Climate change — the big picture 02
Climate change is happeningand humans are contributing to it
Temperatures provide the clearest evidence that the climate is changingand globally the average temperaturehas risen by more than 0.7 °C over thelast 100 years.The natural greenhouse gas effect keeps Earth much warmer than it wouldotherwise be, without it Earth would beextremely cold. Greenhouse gases suchas carbon dioxide, methane and water vapour behave like a blanket around theEarth. These gases allow the Sun’s raysto reach Earth’s surface but impede theheat they create from escaping backinto space.Any increases in the levels of greenhousegases in the atmosphere mean that more heat is trapped and globaltemperatures increase – an effect known as ‘global warming’.There is indisputable evidence that this observed global warming ispredominantly caused by increasesin greenhouse gas concentrations.Concentrations of carbon dioxide(CO
2
), created largely by the burningof fossil fuels, are now much higher,and increasing at a much faster rate,than at any time in the last 600,000 years. Because CO
2
is a greenhousegas, the increased concentrations havecontributed to the recent warming andvery likely most of the warming over the last 50 years.
FACT 1
Climate change is happening and humans are contributing to it
FIG 1
Temperature change 1850-2000
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