# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Geog Rev.  How do the UK Nations meet net zero

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Lesson 19.  Case Study.  water and Carbon in the Amazon

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Lesson 19.  Case Study.  water and Carbon in the Amazon

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Lesson 18.  Mitigation.  International Agreements on Climate Change

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Lesson 18.  Mitigation.  International Agreements on Climate Change

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Lesson 15.  The impact of the changing carbon budget on the atmosphere

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Lesson 15.  The impact of the changing carbon budget on the atmosphere

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1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

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About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

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1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

# data[].attributes.headline
Lesson 14.  The Impact of the changing carbon budget on the oceans

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Lesson 14.  The Impact of the changing carbon budget on the oceans

# data[].attributes.headline
Lesson 1.  Systems and feedback in Geography

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Lesson 1.  Systems and feedback in Geography

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Lesson 13. Human factors driving the movement of carbon

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Lesson 13. Human factors driving the movement of carbon

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Lesson 12.  Physical factors driving the movement of carbon

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Lesson 12.  Physical factors driving the movement of carbon

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About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

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Lesson 8.  Changing Landuse and the water cycle

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Lesson 8.  Changing Landuse and the water cycle

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Lesson 7.  The factors affecting discharge

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Lesson 7.  The factors affecting discharge

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Lesson 6.  River regime, discharge and storm hydrographs

# data[].attributes.subject
Lesson 6.  River regime, discharge and storm hydrographs

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Lesson 5.  The Water Balance and the soil moisture budget

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Lesson 5.  The Water Balance and the soil moisture budget

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Lesson 3.  Factors driving change in the water cycle.

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Lesson 3.  Factors driving change in the water cycle.

# data[].attributes.headline
Lesson 2.  The Global Distribution of Water

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Lesson 2.  The Global Distribution of Water

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (5 mins) - What if all the ice melted?

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (5 mins) - What if all the ice melted?

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  Challenges and Obstacles to renewable energy

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  Challenges and Obstacles to renewable energy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  Energy and Climate Change

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  Energy and Climate Change

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT – 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  Supply and Demand:  The energy transition

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  Supply and Demand:  The energy transition

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit). Ocean Temperature and Heat Transport

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit). Ocean Temperature and Heat Transport

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  Factors affecting discharge

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  Factors affecting discharge

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT – 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit)  - River Hydrographs and Flooding

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit)  - River Hydrographs and Flooding

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT – 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles | High-quality, curriculum-linked video lectures for GCSE, A Level and IB, produced by MASSOLIT.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit). Drainage Basin Processes

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit). Drainage Basin Processes

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

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Video (massolit).  The Impacts of CC and Land Use Change

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Video (massolit).  The Impacts of CC and Land Use Change

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  The Importance of water (7 mins)

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  The Importance of water (7 mins)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.headline
Video (Massolit).  Major Global Stores and Transfers of Water

# data[].attributes.subject
Video (Massolit).  Major Global Stores and Transfers of Water

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About the lecture

In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

About the lecturer

Professor Joseph Holden is Chair of Physical Geography at the University of Leeds, where he also directs the research centre water@leeds. He researches a range of areas within physical geography, such as the carbon dynamics of peatlands and the impacts of land use on hydrological processes. His publications include Water Resources: An Integrated Approach (editor, 2013), Physical Geography: The Basics (2011), and An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (editor, 2004).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MASSOLIT - 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this module, we think about the importance of water in both social and physical processes, focusing on three key features of water and their impacts: (i) its thermal properties - water is densest when it is a liquid and requires a large amount of energy to change temperature, which is very significant for rock weathering and the climate system; (ii) its property of surface tension, which enables the important process of capillary action; (iii) its chemical properties - water is a highly effective solvent, meaning that it carries substances vital for life and drives oceanic carbon storage.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles - Geography

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Geography A Level AQA A Level Geography (7037) 3.1 Physical Geography 3.1.1 Water and Carbon Cycles learning resources for adults, children, parents and teachers - produced by MASSOLIT

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Geog Rev - The role of macropores in the W&C cycle

# data[].attributes.headline
10 Top tips to improve data interpretation

# data[].attributes.subject
10 Top tips to improve data interpretation

# data[].attributes.headline
Extended Writing - Top Tips for Quality Answers

# data[].attributes.subject
Extended Writing - Top Tips for Quality Answers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Extended Writing - 10 tips for quality answers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Antonio Donato Nobre: The magic of the Amazon: A river that flows invisibly all around us

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The Amazon River is like a heart, pumping water from the seas through it, and up into the atmosphere through 600 billion trees, which act like lungs. Clouds form, rain falls and the forest thrives. In a lyrical talk, Antonio Donato Nobre talks us through the interconnected systems of this region, and how they provide environmental services to the entire world.

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1,473,101 views | Christiana Figueres • TED2016

What would you do if your job was to save the planet? When Christiana Figueres was tapped by the UN to lead the Paris climate conference (COP 21) in December 2015, she reacted the way many people would: she thought it would be impossible to bring the leaders of 195 countries into agreement on how to slow climate change. Find out how she turned her skepticism into optimism -- and helped the world achieve the most important climate agreement in history.

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This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

What would you do if your job was to save the planet? When Christiana Figueres was tapped by the UN to lead the Paris climate conference (COP 21) in December 2015, she reacted the way many people would: she thought it would be impossible to bring the leaders of 195 countries into agreement on how to slow climate change. Find out how she turned her skepticism into optimism -- and helped the world achieve the most important climate agreement in history.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

About the speaker

Christiana Figueres is an internationally recognized leader on climate action and steered the global diplomatic effort that culminated in the 2015 Paris Agreement.

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Christiana Figueres: The inside story of the Paris climate agreement

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What would you do if your job was to save the planet? When Christiana Figueres was tapped by the UN to lead the Paris climate conference (COP 21) in December 2015, she reacted the way many people would: she thought it would be impossible to bring the leaders of 195 countries into agreement on how to slow climate change.

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THE 2018 SIR THOMAS GRESHAM ANNUAL LECTURE

The scientific evidence for climate change will be examined, describing how simulations of the Earth's weather and climate are constructed and how these can be used to make assessments of what our climate and weather might be like in the coming decades.

Based on this scientific evidence it will be argued that climate change may well be one of the defining challenges of the twenty-first century, and that how we respond will determine our future prosperity, health and well-being and the sustainability of Earth's natural environment.

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climate change: a defining challenge for the 21st century

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Climate Change: A Defining Challenge for the 21st Century

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The scientific evidence for climate change will be examined, describing how simulations of the Earth's weather and climate are constructed and how these can be used to make assessments of what our climate and weather might be like in the coming decades.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Gavin Schmidt: The emergent patterns of climate change

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You can't understand climate change in pieces, says climate scientist Gavin Schmidt. It's the whole, or it's nothing. In this illuminating talk, he explains how he studies the big picture of climate change with mesmerizing models that illustrate the endlessly complex interactions of small-scale environmental events.

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With the same humor and humanity he exuded in “An Inconvenient Truth,” Al Gore spells out 15 ways that individuals can address climate change immediately, from buying a hybrid to inventing a new, hotter brand name for global warming.

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244 Global Mitigation 2 Removing CO2 from atmosphere

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241 Global Mitigation 1 Energy emissions

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30 September 2019
How to Avoid a Climate Catastrophe The Limits to Growth and the Ecological Crisis: What Role For A Crime of Ecocide?
Damien Short

It is the interaction of the economy + technological change + energy prices that determines growth and hence

emissions - not just the source of fuel. Energy is an essential pre-requisite of economic activity and growth.

The acute problems envisaged by the 1972 Limits to Growth report are occurring roughly as predicted;

The move from "conventional" to "unconventional" energy and mineral resources is an indication we have hit a major limit. BUT, as we know, politicians are ignoring these limits.

Planning a sustainable future requires acceptance of the 'limits to growth'.

Extreme Energy
As conventional resource supplies diminish, new, more energy intensive, technologies are allowing Oil and Gas companies move in to new 'frontiers' and gain access to 'unconventional' supplies:

(even) deeper sea drilling, drilling in the Arctic,

excavations of the Boreal forests of Alberta,

mountain top removal,

and onshore fracking in 'developed' countries.

The Process of Extreme Energy 'Extreme Energy is the process whereby energy extraction methods grow more intense over time, as easier to extract resources are depleted. The process is driven by unsustainable energy consumption and is important because extraction effort is strongly correlated with damage to both society and the environment'.
Short, D, J Elliot, K Norder, E Lloyd-Davies and J Morley, 'Extreme Energy, Fracking and Human Rights: A New Field for Impact Assessments?' International Journal of Human Rights, 11th May, 2015.

Energy inefficiency and societal use value - amount available to society drops as energy input levels increase.
Unconventional Energy and climate crisis
'we must rapidly phase out coal emissions, leave unconventional fossil fuels in the ground, and not go after the last drops of oil and gas. In other words, we must move as quickly as possible to the post-fossil fuel era of clean energies.' James Hansen

'the only responsible action with regard to shale gas, or any "new" unconventional fossil fuel, is to keep it in the ground - at least until there is a meaningful global emissions cap forcing substitution. In the absence of such an emissions cap, and in our energy hungry world, shale gas will only be combusted in addition to coal - not as a substitution, as many analysts have naively suggested.' Kevin Anderson: Tyndall Centre
Why Growth?
The idea of economic growth is that it gives us all more to make us 'happier'. Recent studies suggest that this is not the case, and that fifty+ years of growth has not made us significantly happier AND has massively increased our ecological problems to crisis levels.

Summary - current predicament:

peaking resources,

drive towards extreme energy

anthropogenic climate change

ecological crisis

Solutions?
International law: Ecocide?

What lessons can we take from the UN history of genocide and ecocide?

Genocide was politically diluted from a broad sociological concept that could have protected cultural distinctiveness and integrity of social groups, indigenous and minority both.

BUT, there is a growing campaign to put a law prohibiting ecocide in place at the very top as an international crime,

Would be over and above all other laws to prevent mass damage, destruction to or loss of ecosystems.

To do this - amend the Rome Statute.

Requires a Member State to table it at Review Conference

Chief advocate - the late Polly Higgins defined ecocide as:

'The extensive destruction, damage to or loss of ecosystem(s) of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been severely diminished.'

But a law prohibiting ecocide may do very little to change our current unsustainable levels of consumption of oil and gas.

Developed countries are of course most responsible.

We need to return to 1950s levels of consumption.

Fix and repair rather than replace. Buy less stuff.
Diet
Calculations vary depending on what is included, but roughly stated - industrial agriculture accounts for up to a quarter of the world's greenhouse gases.

Agricultural emissions include methane from the livestock production process,

nitrous oxide from the use of fertilisers and deforestation, driven by the need to expand the land area devoted to the production of food for humans and for animals...

This adds to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. We have rough ideas for reducing fossil fuel use - via renewable electricity through wind and solar, and switching to battery cars and lorries for transport etc but little is ever suggested by way of change in agricultural practices. Convincing national or international plans for fundamental changes to agricultural practices are currently absent from much high-level policy forums. There is no current plan for a fundamental paradigm shift in global farming but unless this is changed, all long-term targets for greenhouse gas reductions are unattainable.

© Professor Damien Short, 2019

30 September 2019
How to Avoid a Climate Catastrophe
Professor Geoffrey Beattie

We need nothing short of a 'green revolution' to avoid a climate catastrophe, and a global green revolution at that. A green revolution in terms of political focus and infrastructure (transport, energy, architectural design, engineering etc.) but also a green revolution in terms of our everyday behaviour as consumers and the choices we make in our everyday lives. We, the public, are the key (at all levels - national level, cities/towns, communities, groups, families, individuals) and we must be the catalyst for change. For this reason, I would suggest, psychology must be central to the whole climate change issue.

It is worth reminding ourselves at the outset, when it comes to climate change, that the scientific evidence is overwhelming. There is indeed a remarkable scientific consensus on climate change - 'remarkable' because it is rare to see this degree of scientific agreement on anything. The science tells us that 'Climate change threatens the basic elements of life for people around the world' and, in addition, that 'Human activities are a major driver of this rapid change in our climate...particularly patterns of consumption and energy use, driven by consumer demand for higher standards of living.'

But there is little evidence of widespread change in these aspects of our behaviour, in the light of the unambiguous scientific evidence. Consider, for example, Unilever's 'Sustainable Living Plan', launched in 2010, which read 'We are living in a world where temperatures are rising, water is scarce, energy expensive, food supplies uncertain and the gap between rich and poor increasing...Business must be part of the solution. Sustainable, equitable growth is the only acceptable business model....to live within the natural limits of the planet we will have to decouple growth from environmental impact.' Unilever announced their sustainability KPI: 'Halve the greenhouse gas impact of our products across the lifecycle by 2020.' Unilever then reduced greenhouse gas emissions from their manufacturing chain; they reduced deforestation; they introduced more environmentally friendly sourcing of raw materials; they doubled their use of renewable energy; they produced concentrated liquids and powders; they reduced greenhouse gas emissions from transport; they reduced greenhouse gas emissions from refrigeration and they reduced employee travel, and the result of all this activity was that their 'greenhouse gas footprint impact per consumer has ...increased by around 5% since 2010.'

The problem, they said, was that 'We have made good progress in those areas under our control but...the big challenges are those areas not under our direct control like...consumer behaviour.' In other words, we are the problem.

So why has this message not got through? Specifically, in terms of our:

1. Understanding

2. Belief

3. Our sense of personal vulnerability

4. Our sense of personal responsibility

5. Behaviour and action
Understanding
I had an experience on a bus in Sheffield a short time ago, which reminded me of some of the issues about understanding. It was snowing. I had a notebook with 'CLIMATE CHANGE' written in bold sitting on my lap. The man beside me said 'Well, that's bloody nonsense for start.' He pointed at the fine dusting of snow on the street 'So that's global warming for you.' I didn't want to argue on the bus, or maybe worse, so I tried to ignore him, as he continued to harangue me relentlessly. Then there's Donald Trump. In December 2017 he tweeted: 'It could be the COLDEST New Year's Eve on record. Perhaps we could use a bit of that good old Global Warming.' He was on vacation in Florida, frozen iguanas were dropping from trees. People were warned to leave them alone until they defrosted. Donald Trump loved it, acting very much like the man on the bus in Sheffield and confusing weather and climate, and therefore able to reassure themselves with any slight cold snap. There is clearly work to be done here.
Belief
In terms of belief, a survey by Yale University (2010) had reported that only 52% of people in U.S. 'believe that global warming is happening' (this figure fluctuates with economic conditions and other factors). 50% thought that global warming (if it does exist) was attributable to natural causes. So, what differentiates believers and non-believers. There are several factors:

1. Faith in/understanding of science.

2. Understanding of probabilistic terms like 'extremely likely' (IPCC) meaning '95% chance of occurring'.

3. Political and ideological position (2013: only 50% of Republican and 88% of Democrats believed in climate change - the divergence widening after the Kyoto Protocol, 1997).

4. Education/age/social class/media consumption etc.

5. And critically individual psychology, including cognitive biases and underlying unconscious values and attitudes. Human beings are not necessarily rational when it comes to climate change (or anything else).
Our sense of personal vulnerability
One cognitive bias is potentially particularly relevant here and that is 'optimism bias', where people overestimate the likelihood of positive events happening to them and underestimate the likelihood of negative events. It seems to be very common. We think that our marriages will succeed, our start-up businesses will be successful and that we will have a long and happy life compared to everyone else. Individual smokers think that they will be the ones who won't get cancer. People may think that climate change will affect other places (spatial bias) and future generations (temporal bias) but not they themselves (those particularly high in dispositional optimism are the most extreme in this regard).

Research in neuroscience suggest that people process information in particular ways which supports an optimism bias. One study measured brain activity as participants estimated their probability of experiencing various negative events. They were then presented with the real information about the probability. People (but particularly dispositional optimists) were more likely to change their estimates only if new information was better than originally anticipated. This bias was reflected in their fMRI data. There was reduced level of neural coding of undesirable information in a critical region of the frontal cortex (the right inferior prefrontal gyrus). Optimism bias, in other words, is characterised by selective information processing.

In our lab, we tested the relationship between optimism and the processing of climate change messages, by asking people to read climate change articles online with adjacent paragraphs arguing either for the scientific consensus ('bad' news) or against it ('good' news) and we used eye-tracking to analyse their individual fixations. Where exactly did people look? We found several significant findings:

1. A significant negative correlation between optimism level and average dwell time. In other words, dispositional optimists spent less time attending to any arguments about climate changes.

2. A significant negative correlation between optimism level and average fixation duration but only to arguments 'for' climate change. Optimists had significantly shorter fixation durations than non-optimists on arguments for climate change.

3. Optimists concentrated more on arguments against climate change.

So, what effect does this attentional bias have? When asked to summarise these articles: 2/3 of non-optimists framed recall in terms of the arguments for climate change ('this article is about global warming and how 95% of it is due to human activity'). 2/3 of optimists framed it as a debate between two opposing positions ('it's about climate change, about trying to understand what's happening with the weather and there are different points of view'). We also found that optimists also had the strongest and most pronounced optimism bias. When we asked our participants 'What is the probability of you personally being affected by climate change?': Optimists reckoned that it was 36.5% (less than half), non-optimists reckoned it was 56.8% (more than half).

So, what are the general implications of this research? We cannot assume that people attend to climate change messages in identical ways. Messages about climate change may not be getting through because of an inherent cognitive bias designed to sustain our mood state. We must pay some regard to this bias in designing our communicational strategies about climate change. A more positive overall frame about possible solutions, interwoven throughout the message, should increase both feelings of self-efficacy and visual attention to the underlying message.
Our sense of personal responsibility
So how do we mobilise the public? Can we just focus on these cognitive biases or do we need a radically, new way of thinking about behaviour change generally? The current approach to behaviour change focusses exclusively on measuring explicit (or self-reported) attitudes as an indicator of propensity for change, and consistently demonstrates a 'value-action' gap between apparent values and behaviour. For example, in 2007 Tesco introduced carbon labelling because (in the words of the CEO of Tesco) 'Customers want to do more in the fight against climate change if only we can make it easier and more affordable', based on self-report surveys of attitudes to climate change. This was meant to be the start of Terry Leahy's 'Green Revolution', to be led by consumer demand to drive the market. It had, after all, worked with health information on food. Tesco now planned to label all their 70,000 own brand products with carbon footprint information. It took several months to calculate the carbon footprint of each individual product. Consumers, the reasoning went, should now choose the low carbon footprint alternatives and lower the overall carbon footprint in consumption.

But how did consumers actually behave? They didn't behave as they should, in terms of buying the low carbon products and our laboratory research demonstrated (again using eye-tracking) that they hardly looked at the carbon labels of products - other features on the products - the brand, price, value, health information, fat content, calories etc. were significantly more important.
Behaviour and action
So, what is going on? Are we just reporting what might be considered socially desirable attitudes to low carbon products and climate change? Do we even know our own attitudes? It is perhaps worth remembering Gordon Allport's definition of an attitude: 'a mental and neural state of readiness organised through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individual's response to all objects and situations with which it is related.' (Allport, 1935). The mainstream approach is that you simply introspect and report your individual preferences, for example, towards high or low carbon footprint products. But Allport had also said: 'Often an attitude seemed to have no representation in consciousness other than a vague sense of need, or some indefinite or unanalysable feeling of doubt, assent, conviction, effort, or familiarity' (Allport 1935). So how do we measure this 'vague sense of need, or some indefinite or unanalysable feeling of doubt, assent, conviction, effort, or familiarity'?

We decided to use a computerised classification task (called an Implicit Association Test), which has been used in other domains to measure 'associative connections' in the brain, based on how quickly participants can associate (in this case) 'low' or 'high carbon footprint' with the concepts of 'good' or 'bad'. This test yields a 'D' or difference score in reaction time and is thought to be a measure of implicit attitude. In one of our studies using the traditional self-report measure of explicit attitude, 70% of our participants reported that they preferred low carbon products to high carbon products (26% reported no preference; only 4% reported a preference for high carbon). The implicit measures, however, were much more variable and critically there was no significant correlation between the explicit and implicit measures, suggesting that the explicit and implicit attitudes were dissociated. There were many 'surface greens' in our sample, who reported that they preferred low carbon products, but their implicit attitudes to low carbon were either not that clear or were the reverse of what they had reported. Understanding these conflicted individuals may be critical in the fight against climate change because they have not been identified as a group thus far (and miscategorised by DEFRA and everyone else). After all they report that they prefer low carbon products, are prepared to adapt their behaviour etc.

In general terms, explicit and implicit attitudes (as measured by the IAT) do predict behaviour to some extent but in different domains, and in different circumstances. The IAT is a better predictor of spontaneous behaviours when behaviour is under cognitive, emotional or time pressure (based on various meta-analyses) and a better predictor of behaviour in sensitive domains (including racial discrimination and environmental issues). In our research, we have found that implicit (but not explicit) attitude to carbon footprint predicted choice of low carbon products particularly under time pressure and predicted unconscious eye fixations on climate change images and on carbon labels.

Most importantly, we have also found that implicit attitudes can be experimentally changed (using emotive film) with implications for behaviour change. This may hold significant promise for the future.

This research has led to the rediscovery of the unconscious, ignored by psychologists for a long time - but not, interestingly, by all psychologists. In the smoking industry, Ernest Dichter revolutionised the marketing of cigarettes, and in the forties and fifties he had argued that you need to access the unconscious to cure neuroses.... and to sell brands. You cannot ask people directly what they think of brands or what their attitudes are. Cigarette ads at the time, he suggested, were getting it badly wrong. There was too much emphasis on taste (a 'minor' consideration) and poor use of doctors to say that certain brands were 'healthier', which unconsciously associates cigarettes with mortality.

Dichter argued that smoking offers 'an (unconscious) psychological satisfaction sufficient to overcome health fears, to withstand moral censure, ridicule, or even the paradoxical weakness of enslavement to habit.' He also dealt with the conscious, rational arguments head on. He argued that it's the guilt associated with smoking that gives you cancer and set up a fight against the science. Tobacco companies wanted to open a great 'debate' about the effects of smoking on health. and created the Council for Tobacco Research in 1953 to fund research. Hans Selye the 'father of stress' was offered $1000 to write a memorandum saying that correlations do not prove cause and effect. He argued that it is stress that kills, not smoking, and that smoking could be marketed as a cure for stress. A long and fruitful partnership then developed. By the 1960s, Selye was receiving $100,000 dollars a year from the tobacco companies. He publicly argued that smoking was a 'diversion' to avoid disease-causing stress.

The marketing of smoking was (very unfortunately, as we all know) a very successful behaviour change campaign, and perhaps we should not be too anxious about assessing and changing unconscious implicit attitudes to carbon in the pursuit of similar behavioural effects.

So how do we avoid a climate catastrophe? Here are some suggestions:

∙ We need to help explain the science better and clear up conceptual confusions.

∙ Climate change messages must be designed to overcome optimism bias. We cannot just scare people ('this house is on fire').

∙ We need to increase people's feelings of self-efficacy and response efficacy when it comes to their actions. They are crucial to making a difference.

∙ Self-reported attitudes to carbon might lull us into a false sense of security. We need to develop and use measures of underlying implicit attitude to carbon products and lifestyles which may be held unconsciously.

∙ We need to understand that many people have implicit and explicit attitudes to carbon products and lifestyles that are dissociated.

∙ We need to find new ways of identifying these individuals.

∙ We need different strategies for different groups and countries (the barriers will be different). What do these individuals see? What do they attend to?

∙ And critically, we need to work on changing our implicit attitudes to carbon products and lifestyles by influencing our underlying associative networks. The smoking industry has shown that such a change is possible, with enormous implications for behaviour (the one positive legacy of this industry).

© Professor Geoffrey Beattie, 2019
Further Reading:
Beattie, G. (2010) Why Aren't We Saving the Planet? A Psychologist's Perspective. Routledge: London.

Beattie, G. (2018) The Conflicted Mind. Why We Say One Thing and Do Another. Routledge: London.

Beattie, G. and McGuire, L. (2018) The Psychology of Climate Change. Routledge: London.

Hoffman, A. J. (2015) How Culture Shapes the Climate Change Debate. Stanford University Press: Stanford.

Kahneman, D. (2011) Thinking, Fast and Slow. Penguin: London.

Marshall, G. (2015) Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change. Bloomsbury: London.

Oreskes, N. & Conway, E. M. (2010) Merchants of Doubt. Bloomsbury: London.

30 September 2019
How to Avert a Climate Catastrophe:
The Development of Climate Models and How They Can Help
Professor Vicky Pope

When I say that I work on the science of climate change, I am often asked two questions. The first is whether I believe in climate change, which illustrates that there is still a poor understanding of what science is. It is about amassing and testing objective evidence, not belief, and this is manifested in the comprehensive reports that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change produce periodically [1]. The second is whether we are doing enough? I answer that we have to start somewhere but that progress is not fast enough (figure 1). We must also bear in mind that some solutions have problems of their own. We must look at the complete cost of solutions over their lifetimes and all the aspects of the impacts, not just climate change. This is the challenge for scientists and engineers as well as policymakers, and we must take a much more multidisciplinary approach. The push to increase the number of diesel cars in the UK did reduce carbon emissions somewhat but also led to problems with air quality. The proposed scenarios, for the large reductions in CO2 needed to give a good chance of keeping the temperature rise below 2ºC, all require us to switch to using substantial amounts of biofuels and then capturing the carbon that is produced when they are burnt. This could potentially reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere but at a large cost to natural ecosystems and food- based agriculture: also, the technology required has not been tested at scale.

For 2⁰C, earlier action requires less aggressive technology deployment

The observational evidence of climate change, and understanding of causes of the change that we see (figure 2), are probably the most important factors in helping people to accept that the climate is changing: first-hand experience of extreme weather events often makes a difference as well.

Observations alone cannot help us to understand the causes, change and future risks: climate models are needed to do this. Indeed they were used to determine the information provided in figure 1. It is important that people understand the value of the information that models can provide, but equally important that they understand their limitations. The models help us to understand possible future climates and the risks involved, but still contain some major uncertainties. At the higher end of the scale of temperature rises of 4ºC or more, models are untested, since there is no real-world analogue of some of the impacts. It is quite possible that large unexpected feedbacks could lead to very rapid unexpected changes. For example, we already know that increasing temperatures in the Arctic are likely to acerbate the increasing greenhouse gases by releasing additional methane as the permafrost melts.

Some types of extreme weather have become more frequent or more severe
Climate Simulation
The underlying physical processes required to model and forecast the weather and climate change are essentially the same. The Met Office and its partners are unusual in that they use different flavours of the same model for their weather and climate simulations: most other major modelling centres focus on one or the other. Both models use the same fluid dynamics and representations of physical processes like clouds, radiative transfer and boundary layer processes (figure 3). The weather model places more emphasis on assimilating up-to-date observations to initialise the atmosphere model forecast, whereas the climate model places more emphasis on representing the ocean and the chemistry and biology of the whole system. Weather models typically forecast ahead for a few days or weeks and can therefore include much more detail of individual weather events.

Climate models on the other hand are run for a century or more and give average weather and variability.

The weather and climate community has made significant progress in improving predictions and quantifying uncertainty in recent years. This is easier to quantify for weather forecasts which are tested every day against the real world (figure 4). The improvements are driven by a combination of factors such as better understanding of the science, the ability to represent that science in computer models and the rapid improvement in computer power allowing more detailed modelling. A 4-day forecast now is as good as a 1-day forecast was in 1980. Recent increases in investment in Met Office resource (increasing computing power from I.2 Pflops to 8 Pflops in 2016 and to 16 Pflops in 2017) took the Met Office computing resource to number 11 in the top 100 internationally. This led to a measurable speedup of the improvements in weather forecasts after a few years when it changed very little.

Climate models must be able to provide useful information over decades or even centuries to help us make rational choices about climate change. Of course, they cannot predict the specific day-to-day weather in 50 years' time. The improvements that have been made in the last few years mean that they should be able to give us a good idea of the average weather and the sorts of variations that we might expect. Rapidly increasing availability of computer power has allowed us to make longer simulations including more of the detailed physical, chemical and biological processes. It is also used to make multiple simulations so that the range of possible outcomes is captured better. Recent improvements in the models developed by the Met Office Hadley Centre include a better representation of the way that clouds behave and the way they are affected by the small particles that are released as a by-product of a number of forms of pollution including burning fossil fuels. These particles also have a big impact on air quality, illustrating the interconnectedness of different types of environmental damage. The focus on clouds is important because more water vapour is released, as the atmosphere warms, some of which forms more clouds. Some types of clouds increase the amount of global warming whilst others decrease it. Other recent improvements in the models include better representation of the variations in the winds and storms that reach us from the Atlantic. This means that we have increasing confidence in the predictions that the UK can expect warmer wetter winters and hotter dryer summers on average over the next century (figures 5 and 6). We also expect that when there are rainstorms, they are more likely to be heavy. There are many excellent books and webpages that give more information on the history and development of climate modelling. [2]

The latest UK climate projections produced by the Met Office in 2018 (with updates to follow this year) are an excellent example of the use of cutting-edge technology and communication tools to provide information to climate experts, scientists in different disciplines, and other users of climate information such as local authorities.

This is done by having different levels of information for different users and guiding people through the webpages to find what they need (figures 5, 6 and 7) [3][4].
Future UK Temperatures and precipitation

All areas of the UK are projected to experience warming

Warming is greater in the summer than the winter

greenhouse gases the world emits

The lowest scenario is compatible with aims limit global warming since pre-industrial level to below 2°C

The highest scenario will likely require significant further adaptation

Conclusion
In conclusion, numerical models to simulate the weather were one of the first uses of high-performance computing for everyday decision-making. Today, the descendants of these models are used to make every day decisions affecting our social and economic well-being, as well as safety critical activities. The climate versions of these models are being used to make important decisions about how much we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and what trade-offs there are likely to be between adapting to and mitigating the impacts of climate change. They have profound implications for the decisions that we make about future energy supply and other economic and technological development.

© Professor Vicky Pope, 2019
References

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports. https://www.ipcc.ch/2019

Carbon Brief, "How do climate models work?" 2018 https://www.carbonbrief.org/qa-how-do- climate-models-work

Met Office, "UK Climate Predictions," 2018. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/collaboration/ukcp.

Met Office, "Weather and climate news," 2019. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press- office/news/weather-and-climate/facet/Topic/climate-change

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30 September 2019 How to Avoid a Climate Catastrophe The Limits to Growth and the Ecological Crisis: What Role For A Crime of Ecocide? Damien Short It is the interaction of the economy + technological change + energy prices that determines growth and hence emissions - not just the source of fuel.

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John Doerr and Hal Harvey: How to decarbonize the grid and electrify everything

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"The good news is it's now clearly cheaper to save the planet than to ruin it," says engineer and investor John Doerr. "The bad news is: we are fast running out of time."

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9 February 2017

Under The Sea:
What’s Happening In Our Oceans?

Professor Carolyn Roberts

Tonight, I am going to talk about the Earth’s ocean environment. I want to surprise and delight you, to challenge you with some of the issues that are problematic for oceans, to look at some potential solutions, and perhaps to provoke you think about these issues in a more critical and connected way. Environmental scientists are finding increasing evidence of human-induced damage to oceans at vast scale – destruction of fish and coral ecosystems, and massive gyrating pools of plastic refuse, for example. Moreover, we may be storing up heat and trouble for ourselves in relation to future sea level changes. What attempts are being made to reduce the footprint of human activity on the oceans, and can they succeed in restoring the damage to the largest living space on earth? I use the words ‘living space’ advisedly, since significant numbers of architects are now seeing ‘floating ocean-going cities in international waters’ as an answer to problems of crowding in major conurbations – a challenge I will look at in more detail in my next talk on ‘Megacities’. I gather there may be tax advantages to a perennially floating existence and, some would allege, freedom from burdensome regulation and the ‘ability to pursue enterprises that would be possible onshore’, but perhaps that’s something for the Gresham Professor of Commerce rather than me to contemplate. These images show recent designs for such ocean-going communities – personally I think they look rather limiting, and even if they were inhabited solely by wealthy tax exiles, one wonders where the food and water would come from. Not cattle ranching, I think. The early ones are likely to be converted ships, but the ‘experts’ at the Seasteading Institute (on the West Coast of the USA) suggest that semi-submersible floating cities would be more stable in the face of changeable weather and currents. But the point is that oceans are a resource, and a valuable one at that, not only for living space but for other things too. That leads to differences of opinion.

Closer to home, the recent controversy over the potential of Swansea Bay for generating renewable tidal energy, highlights the conflicts that can arise when human need for energy interacts with the ecological interests of various other species including birdlife, a theme to which I will return in a few minutes.

Conversely, oceans are the least well-known major component of the Earth’s environment. In times past, they were the mysterious location of dragons, and other terrible and terrifying beasts as illustrated on these historic charts from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Even today, we can still be extremely surprised by what is emerging from oceanographic research. Measurements in February 2013 at an automated buoy by the World Meteorological Organisation, for example, detected record breaking 19 metre waves in the North Atlantic. This is the sort of apocryphal size formerly dismissed as a sailor’s tall story. The buoy is part of the Marine Automatic Weather Stations network that includes ships and satellite imagery. Actually it was not just one freak wave, but a series of them over a stormy twenty minute period. That, I think, could give the libertarian residents of floating cities something to think about should they stray away from the warmer climes of the American West Coast.

That’s on the surface. When we pass below the waves, there is a much greater level of ignorance of things that may be only a couple of kilometres below the surface. In practice only about 10% of the ocean has ever been explored, and it comprises about 1.3billion cubic kilometres – the largest ecosystem on earth. The rest has been the subject of speculation until very recently and even the major configurations of the oceans, with their complex volcanic ridges and abyssal trenches reflecting the slowly shifting patterns of plate tectonics, only emerged in the last sixty years.

Don Walsh and Jacques Piccard went to the bottom of the Mariana trench, 11 kilometres down, in a bathyscaphe for the first time only in 1960. In fact they saw very little because the water was milky from stirred up sediment that did not disperse, though they thought they saw some sort of halibut. The feat has never been repeated. Richard Branson was intending to have a go in 2011, but in 2014 he quietly shelved his plan for Deep Flight Challenger to ‘fly’ to the bottom of the Mariana trench. Apparently, the submersible proved unable to withstand the pressures at that depth, at least for repeat ‘flights’, and developed fractures. Even though we can walk on the moon, human technology is not yet good enough for us personally to traverse the ocean floor.

Other creatures do have the ability to withstand the extreme pressures. Deep sea frill sharks, for instance are an example of a larger organism thriving at high pressures, and about which little is known. This specimen was found in shallow water off Japan, and died shortly after being caught. Here’s another organism that thrives at high pressures, usually in the darkest depths, a huge spider crab, again found close to Japan. Similarly new discoveries are being found in other dark, deep and cold environments. Alexander Semenov, for example, has photographed a range of stunning organisms in the Arctic Ocean, working out of the White Sea Biological Station near the Arctic Circle in the six months when it is ice free. In newly explored areas of oceans, we find all types of novel organisms, of all sizes, including worms, sea cucumbers, starfish, jellyfish and types of fish far too many to enumerate. Mammals such as whales, dolphins and walruses too, with their complex social patterns are starting to be understood. I particularly liked the recent research findings by Dr Darren Croft from Exeter University that showed wild, male orca whales are highly dependent on their mothers and return to their home ‘pod’ after breeding. The mothers live to be 90, but stop reproducing at 30 in order to support their sons (less so their daughters) – does that all sound rather familiar, ladies? These diverse animals move around mysteriously, and colonise every ecological niche, everywhere, it seems. Beautiful too, and sometimes astonishing organisms are found unexpectedly close to the UK, as are these colourful jellyfish in the Irish Sea.

Since discovering last week from some American politician’s aide that ‘alternative facts’ are as equally acceptable as scientifically verified material, I am including this image of some ‘alternative’ deep sea organisms, courtesy of Disney.

It is important not to omit microscopic organisms, on top of which rests the majority of the oceanic food chain. Recent discoveries by Danish scientists on the deep Pacific Ocean floor include bacteria and the distinct single-celled archaea that lack a cell nucleus, and challenge our ability to understand what ‘being alive’ is. They are found in vanishingly small numbers, maybe a thousand in a cubic metre of clay sediment. Their metabolic processes such as respiration are so slow, a response to the extremely limited food supplies far from nutrient sources, that it would take hundreds or thousands of years for them to generate enough energy to reproduce, and some are probably thousands of years old. That’s a lot older than the longest-living vertebrate on earth, likely to have been a Greenland shark, which was dated by Danish scientists from the radiocarbon in the lenses of its eyes, at 392 years old. The lethargic archaea perked up and divided when fed with nutrient soup in the laboratory. Interestingly, the latest research work suggests that archaea in turn are host to novel viruses and parasites, again something we know next to nothing about. These and other extremophiles living in exceptionally hostile (to us) environments, support the global ecosystem in ways we do not yet understand, living on the nutrients generated from geologically-slow processes. They are certainly very important in the planetary-scale carbon recycling system on which we all rely. Kelp, for instance (and I have not forgotten vegetation) is a crucial carbon store perhaps more significant that tropical forest.

So not only do geological inputs influence the biosphere, but the converse is also true: animals (not just humans) influence chemical cycling in the oceans. We know that large mammals play a previously unknown role in recycling nutrients from ocean depths, stirring up sediments with fertilising potential (including increasingly sought-after nutrients such as phosphorus) and allowing them to disperse around the world. The Environmental Change Institute in Oxford University, for instance, has recently established that the massive reduction in large oceanic mammals such as whales has reduced this capacity to a tiny fraction of what it was before these mass extinctions.

Specific groups of extremophiles even live in the superheated acid environments close to mid-oceanic hydrothermal vents, where they are potentially very vulnerable to damage from deep sea mining for metals such as copper, zinc and gold, using drag lines or (coming soon to an ocean area near us) remotely-controlled ocean bed crawlers. Many of these areas of hydrothermal vents are very deep and they were only discovered in 1977. Early exploration of the oceans depended upon imprecise surveys from ships, measuring bathymetry and water temperatures by ‘swinging the lead’ and dropping thermometers on lines as they traversed across the sea. Painfully slowly, these were built up into generalised bathymetric maps, but it was only in the mid-20th Century that a broader understanding of ocean topography, based on sonar depth observations (again from ships) and plate tectonics, developed. Scientists such as the largely unrecognised Dr Marie Tharp, of Colombia University, were instrumental in this work, producing the familiar ocean floor map that now adorns almost every school’s geography classroom.

Beyond topography, whilst deep ocean exploration has enabled great advances in understanding the nature of sea floors, we are only now starting to understand patterns of marine circulation patterns of water and air across the and how these have changed over time. Observations made from boats were exceptionally time consuming, and only six Atlantic transects where water temperature and salinity was measured at depth have been made since the 1950s. Autonomous underwater vehicles and robots are capturing most of the imagery and samples today, minimising the need for people to travel to the sea bed, or for ships to drop samplers. Satellite-borne altimeters, in combination with drone vessels, drifters or wave gliders and buoys, are enabling us to understand far more about the nature of the ocean, and the way water of different characteristics moves around it. Previously, some Earth Observation satellites were actually turned off as they passed over the ocean in order to save energy, but the newer ones, including microsatellites, are now recording sea levels, wave heights and water temperatures with astonishing precision. The American National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s new GOES-16 satellite, for instance, measures ocean meteorology from 36,000km up, and other satellites look specifically at oceans, allowing heat exchange between air and ocean and other parameters such as biomass content to be calculated.

One of the UK’s newest universities, the University of the Highlands and Islands, is something of a specialist at this type of oceanographic research, their Environmental Research Institute researching wave power using data from the tiny SAREL satellite and the solar powered Wave Glider. Wave Gliders can sail for a year, covering thousands of miles without fuel, collecting and transmitting data about meteorology, bathymetry, waves, water temperatures, currents and fish stocks back to a remote base. Other robotic craft can travel down to 6000 metres, including underneath floating ice sheets. The recently-christened ‘Boaty McBoatface’ long range autosub that will be operating from the new research vessel RRS Sir David Attenborough in the Antarctic next month, is an example managed by the National Oceanography Centre at Southampton University. No doubt some people will remember the controversy over the choice of a name for the prestigious research vessel – the obvious dangers of holding a public referendum! ISIS is another deep sea sub, already being operated by Southampton’s environmental scientists, and which is able to examine the sea floor and document habitats and sea life 3000 metres down. In combination with equipment on board the surface vessels, incredibly detailed information can be gathered remotely about the topography of the ocean floor and objects on it, natural or made by humans, and the materials on it. We see here an image showing a wreck that was picked up during high-resolution benthic mapping in Belfast Lough. It is also now possible to identify bed materials such as shell and sand lenses from boats without the need for extensive sampling, which is invaluable for ecological surveys, as well as (of course) for commercial mineral resource analysis.

We need to contrast this plethora of new information about our oceans with the paucity of data in the last century, in order to grasp what scientific progress is now capable of delivering. It is really exciting. In 1959, I was given a child’s version of a book on oceans by one of the world’s greatest environmentalists, Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring. In general terms we now know a lot more about ocean water circulation, the basis for understanding much else, than  was included in that. The slide here shows an example of recent satellite imagery from Sentinal-3, where tiny changes of 10 or 20 centimetres in the altitude of the sea surface tell us how warm and cold ocean currents are functioning in real time, at planetary scale. This image is for March and April 2016, where you can see the warm Gulf Stream and other currents in the Southern Oceans that are much less easy to investigate. We now know that the general water circulation of the oceans is dynamic, with a complex pattern reflecting the atmospheric drivers and the location of major continents. The Gulf Stream is only one part of a global conveyor system where warm surface waters and cold deep waters swing around the planet. Focussing in on the Atlantic, it has also been suggested that rapid ice sheet melting in Greenland might interrupt the patterns more typical of recent centuries. We know, for instance that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) that brings heat from the tropics towards Northern Europe is highly seasonal, and that it weakened dramatically between 2009 and 2010. We can see that it is sensitive and volatile. The decline was linked to an unprecedented and surprising rise in sea level on the Eastern seaboard of the USA. Now the results have to be incorporated into our understanding of climate systems.

The new robotic technology has also been picked up by the oil and gas industry, BP and others, to try to assist in monitoring oil spills, and it is to a small range of oceanic environmental challenges that I now want to direct my attention.

Let me turn first to issues of pollution – specifically plastic in the ocean, although there are challenges from all sorts of substances entering waters, including pharmaceutical products. Almost all the plastic ever produced is still with us and according to research at the University of the Highlands and Islands, about 8m tonnes of plastic litter enter the ocean each year, with dramatic effect on litter and marine life. About 100,000 marine mammals and a million seabirds per year are killed by eating waste or becoming entangled in discarded plastic including fishing nets, which make up 10% of the waste. By 2025, there could be one tonne of plastic in the ocean for every three tonnes of finfish. And yet it could be recycled into socks and trainers.

The biggest collection of plastic rubbish is found in the Northern Pacific Gyre, a direct result of the ocean currents we were looking at a few minutes ago – a vast swirling mass of microscopic fragments of polymer that have been partly broken down by the sun, and are individually too small to be seen from satellites (perhaps less than 5 mm across), and may be invisible even from boats. Sampling shows that they were once plastic bags (polyethylene), plastic bottle caps (polypropylene), plastic water bottles (polyethylene terephthalate) and expanded polystyrene. A small fraction of it is the plastic microbeads that seem to appear in everything from toothpaste to facial scrubs, about which the UK Government is currently prevaricating. We release about 86 tonnes per year of this unnecessary stuff into the ocean from skin exfoliants alone, along with the usual range of other materials, and most of it is likely then to float north-westwards towards the Arctic. It includes microfibres from artificial textiles in washing machines without filters. Elsewhere on the planet even more plastic is released per capita, ending up in the vortices on the ocean surface, elsewhere in the water column, and subsequently in the bodies of ocean and bird life (and in our bodies too, if we eat fish, as recent research has demonstrated). The images here come from research published by Imperial College London. I am sure many of you will be familiar with the harrowing photography showing the contents of sea bird’s stomachs, including cigarette lighters, toothbrushes and tampon casings. Australian research published by the National Academy of Sciences in 2015 found that 90% of all seabirds had ingested plastic, and it made up 10% average bodyweight. It has also been found in turtles, fish and dolphins, and wrapped around organisms effectively strangling them. Turtles seem to think plastic bags are jellyfish.

Why do birds in particular eat plastic? University of California scientists from Davis have established by field testing that the plastic becomes coated with algae, which when consumed by krill release a sulphur compound called dimethyl sulphide, or DMS. DMS is also a trigger for petrels and shearwaters, who associate it with the krill, one of their favourite foods, and they eat it. Bird ‘junk food’, almost. Since it cannot be digested, they fill up and die. The plastic is also a new floating habitat for some insects (the water strider halobates sericeus, for example), again attracting birds and fish to consume it.

We could control this, if we wished, most sustainably by reducing the amount of plastic we use, and not putting it into the sea, and some progress has been made. Tesco are banning microbeads, and Unilever have said they will use only biodegradable plastic from 20, but there is as yet no legislation in the UK. New types of biodegradable plastic are being made, that break down under the influence of UV light into gases, or dissolve. Some can be used in anaerobic digesters, to generate power and fertiliser. A new production plant in Birmingham opens this year to produce polyvinyl alcohol polymer, to replace food pouches, for instance. But overall, the amount of plastic being used globally is likely to double by 2025 (work by Jambeck et al, 2015) so methods of recovery are being considered. The highest profile project is a ‘trash collecting’ Ocean Clean Up system piloted by the Dutch in 2013, that sees barriers being towed into areas in the Northern Pacific identified from planes as having large pieces of plastic debris, allowing currents to move the floating material into a trap where it could be recovered back to shore. It will apparently be operational by 2020.  Other researchers including the Canadian scientist Chelsea Rochman, point out that it is more effective to collect the waste closer to the shore, specifically off the coast of China and in Indonesia, where it is denser. She and others suggest that 31% of the modelled microplastic mass, that totals an estimated 51 trillion particles, could be removed by 2025 using that evidence-based strategy. But the sustainable solution is to reduce production and consumption of plastic, trap it on land, and reuse it. That needs legislation.

The second problem I want to look at is ocean warming. The scientific evidence for human-induced climate change was the subject of an earlier lecture at Gresham College, and I will not repeat that here. Whether or not the shift is the result of human activity in increasing greenhouses gases, the evidence of the recent temperature trend is now clear, as illustrated on NASA’s graph of mean surface temperature variability since 1880 when records began. We also know that ice sheets are in retreat in most parts of the globe, particularly the Arctic and Antarctic. The little video shows a great summary of this pulsating annual cycle of ice cap growth and decay in the Arctic, and the significant progressive change over the last few years, as recorded from satellites.  For the Antarctic, early explorers’ log books by Shackleton and Scott have indicated a more complex decadal cycle, with only a 14% volume loss so far. Ice volume seemed to peak in the 1950s, as compared with the end of the nineteenth century, according to Reading University scientist Jonny Day. Sea ice as recorded from satellites has actually increased as ice is lost from glacier fronts. So, the Northern and Southern Hemispheres are reacting differently, perhaps unsurprisingly when we consider those ocean current pathways. The news is not all bad, as there is evidence from Bristol University that melting Antarctic icebergs release nutrients, particularly iron compounds ferrihydrite and schwertmannite, into the Weddel Sea and that this boosts the growth of plankton, which then take up the atmospheric carbon dioxide – a partly self-regulating system. However, it not likely to be in balance with the losses, and Japanese scientists have found that ocean waters in the tropical Sea of Japan are taking up less carbon dioxide that previously. On balance, oceans are estimated to take up about a quarter of all the CO2 produced globally.

The impact of this is manifest in several ways, amongst which are sea temperatures and sea level change. Increasing sea temperatures, together with increasing acidity from dissolved atmospheric carbon dioxide and sea level change are putting pressure on the coral reefs that protect many coastlines from the ravages of flooding. Many carbonate reefs (and there are now known to be silica reefs as well, recently found at 760 metres in the Mediterranean, and a legacy of ancient organisms such as sponges) are experiencing ‘bleaching’ and death of their constituent microorganisms, polyps. Bleaching can be part of the natural cycle of coral reefs, and has an association with natural aerosols emitted from volcanoes (which protect them), and the strength of the cycles of sea currents associated with El Nino, so it is sometimes difficult to establish that widespread bleaching such as observed in the Great Barrier Reef, is actually the result of water temperature change. But it seems likely. Cold water corals are also likely to be affected, including common North Atlantic species such as Lophelia, which have been shown to become more brittle with acidification – a type of coral reef osteoporosis. Collapse of the basic structural elements of a reef can initiate wider changes in the marine ecology, with new species arriving to replace some of the rarer incumbents. It may also leave coastal areas open to inundation at high tides and in storms. Clearly some form of protection is required, but it cannot just be a locally-based solution as in most cases this will not address the fundamental cause of the bleaching.

Microorganisms such as phytoplankton, at the bottom of the food chain are also likely to alter their distribution in response to the changed water temperatures, tending to migrate away from the equator. This would not necessarily matter, except that research by Simon Simpson at Exeter University suggests that this is associated with a reduction in biodiversity and reduced ocean productivity. Fish life could be affected. The International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO) described this in 2011 as an ocean apocalypse of mass extinction, comparable to the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum of 55 million years ago when 2.2 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide were estimated to be released every year into the atmosphere, whereas today we release 25 gigatonnes every year. The increased carbon dioxide may also affect fish ability to navigate, and studies in fish farms by Exeter University suggest that fish hearing, sight and smell is compromised. They may start swimming towards predators, which is clearly not a good plan.

That brings me, finally, to fish and over fishing. Fish have always been a vital part of the world’s human diet, and 90% of all fisheries are in the developing world where population is increasing. The pressure is on. Fisheries are also an area where global legislation and enforcement is weak, and governance arrangements are patchy. Research by Richard Bailey in the Oxford Martin School has produced some most interesting findings, and ways to think about the questions. Take for example cod stocks in the North West Atlantic in the 1990s, which fell to 1% of the biomass of the previous yields as a result of overfishing. The UN FAO has suggested that this is not untypical of other fisheries, where they estimate that 75% are at maximum capacity or overfished. The technology of fishing improved very quickly in the 1980s and 1990s, for the same reasons that oceanography understanding improved rapidly – GPS, new sensors and similar technologies. Vested interests, financial subsidies and uncertainty produced a political environment in which international competition could thrive, with an overarching view that there were plenty of fish in the sea. As the boats became bigger and more sophisticated, and despite some regulation, ecosystems were degraded with a ‘Tragedy of the Commons’ as everyone took more or less what they wanted in case others got there first. The combination of what he calls high ‘subtractability’ (what’s lost is lost), and difficult ‘excludability’ (everyone can get in to fish quite easily) has generated this situation. Basically, as soon as policy measures were put into place, shorter boats, for instance, fishermen adapted their boats to make them wider. Cutting the days at sea – fishermen work longer hours per day. And a fifth of all estimated fish catches are illegal, with the same boats probably being used for drug dealing and people smuggling. We now have large and very efficient fishing fleets. The catch figures show the result. Pressurised also by climate change and localised pollution, considerable damage has been done to North Atlantic fisheries and we are now in a position where we do not know if the ecosystems will fully recover to their previous positions. They may lock into a new, less productive, situation. With or without the agreements currently in force with Europe.

Perhaps what is required is Marine Conservation Areas where fishing and mineral extraction are prohibited, protected areas where fish and other organisms can recover, and here we do report some successes close to the UK and beyond. With the new technologies we can now see ship lights from space, use synthetic aperture radar from aircraft to spot even small ships at sea by observing their wakes, and ‘chip’ or tag boats electronically so we know where they are all the time. Perhaps there is some cause for optimism that fish stocks will recover and our reefs and other vulnerable systems will be protected.

Environmental journalist George Monbiot, writing powerfully in the Guardian newspaper last month, said that encounters with huge basking sharks and sunfish whilst canoeing off the Hebrides triggered in him a raw set of feelings, a vestigial genetic memory from a time when ocean circumstances obviously directly shaped human lives. Less obviously today, ladies and gentlemen, they still do.

© Professor Carolyn Roberts, 2017

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Under the Sea: What’s Happening in Our Oceans?

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Scientists are now finding increasing evidence of the terrible extent of human-induced damage of the sea. What attempts are being made to reduce this footprint of human activity, and can they succeed in restoring the largest living space on earth?

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Gabrielle Walker: What you need to know about carbon removal

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What do woolly pigs have to do with climate change? They're part of a vital, ingenious and evolving strategy to take carbon out of the sky and store it safely -- in trees, soils, the ocean, buildings, rocks and deep underground.

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Bas Sudmeijer: How carbon capture networks could help curb climate change

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What if we could build a global waste disposal service for carbon? In this forward-thinking talk, carbon capture advisor Bas Sudmeijer proposes building CO2 networks: partnerships between cities around the world that would share the cost and geological resources needed to trap emissions deep in the earth -- and give us a shot at stalling climate change.

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Course links: GCSE * IGCSE * A-level * IA-level * IB * National 5 * Higher Geography

Contents

Carbon is found in all Earth's systems: in the air we breathe, in the ground beneath our feet-it even makes up about 18% of our bodies.

In this video we team up with Dr Tim Lane from Liverpool John Moores University to explore the major stores of carbon on Planet Earth:

* The rocks and fossil fuels of the lithosphere

* The water of the hydrosphere

* The soils of the pedosphere

* The gases of the atmosphere

* The living organisms of the biosphere

Acknowledgments

Written and developed by: Tim Lane, Jason Kirby, Jon Dick, Rob Parker, Harriet Ridley, Tim Parker.

Videography by: Josh Carron, Harriet Ridley.

Thank you to the National Trust for enabling us to film this video at Doctors Gate in the Peak District.

Attributions

Car Image by Oli Woodman on Unsplash.

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Course links: GCSE * IGCSE * A-level * IA-level * IB * National 5 * Higher Geography Contents Carbon is found in all Earth's systems: in the air we breathe, in the ground beneath our feet-it even makes up about 18% of our bodies.

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Lesson 11.  Global and Major stores of Carbon

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Lesson 11.  Global and Major stores of Carbon

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Lesson 11. Global and major stores of carbon

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W&C Geog Rev - the impact of plam oil plantations

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W&C Geog rev - Rainforests and the carbon cycle

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W&C Geog Rev - Climate C and flood management

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W&C Geog Rev - Why aren't we acting on climate change

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W&C  Geog Review Sustainable Dev Goals - Can they Succeed

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W&C Geog Rev - GGs Monitoring for mitigation

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W&C Geog Rev - the CC and global warming

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W&C Geog Rev - ocean currents, carbon cycle and climate change

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W&C Geog Rev - Farming practices and waterways

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W&C Geog Rev - Farming practices and waterways

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W&C Geog Rev - Floodplain fens and carbon cycling

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W&C Geog Rev - Carbon in the river system

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W&C Geog Rev - Tropical Peatlands and the CC

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W&C Geog Rev - Climate C and flood management

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W&C Geog Rev - The permafrost carbon feedback

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W&C Geog Rev - The carbon cycle, columbus, ice age