Scientists call for more precision in
global warming predictions
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[May 05, 2017]
By Emily Flitter
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Researchers from
Harvard University, Princeton University and the Environmental Defense
Fund proposed a new, more precise way to measure the effects of
greenhouse gas emissions on Earth's climate in an article published on
Thursday in the academic journal Science.
The proposal, titled "Unmask temporal trade-offs in climate policy
debates," would create a two-digit measurement system the scientists
likened to blood pressure readings in medicine, which show the pressure
on blood vessels both during heartbeats and in between them. It would
help scientists and policymakers account for the fact that some
greenhouse gasses last longer than others in the atmosphere.
"Different gases have widely different lifetimes in the atmosphere after
emission and affect the climate in different ways over widely different
timescales," said co-author Michael Oppenheimer, a geosciences professor
at Princeton.
The system would show the effects of greenhouse emissions on a 20-year
scale and a 100-year scale. Having a measurement that shows both
numbers, the scientists argued, would let governments and other
institutions trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow global
warming decide which policies would be best in the short term and which
should be adopted longer term.
It would also help in disputes between opposing advocacy groups. For
example, according to the researchers, advocates for using natural gas
as an energy source base their arguments on a 100-year timescale. But
their opponents, activists lobbying against natural gas, use a 20-year
timescale to show the effects of burning natural gas on the climate.
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A drop of water falls from a melting piece of ice on Argentina's
Perito Moreno glacier near the city of El Calafate, in the
Patagonian province of Santa Cruz, December 16, 2009. REUTERS/Marcos
Brindicci
An overwhelming majority of scientists believe gas emissions like
carbon dioxide, which is produced from burning fossil fuels, are
contributing to global climate change, triggering sea level rise,
droughts and more frequent violent storms.
For the two-value proposal to be successful, the scientists argued,
it would have to be widely adopted, not only by individual
government agencies like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
but also by international bodies like the United Nations and the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate change.
Science is a weekly, peer-reviewed journal published by the American
Association for the Advancement of Science.
(Reporting by Emily Flitter; Editing by Sandra Maler)
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