Population increase impacts the climate,using the sensitive Arctic as an example |
| |
| Authors: | Ola M Johannessen Elena V Shalina |
| |
| Institution: | 1. Nansen Scientific Society, Bergen, Norway;2. Nansen International Environmental and Remote Sensing Centre, St. Petersburg, Russia;3. Institute of Earth Sciences, St. Petersburg State University, Russia |
| |
| Abstract: | The global population during the last 100 years has increased from 2 to 7.7 billion, causing an increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. In order to see how population increase is directly related to physical variables of the climate, this Perspective article places observations and scenarios of climate change into context and puts forth a statistical modeling study on how the sensitive Arctic climate responds to the increasing population. The relationships between population, Arctic sea-ice extent (SIE), and surface air temperature (SAT) are very strong, with the increasing population explaining 96% of the decreasing SIE and about 80% of the increasing SAT in the Arctic. Our projection for the SIE using the population as a “proxy predictor” for a projected population of 10 billion people on the Earth in 2100, yields a SIE of 9.30 and 8.21 million km2 for a linear and squared relationship, respectively, indicating no “tipping point” for the annual ice extent in this century. This adds another dimension to climate understanding for the public at large using population as a proxy variable, instead of the more abstract CO2 parameter. This also indicates that it is important to attempt to limit the ongoing increase in population, which is the main cause of the greenhouse gas emissions, in addition to reducing per capita emissions by an exponential increase in implementing renewable energy, a formidable challenge in this century. |
| |
| Keywords: | |
| 本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录！ |
|
