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Past Shows
December 3, 2005
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Climate Change and Fresh Water
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Mount Everest - AP file photo
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One aspect of climate change that's been largely overlooked is the
effect on fresh water around the world. In many places, the main source
of fresh water is the spring run off from the mountains.
That water comes from melting glaciers and snow, which build up
during the winter. But as temperatures rise, the amount of snow
fall is decreasing. This means less run off, and what there is
is coming down from the mountains earlier. Dr. Tim Barnett is a
researcher at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He predicts increases in spring floods and summer droughts throughout the northern hemisphere, even if we clean up our greenhouse gas emissions
now.
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Current Issues
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Atlantic circulation patterns - Courtesy, Nature
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A strong ocean circulation pattern that brings warm water north from the tropics, and keeps northern Europe's climate relatively mild, may be weakening. Dr. Harry Bryden, is a professor of oceanography at the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton, UK. His team has early evidence that the major Atlantic Ocean circulation pattern that brings some of the warm Gulf Stream towards northern Europe is slowing down, probably in response to melting of Arctic ice and Greenland ice cap. Some climate models predict that a colder northern Europe might be a result of global warming. This is the first evidence that this process may actually be starting.
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Oceans and CO2
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Pteropod mollusk - Courtesy, Victoria Fabry
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Carbon dioxide emissions from industrial smokestacks and tailpipes doesn't just stay in the atmosphere. The CO2 is also absorbed into the world’s oceans, essentially acidifying the water. And that acid mix isn’t a healthy one for marine organisms, such as pteropod snails and corals that build their shells from calcium carbonate in the water.
Biologist Dr. Victoria Fabry of California State University at San Marcos and a team of scientists are warning that, as oceans absorb more and more carbon dioxide, the acidic conditions could harm those creatures. Their models show that CO2 levels in polar waters will rise so quickly that pteropod shells could begin dissolving as soon as the middle of this century.
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Climate Change and Ice Cores
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Placement of ice core on Antarctic mainland ice - Courtesy, Sepp Kipfstuhl, Alfred-Wegener-Institut
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One of the challenges of developing good climate models is having
enough detailed historical data to be sure the models are accurate. A
European consortium recently published results from Antarctic ice cores
that look back 650,000 years. It's the most detailed record of climate
events we have, and shows six ice ages. Along with these ice ages, the
cores also track greenhouse gas levels and show that temperature and gas
levels are very closely linked. This will add to the accuracy of future climate
models. More alarming is evidence that our greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere are higher than they've been at any
point in the record we now have. Dr. Thomas Stocker is a professor at
the University of Bern in Switzerland and the leader of the project
looking at ice cores.
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Carbon Capture and Storage
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Separate carbon dioxide from fossil fuel emissions and store it
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If we can't wean ourselves off our fossil fuel habit as quickly as we need to in order to prevent catastrophic climate change, perhaps we can tackle the problem another way. That's the idea behind carbon capture and storage. Dr. David Keith from the University of Calgary, contributed to a report for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on ways to extract and separate carbon dioxide when fossil fuels are burned for energy. The CO2 gas can then be piped into deep underground storage reservoirs, sometimes the very sites from which the fossil fuel was originally extracted. It could then stay there permanently, and would have no impact on climate. The idea is being taken seriously by governments looking to reduce their greenhouse emissions. Dr. Keith is the Canada Research Chair in Energy and Economics.
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Web Extra
Our interview with Dr. Mary Griffiths, Policy analyst with the Pembina Institute on Carbon Capture and Storage
Question of the Week: CO2 and Trees
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This week, in keeping with the theme of the show, we have a climate question from Paul McManus in Dunrobin, Ontario, who emailed us this query: “How many mature trees does the average Canadian adult need, to offset that person’s greenhouse gas production?”
For the answer we go to the University of Victoria where Dr. Andrew Weaver is a professor in the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences.
Last week
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