greenhouse effect. However, the amount of water vapour stays pretty
much the same from one year to the next so it doesnt play a huge role (yet?) in the current climate
change story. The second most common greenhouse gas is carbon dioxide. Eventhough there is less
CO2 than water in the atmosphere, its still the most important greenhouse gas as far as todays
climate change is concerned because, unlike water vapour, the CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing
rapidly and it stays in the atmosphere for a long term (approximately 200 years).
Other Greenhouse Gases Affecting Modern Global Warming
Greenhouse Gas

Heat Absorbed Over

100 years as Compared
to Carbon Dioxide

Amount in Atmosphere
(in parts per million or PPM)

Carbon Dioxide CO2

~390

Methane CH4

Traps 25 times more

heat than CO2 for an
equal weight of gas

~2

Nitrous Oxide N2O

Traps 298 times more

heat than CO2 for an
equal weight of gas

~0.3

Artificial industrial gases

like hydrofluorocarbons
HFCs, perfluorocarbons
PFCs and sulfur hexafluoride SF6

Can trap between 140 and

24000 times more heat than
an equal weight of CO2

Less than 0.001

In the 1950s an American chemist, Charles Keeling, worked-out a more accurate method of
measuring the quantity of CO2 in the atmosphere. In 1958, the US Weather Bureau started using
Keelings new technique at their monitoring station on Mauna Loa in Hawaii ... and were surprised
to find that CO2 levels in the Earths atmosphere were increasing as a significant rate (see figure
below).[4] The sharp oscillations in the graph are caused by the great forests of the Northern
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hemisphere; they take-in more CO2 during the summer and release more during the winter, turning
the graph into an upward curving sawblade.[5] But, how do we know that this increase is all the
fault of humanity? Perhaps this CO2 is originating from somewhere else?

At the moment, most of the carbon on Earth isnt in the form of CO2, rather it is in the rocks, plants
or fossil fuels. The table below indicates where the carbon (indicated as a CO2 equivalent assuming
all this carbon was burned and released into the atmosphere) is located and how it is currently
moving within our Earth sphere.
Global Carbon Cycle in Billions of Tons of CO2 Equivalent
Location

Amount Stored Amount Released

to Air per Year

Amount Absorbed
from Air per Year

Net Change
to Air per Year

Earths
Crust

3.7 108

0.4 (Volcanoes)

0.4 (Absorption by
rocks)

~0

Oceans

1.41 105

332 (Released)

340 (Dissolved)

-8

Fossil Fuels

1.4 104

28 (Human activity)

+28

Plants/Soils

8.5 103

444 (Respiration
plus Deforestation)

449 (Photosynthesis
and Afforestation

-5

TOTAL

3.7 108

804

789

+15

As can be seen from this table, while CO2 is being released from natural sources ... oceans, plants,
soils and rocks ... these natural carbon stores are in fact sucking-up slightly more CO2 than they are
putting-out per year. However, the burning of fossil fuels by humanity has pushed the net release
of CO2 into the atmosphere to a level that is more than the natural system can absorb which is why
this key greenhouse gas is building-up in the atmosphere. To be certain that all this extra CO2 is
originating from human activity we can look at two additional items. First, we can look at the
historical records of how much fossil fuel humanity has burned each year for the last 250 years. We
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know how much CO2 is emitted for each kg of coal, oil or gas that we burn, which means that we
can create a plot of humanitys approximate CO2 emission stretching back to ~1750 (see graphs
below). Unfortunately, this tallies fairly neatly with the rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere.

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Finally, we can look at something called the isotopic signature of the carbon dioxide in the air as
carbon from different sources has some very slight physical differences that can be used to determine
its origin. Scientist began checking this feature in the early 1980s and found that most of th extra
carbon in the atmosphere was from the type of carbon that comes from fossil fuels.[6]
Between 1990 and 1998, a narrow but very deep (3.5 km) column was drilled into the ice cover at
Vostok, Antartica. This ice core is a piece of frozen history in that it contains many tiny bubbles
of trapped air dating back through the last 400,000 years. Each of these is a minature time capsule
and can be analysed to tell us what gases were in the atmosphere as well as the average global
temperature at that point in history.[7] This allows us to stretch our Keeling graph of CO2 levels
back in time a few eons and to see how the current CO2 level compare with the past (see graphs
below). The data obtained shows three interesting and worrying trends:
(1) The Earths temperature clearly falls and rises in line with CO2 levels in the atmosphere.
(2) In the last 400,000 years, shifts in CO2 levels from around 180 ppm to 300 ppm have been
associated with very serious changes in climate ... the low points on the temperature graph
correspond with what we think of as Ice Ages.
(3) We are currently at ~390 ppm of CO2, right at the top of the graph. This level of CO2 is higher
than at any other period during the last 400,000 years! Also, the current rate of increase is so fast
that it looks like a vertical line on this graph.

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Unsurprisingly, CO2 level began rising at the beginning of the Industrial revolution (in the late 18th
century), when humanity began to burn fossil fuels in earnest and they have gradually accelerated
ever since. If we zoom-in on the last thousand years of CO2 data from recent ice cores we can see
this quite clearly (see graph below ... known popularly as the hockey stick curve).

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The last time CO2 concentration was believed to be this high was in the mid-Pliocene period, some
3.5 million years ago. At this time, sea levels were 2.5 metres higher than today.[8] Of course this
raises the question ... Why, if CO2 levels are in this significantly higher range, do we not see obvious
effects? Why is Florida not under water and Greenland famous for its tropical beach holidays?
The answer is that there is a time delay between rising CO2 levels and rising temperature in the
atmosphere.[6] The greenhouse gases need to spend time (decades?) in the atmosphere doing their
absorption and warming before we start to really notice the effects at the Earths surface and in the
sphere that we normally live within. This occurs because the oceans, rather than the air and the land,
are absorbing most of the extra heat. The effects of this oceanic warming are far less immediate and
noticeable to us land-dwellers than the effects of a warmer atmosphere. This is beneficially in the
sense that the delayed warming effect means that the effects of climate change have been nowhere
near as extreme as they would have been if the oceans were not such a great heat sink. However,
it is harder for the typical person to recognize the connection between our collective CO2 emissions
and the gradual warming of our planet.
Up to this point we have mostly discussed emissions of CO2 from the burning of fossil fuels.
However, this isnt the only way that humanity is contributing to climate change:
(1) Cement manufacture brings some extra CO2 into the equation because it involves heating calcium
carbonate (from rocks) to produce lime and CO2. Thus, it takes carbon from the Earths crust and
transfers it into the air. Collectively, this releases an extra 0.9 billion tons of CO2 into the
atmosphere each year (about 3% of the annual CO2 total).[9]
(2) In addition to CO2 we release other gases such as methane (from livestock, coal mines, rice fields
and landfill sites), nitrous oxide (from fertilizers and manufacturing) and small amounts of other
powerful warming gases from certain industrial processes. Together, these extra emissions add to
the CO2 emissions a bonus warming effect of about 30% to the warming influence of just the CO2
itself.[10]
(3) The emissions from aircraft cause a bit of extra warming because they occur high-up in the
atmosphere. When the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajokull erupted in March of 2010 the resulting ash
cloud led to the grounding of planes across Europe for several weeks, preventing the release of far
more CO2 than the volcano was emitting. According to one estimate, it created a savings of around
50,000 tonnes of CO2 per day.[11]
(4) Finally, we are rapidly altering the planets ability to take CO2 out-off the atmosphere by cutting
down forests and clearing land faster than at any point in our history. This is particularly effective
and destructive because it releases the carbon stored in those plants (and soil) back into the air and
it also means that there are fewer plants available to take-in CO2 in the future.[12]
Earths Ancient Thermal Cycles
Scientists are developing more complete computer models to try to predict the effects of various
greenhouse gas emissions on climate change. As part of their process they attempt to compare past
conditions on the Earth (using these conditions as input to their models) with subsequent changes
in climate that we know occurred in the past. Thus, by looking at what has happened when CO2
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levels have risen in the past, reviewing model predictions and then comparing those predictions to
actual, past events it is anticipated that we can learn about what is likely to happen in response to our
changing atmosphere.
We can gather evidence from ancient ice cores, tree rings, coastlines and the oceans depths that
provide us with a decent picture of how temperatures, sea levels and the amount of CO2 in the air
have changed over the last few tens of millions of years. The results are fascinating because they
show that the Earth has swung periodically between colder and warmer periods over the eons (see
ice data from Vostok, Antartica). In the coldest periods or glaciations, the northern continents were
covered with massive ice sheets several kilometres thick; whereas in the warmer periods, there was
no ice at the poles and sea levels were upto 75 metres above current levels. These huge changes
were historically triggered by tiny fluctuations in the Earths temperature caused by changes in the
Suns energy output [13] and/or by small perturbations in the Earths orbit.[14] In combination,
these changes would result in an incredibly small amount of extra warming or cooling each year.
Earth would then warm or cool gradually, over hundreds or thousands of year, and then suddenly,
this would become more rapid and switch the planet from cool to warm or vice versa. Why the
sudden flip-flop into rapid change?
In a single word, feedbacks which are factors that can either speed-up or slow-down the rate of
global warming or cooling. There are three particularly important feedbacks when considering
ancient climate change:
(1) Carbon dioxide and methane release: As Earth warms up, carbon dioxide and methane are
released from plants, soils and oceans. These gases create a greenhouse effect which leads to more
warming and thus to a greater release of CO2 and so forth until the climate changes completely. This
has been a very important factor in transforming very slow ancient warmings into sudden shifts and
it explains why temperatures started to rise first, and then CO2 follows (see Vostok, Antartica data
in each of the roughly 5000 year warming periods shown in this graph).
(2) Ice cover: As the atmosphere gets hotter, snow and ice begin to melt at the poles and the white,
reflective surface gives way to reveal the much darker water or land underneath. This albedo effect
or reflectivity means that the darker surfaces will absorbs more light from the Sun and they will
warm-up faster leading to an accelerating heating effect.
(3) Water vapour: Warmer temperatures increase evaporation which places more water vapour into
the air and this water vapour also acts like a greenhouse gas to trap reflected sunlight as heat.
All three of these processes can also act in reverse. If the Sun energy output lowers and/or the
Earths orbit shifts to a slightly cooler phase, then there will be a period of slow cooling until falling
CO2, etc. levels increase ice cover, reduce water vapour in the air and cause the Earths temperature
to plunge.
Eventually, the warming or cooling period will reach its natural end, when the feedbacks run out off
effect (e.g. If the air cant hold any more water ... its saturated, the maximum amount of CO2 has
been released, and when all the ice has melted) or when external solar or orbital changes start to push
things back the other way. Sometimes, the Earth will remain in a relatively stable state for hundreds,
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thousands or even millions of years, as all of these effects remain in balance. At other times, the
temperature will slowly start to change again, in response to the next tiny fluctuation in the Suns
output or in our planets orbit or orientation.[15]
Our collective choice to dump so much CO2 into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution has
effectively over-ridden these slow, natural cycles and the jolt of extra heating from humanitys
greenhouse gas emissions is also happening much more rapidly than the tiny, incremental changes
that triggered those past, dramatic changes to Earths climate. Thus, the immensely important
question is: Can we reduce the CO2 levels rapidly enough to prevent these feedback mechanisms
from kicking in and catapulting the Earths climate rapidly into an unfortunate state?
References
[1] J. Fourier, Mmories de lAcadmie Royale des Sciences, 1827. Theres a translation of his
writing at http://nin.tl/bxSjtU
[2] J. Tyndale, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, vol. 151, Part I, 1861.
Theres a short biography of Tyndale at http://nin.tl/cUVbGu
[3] S. Arrhenius, 1896. Available online at http://nin.tl/9td4cy
[4] See http://nin.tl/bew6i5
[5] You can see the latest data from this station and a full explanation of how the data is collected
and calculated at http://nin.tl/b1qTUo
[6] Material is from the IPCC fourth Assessment report, 2007. The newest report was published
later last year.
[7] Petit etal, Nature, 399, 429, 1999. Available at http://nin.tl/amWq9Z
[8] G.S. Dwyer, M.A. Chandler, Phil Trans Royal Soc A, 367, 157, 2009.
[9] According to the International Energy Agency, global cement production produces 1.8 billion
tonnes of CO2 per year of which half is from energy use and the other half from the chemical
processes involved.
[10] World Resources Institute, see http://nin.tl/ahQXSb
[11] http://nin.tl/9N4i5B
[12] C. Le Qur etal, Nature Geoscience, 2, 831, 2009. See also http://nin.tl/csqmyt
[13] http://nin.tl/bk59Hd
[14] http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/07/the-lure-of-solar-forcing/
[15] J. Hansen, Storms of my Grandchildren - The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe
and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity, Bloombury, New York, 2009.
Further Readings
Nicola Armaroli, Vincenzo Balzani, Energy for a Sustainable World, Wiley-VCH (2011).
Egbert Boeker, Rienk van Grondelle, Environmental Physics - Sustainable Energy and Climate
Change, 3rd ed., Wiley (2011).
Gwynne Dyer, Climate Wars, One World, Oxford (2011).
Paul N. Edwards, A Vast Machine - Computer Models, Climate Data and the Politics of Global
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Warming, MIT Press (2010).

Robert L. Evans, Fueling Our Future - Introduction to Sustainable Energy, Cambridge (2007).
Brian Fagan, The Attacking Ocean - Past, Present and Future of Rising Sea Levels, Bloomsbury
Press (2013).
William R. Freudenburg, Robert Gramling, Blowout in the Gulf - BP Oil Spill Disaster and the
Future of Energy in America, MIT Pr. (2011).
Chris Goodall, Ten Technologies to Save the Planet, Greystone Books (2010).
Robert Henson, The Rough Guide to Climate Change - Symptoms, Science, Solutions, 3rd ed.,
Rough Guide (2011).
Michael E. Mann, The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars, Columbia Univ. Pr. (2012).
Chris Martenson, The Crash Course - Unsustainable Future of Our Economy, Energy and
Environment, Wiley (2011).
Elizabeth May, Zo Caron, Global Warming for Dummies, Wiley (2009).
Robert M. May, The Britannica Guide to Climate Change, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2008).
George Monbiot, Heat - How to Stop the Planet from Burning, Anchor Canada (2006).
Alastair Sweeny, Black Bonanza - Canadas Oil Sands and the Race to Secure North Americas
Energy Future, Wiley (2010).
B. Sudhakara Reddy etal, Energy Efficiency and Climate Change, Sage (2009).
S. Fred Singer, Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, Rowman & Littlefield (2008).
Andrew Weaver, Keeping Our Cool - Canada in a Warming World, Penguin (2008).
Website Resources
http://www.library.carleton.ca
http://www.ebook3000.com
http://bookre.org
http://bib.tiera.ru

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