FAQ

Climate has always changed. Why are we susceptible to climate change now? 

 ·         Global warming brings with it changes to most other elements of the weather – changing patterns of rainfall, wind speed, snowfall, drought and flood. It also changes the seasonal distribution of these events.

·         The rate of change in climate now is far greater than that experienced in the last few centuries.  The speed of change is expected to accelerate further in the coming decades.

·         The impact of climate change is a function of the way we live our lives – where we live, where we work, how we travel.

What about future climate change?

 ·         Global warming of 1.8 to 4.0ºC by 2090-99 compared with 1980-99, the rate depending upon future use of fossil fuel use;

·         More rain in the mid-latitudes, especially in winter; less rain in the sub-tropics;

·         More floods and more droughts in the mid-latitudes – summers will continue getting drier as winters become wetter.

·       We are committed to further warming even if we manage to stabilise the concentrations of greenhouse gases now

Has the climate changed in recent years?

 ·         The recent IPCC report stated that the planet has warmed by 0.2ºC per decade since 1990 and that temperatures in the last 50 years are likely to have been the highest of the last 1,300 years. The report also states that the concentration of CO₂ in the atmosphere today is far higher than it has been at any time over the past 650,000 years;

·         Since 1990, drier summers and wetter winters in the mid-latitudes have been experienced and in the UK generally higher rainfall in the wettest areas in the north-west of the UK with little change further south-east.

Why do people think that current climate change is caused by human activity?

 ·         The patterns of climate change over the last three decades correspond in broad terms with the projections of computer models showing the likely effects of a strengthening greenhouse effect;

·         However, natural variations in weather will always occur but these are likely to be smaller than the ‘signal’ caused by the developing greenhouse effect.