MONTREAL/February 15, 2008—
Now that scientists have reached a consensus that carbon dioxide emissions from human activities are the major cause of global warming, the next question is: How can we stop it? According to a new study by scientists at Concordia University and the Carnegie Institution at Stanford, halfway measures won’t do the job. To stabilize our planet’s climate, we need to find ways to kick the carbon habit altogether.
In the first study of its kind, to be published in the February 27th edition of Geophysical Research Letters, climate scientists Damon Matthews from Concordia and the Carnegie Institution’s Ken Caldeira, used an Earth system model to simulate the response of the Earth’s climate to different levels of carbon dioxide emission over the next 500 years.
"International policy discussions are focused on setting emissions targets which would lead to stable levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere,” said Matthews. “However, constant greenhouse gas levels will commit us to continued climate warming far into the future. The aim of our study was to determine what emissions would need to be in order to prevent any future warming."
What they found, is that carbon dioxide emissions would need to be eliminated entirely.
With emissions set to zero in the simulations, the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere slowly fell as carbon “sinks” such as the oceans and land vegetation absorbed the gas. Surprisingly, however, the model predicted that global temperatures would remain high for at least 500 years after carbon dioxide emissions ceased completely.
Just as an iron skillet will stay hot and keep cooking after the stove burner’s turned off, heat held in the oceans will keep the climate warm even as the heating effect of greenhouse gases diminishes. Continued greenhouse gas emissions, even at a rate lower than today, would lead to additional climate warming that could persist for centuries.
To avoid such a future, reductions need to begin as soon as possible. Current targets for emissions reductions do not go far enough, and delays will only make more drastic cuts necessary in the future.
For more information, please contact Damon Matthews at 514.848.2424 ext 2064 or dmatthew@alcor.concordia.ca.
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Source :
Tanya Churchmuch
Senior Media Relations Advisor
Concordia University
