Climate change : past, present and future

Author(s)

    • Mélières, Marie-Antoinette
    • Maréchal, Chloé
    • Geissler, Eric
    • Cox, Catherine

Bibliographic Information

Climate change : past, present and future

Marie-Antoinette Mélières and Chloé Maréchal

Wiley Blackwell, c2015

  • cloth
  • pbk

Other Title

Climat et société. climats passés, passage de l'homme, climats futurs : repères essentiels

Access to Electronic Resource 1 items

Available at  / 3 libraries

Search this Book/Journal

Note

Originally published: Grenoble : CRDP de l'Académie de Grenoble, 2010

translated by Eric Geissler and Catherine Cox

Includes bibliographical references and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

This book is designed for first- and second-year university students (and their instructors) in earth science, environmental science, and physical geography degree programmes worldwide. The summaries at the end of each section constitute essential reading for policy makers and planners. It provides a simple but masterly account, with a minimum of equations, of how the Earth's climate system works, of the physical processes that have given rise to the long sequence of glacial and interglacial periods of the Quaternary, and that will continue to cause the climate to evolve. Its straightforward and elegant description, with an abundance of well chosen illustrations, focuses on different time scales, and includes the most recent research in climate science by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It shows how it is human behaviour that will determine whether or not the present century is a turning point to a new climate, unprecedented on Earth in the last several million years.

Table of Contents

Foreword xiii Acknowledgements xv About the companion website xvii Introduction 1 Part I: The Climate Engine of The Earth: Energy 5 1. Why are there many different climates on Earth? 7 2. Different climates . . . such diversity of life 11 3. From a patchwork of climates to an average climate 19 4. The global mean climate 27 5. Atmosphere and ocean: key factors in climate equilibrium 33 Part II: More On The Energy Balance of The Planet 55 6. Thermal radiation, solar andterrestrial radiation 57 7. The impact of the atmosphere on radiation 61 8. Radiative transfer through the atmosphere 73 9. The energy balance 87 10. Climate forcing and feedback 93 11. Climate modelling 99 Part III: The Different Causes of Climate Change 109 12. The choice of approach 111 13. The Sun's emission 115 14. The position of the Earth with respect to the Sun 119 15. The composition of the atmosphere 129 16. Heat transfer from the Equator to the poles 135 17. Oscillations due to ocean-atmosphere interactions 137 Part IV: Learning From The Past ... 149 18. Memory of the distant past 151 19. Since 2.6 million years ago: the dance of glaciations 161 20. Glacial-interglacial cycles and the Milankovitch theory 181 21. The glaciation dance: consequences and lessons 191 22. The past 12,000 years: the warm Holocene 201 23. Global and regional fluctuations(Timescale 3: decades) 225 24. Future warming and past climates 231 Part V: Climate Change in Recent Years 241 25. Recent climate change 243 26. The impact of global warming on the cryosphere 257 27. The impact of warming on the ocean 273 28. The impact of warming on the biosphere 285 29. Warming in the 20th century: natural or human-induced? 297 Part VI: Climate in The 21st Century: Different Scenarios 323 30. Two key factors 325 31. Projections: economic scenarios and climate models 329 32. Simulations: a survey 333 33. Future warming and its consequences 343 34. The choice 355 35. Climate change in the present state of the planet 363 Conclusion 369 References 373 Index 383

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

Page Top