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This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on June 21, 2006, and on October 31, 2021.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
February 28, 2006	Peer review	Reviewed
May 17, 2006	Featured article candidate	Promoted
May 4, 2007	Featured article review	Kept
March 26, 2020	Peer review	Reviewed
January 21, 2021	Featured article review	Kept
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Current status: Featured article

This page is not a forum for general discussion about Climate change. Any such comments may be removed or refactored. Please limit discussion to improvement of this article. You may wish to ask factual questions about Climate change at the Reference desk.

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faq page

Frequently asked questions

To view an answer, click the [show] link to the right of the question. To view references used by an answer, you must also click the [show] for references at the bottom of the FAQ.

Q1: Is there really a scientific consensus on climate change?

A1: Yes. The IPCC findings of recent warming as a result of human influence are explicitly recognized as the "consensus" scientific view by the science academies of all the major industrialized countries. No scientific body of national or international standing presently rejects the basic findings of human influence on recent climate. This scientific consensus is supported by over 99% of publishing climate scientists.^[1]

Q2: How can we say climate change is real when it's been so cold in such-and-such a place?

A2: This is why it is termed "global warming", not "(such-and-such a place) warming". Even then, what rises is the average temperature over time – that is, the temperature will fluctuate up and down within the overall rising trend. To give an idea of the relevant time scales, the standard averaging period specified by the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) is 30 years. Accordingly, the WMO defines climate change as "a statistically significant variation in either the mean state of the climate or in its variability, persisting for an extended period (typically decades or longer)."^[2]

Q3: Can't the increase of CO₂ be from natural sources, like volcanoes or the oceans?

A3: While these claims are popular among global warming skeptics,^[3]^[4] including academically trained ones,^[5]^[6] they are incorrect. This is known from any of several perspectives:

Current human emissions of CO₂ are at least 100 times larger than volcanic emissions. Measurements of CO₂ levels over the past 50 years do not show any significant rises after eruptions.^[7] This is easily seen in a graph of CO₂ concentrations over the past 50 years: the strongest eruption during the period, that of Mount Pinatubo in 1991, produced no increase in the trend.
Isotopic analysis of atmospheric carbon dioxide shows the observed change in the ratio of carbon isotopes reflects the isotopic ratios in fossil fuels.^[8]
Atmospheric oxygen content is decreasing at a rate that agrees with the amount of oxygen being used to burn fossil fuels.^[9]
If the oceans were giving up some of their carbon dioxide, their carbon dioxide concentration would have to decrease. But instead we are measuring an increase in the oceans' carbon dioxide concentration, resulting in the oceans becoming more acidic (or in other words, less basic).^[10]

Q4: I think the article is missing some things, or has some things wrong. Can I change it?

A4: Yes. Keep in mind that your points need to be based on documented evidence from the peer-reviewed literature, or other information that meets standards of verifiability, reliability, and no original research. If you do not have such evidence, more experienced editors may be able to help you find it (or confirm that such evidence does not exist). You are welcome to make such queries on the article's talk page but please keep in mind that the talk page is for discussing improvements to the article, not discussing the topic. There are many forums that welcome general discussions of global warming, but the article talk page is not such a forum.

Q5: Why haven't the graphs been updated?

A5: Two reasons:

There are many images used in the articles related to global warming, and there are many reasons why they may not be updated with the latest data. Some of the figures, like the Global Warming Map, are static, meaning that they are intended to show a particular phenomenon and are not meant to be updated frequently or at all. Others, like the Instrumental Temperature Record and Northern Hemisphere Sea Ice Extent Anomalies, use yearly data and thus are updated once per year—usually in mid- to late-January, depending upon when the data is publicly released, and when a volunteer creates the image. Still others, like Mauna Loa Carbon Dioxide, use monthly data. These are updated semi-regularly.
However, just because an image is 6 months or a year old does not mean it is useless. Robert A. Heinlein is credited with saying, "Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get", meaning that climate is defined as a long-term average of weather, usually about 30 years. This length was chosen to eliminate the year-to-year variations.^[11] Thus, in terms of climate change, any given year's data is of little import.

Q6: Isn't climate change "just a theory"?

A6: People who say this are abusing the word "theory" by conflating its common meaning with its scientific meaning. In common usage, "theory" can mean a hunch or guess, but a scientific theory, roughly speaking, means a coherent set of explanations that is compatible with observations and that allows predictions to be made. That the temperature is rising is an observation. An explanation for this (also known as a hypothesis) is that the warming is primarily driven by greenhouse gases (such as CO₂ and methane) released into the atmosphere by human activity. Scientific models have been built that predict the rise in temperature and these predictions have matched observations. When scientists gain confidence in a hypothesis because it matches observation and has survived intense scrutiny, the hypothesis may be called a "theory". Strictly speaking, scientific theories are never proven, but the degree of confidence in a theory can be discussed. The scientific models now suggest that it is "extremely likely" (>95%) to "virtually certain" (>99%) that the increases in temperature have been caused by human activity as discussed in the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report. Global warming via greenhouse gases by human activity is a theory (in the scientific sense), but it is most definitely not just a hunch or guess.

Q7: Does methane cause more warming than CO₂?

A7: It's true that methane is more potent molecule for molecule. But there's far less of it in the atmosphere, so the total effect is smaller. The atmospheric lifetime of methane (about 10 years) is a lot shorter than that of CO₂ (hundreds to thousands of years), so when methane emissions are reduced the concentration in the atmosphere soon falls, whereas CO₂ accumulates in the atmosphere over long periods. For details see the greenhouse gas and global warming potential articles.

Q8: How can you say there's a consensus when lists of "skeptical scientists" have been compiled?

A8: Consensus is not the same as unanimity, the latter of which is impractical for large groups. Over 99% of publishing climate scientists agree on anthropogenic climate change.^[1] This is an extremely high percentage well past any reasonable threshold for consensus. Any list of "skeptical scientists" would be dwarfed by a comparably compiled list of scientists accepting anthropogenic climate change.

Q9: Did climate change end in 1998?

A9: One of the strongest El Niño events in the instrumental record occurred during late 1997 through 1998, causing a spike in global temperature for 1998. Through the mid-late 2000s this abnormally warm year could be chosen as the starting point for comparisons with later years in order to produce a cooling trend; choosing any other year in the 20th century produced a warming trend. This no longer holds since the mean global temperatures in 2005, 2010, 2014, 2015 and 2016 have all been warmer than 1998.^[12] More importantly, scientists do not define a "trend" by looking at the difference between two given years. Instead they use methods such as linear regression that take into account all the values in a series of data. The World Meteorological Organisation specifies 30 years as the standard averaging period for climate statistics so that year-to-year fluctuations are averaged out;^[2] thus, 10 years isn't long enough to detect a climate trend.

Q10: Wasn't Greenland much warmer during the period of Norse settlement?

A10: Some people assume this because of the island's name. In fact the Saga of Erik the Red tells us Erik named the new colony Greenland because "men will desire much the more to go there if the land has a good name."^[13] Advertising hype was alive and well in 985 AD.

While much of Greenland was and remains under a large ice sheet, the areas of Greenland that were settled by the Norse were coastal areas with fjords that, to this day, remain quite green. You can see the following images for reference:

A map of the Eastern Settlement
A satellite image of that area today
A map of the Western Settlement
A satellite image of that area today
A zoom in on the general area where the Brattahlíð (Erik the Red's farm) and Garðar farms were located

Q11: Are the IPCC reports prepared by biased UN scientists?

A11: The IPCC reports are not produced by "UN scientists". The IPCC does not employ the scientists who generate the reports, and it has no control over them. The scientists are internationally recognized experts, most with a long history of successful research in the field. They are employed by various organizations including scientific research institutes, agencies like NASA and NOAA, and universities. They receive no extra pay for their participation in the IPCC process, which is considered a normal part of their academic duties.

Q12: Hasn't global sea ice increased over the last 30 years?

A12: Measurements show that it has not.^[14] Claims that global sea ice amounts have stayed the same or increased are a result of cherry picking two data points to compare, while ignoring the real (strongly statistically significant) downward trend in measurements of global sea ice amounts.

Arctic sea ice cover is declining strongly; Antarctic sea ice cover has had some much smaller increases, though it may or may not be thinning, and the Southern Ocean is warming. The net global ice-cover trend is clearly downwards.

Q13: Weren't scientists telling us in the 1970s that the Earth was cooling instead of warming?

A13: They weren't – see the article on global cooling. An article in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society has reviewed the scientific literature at that time and found that even during the 1970s the prevailing scientific concern was over warming.^[15] The common misperception that cooling was the main concern during the 1970s arose from a few studies that were sensationalized in the popular press, such as a short nine-paragraph article that appeared in Newsweek in 1975.^[16] (Newsweek eventually apologized for having misrepresented the state of the science in the 1970s.)^[17] The author of that article has repudiated the idea that it should be used to deny global warming.^[18]

Q14: Doesn't water vapour cause 98% of the greenhouse effect?

A14: Water vapour is indeed a major greenhouse gas, contributing about 36% to 70% (not 98%) of the total greenhouse effect. But water vapour has a very short atmospheric lifetime (about 10 days), compared with decades to centuries for greenhouse gases like CO₂ or nitrous oxide. As a result it is very nearly in a dynamic equilibrium in the atmosphere, which globally maintains a nearly constant relative humidity. In simpler terms, any excess water vapour is removed by rainfall, and any deficit of water vapour is replenished by evaporation from the Earth's surface, which literally has oceans of water. Thus water vapour cannot act as a driver of climate change.

Rising temperatures caused by the long-lived greenhouse gases will however allow the atmosphere to hold more vapour. This will lead to an increase in the absolute amount of water vapour in the atmosphere. Since water vapour is itself a greenhouse gas, this is an example of a positive feedback. Thus, whereas water vapour is not a driver of climate change, it amplifies existing trends.

Q15: Is the fact that other solar system bodies are warming evidence for a common cause (i.e. the sun)?

A15: While some solar system bodies show evidence of local or global climate change, there is no evidence for a common cause of warming.

A 2007 National Geographic article described the views of Khabibullo Abdusamatov, who claims that the sun is responsible for global warming on both Earth and Mars.^[19] Abdussamatov's views have no support in the scientific community, as the second page of the National Geographic article makes clear: "'His views are completely at odds with the mainstream scientific opinion,' said Colin Wilson, a planetary physicist at England's Oxford University. [...] Amato Evan, a climate scientist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, added that 'the idea just isn't supported by the theory or by the observations.'"^[20]
There is no reliable source claiming that Jupiter is warming. However, observations of the Red Spot Jr. storm suggest Jupiter could be in a period of global climate change.^[21]^[22] This is hypothesized to be part of an approximately 70 year global climate cycle, characterized by the relatively rapid forming and subsequent slow erosion and merging of cyclonic and anticyclonic vortices that help transfer heat between Jupiter's poles and equator. The cycle works like this: As the vortices erode, heat exchange is reduced; this makes the poles cool down and the equatorial region heat up; the resulting temperature difference destabilizes the atmosphere, leading to the creation of new vortices.^[23]^[24]
Pluto has an extremely elliptical orbit with a period of about 248 years. Data are sparse, but two data points from 1988 and 2002 indirectly suggest that Pluto warmed between those two dates.^[25] Pluto's temperature is heavily influenced by its elliptical orbit – it was closest to the sun in 1989 and has slowly receded since. Because of thermal inertia, it is expected to warm for a while after it passes perihelion (similar to how a sunny day's warmest temperatures happen during the afternoon instead of right at noon). No other mechanism has so far been seriously suggested. Here is a reasonable summary, and this paper discusses how the thermal inertia is provided by sublimation and evaporation of parts of Pluto's atmosphere. A more popular account is here and in Wikipedia's own article.

Q16: Do scientists support climate change just to get more money?

A16: No,

Scientists participate in international organizations like the IPCC as part of their normal academic duties. They do not receive any extra compensation beyond possibly for direct expenses.
Scientific grants do not usually award any money to a scientist personally, only towards the cost of his or her scientific work.
There is not a shortage of useful things that scientists could study if they were not studying global warming.
- Understanding our climate system better brings benefits independent of global warming. For instance, more accurate weather predictions save a lot of money (on the order of billions of dollars a year), and everyone from insurance agents to farmers wants climate data.^[26]^[27] Scientists could get paid to study climate even if global warming did not exist.

Q17: Doesn't the climate vary even without human activity?

A17: It does, but the fact that natural variation occurs does not mean that human-induced change cannot also occur. Climate scientists have extensively studied natural causes of climate change (such as orbital changes, volcanism, and solar variation) and have ruled them out as an explanation for the current temperature increase. Human activity is the cause at the 95 to 99 percent confidence level (see the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report for details). The high level of certainty in this is important to keep in mind to spot mention of natural variation functioning as a distraction.

Q18: Should we include the view that climate change will lead to planetary doom or catastrophe?

A18: This page is about the science of climate change. It doesn't talk about planetary doom or catastrophe. For a technical explanation, see catastrophic climate change, and for paleoclimatic examples see PETM and great dying.

Q19: Is an increase in global temperature of, say, 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) important?

A19: Though it may not sound like much, a global temperature rise of 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) is huge in climate terms. For example, the sea level rise it would produce would flood coastal cities around the world, which include most large cities.

Earth's climate has varied significantly over geological ages. The question of an "optimal temperature" makes no sense without a clear optimality criterion. Over geological time spans, ecosystems adapt to climate variations. But global climate variations during the development of human civilization (i.e. the past 12,000 years) have been remarkably small. Human civilization is highly adapted to the current stable climate. Agricultural production depends on the proper combination of soil, climate, methods, and seeds. Most large cities are located on the coast, and any significant change in sea level would strongly affect them. Migration of humans and ecosystems is limited by political borders and existing land use. In short, the main problem is not the higher absolute temperature but the massive and unprecedentedly fast change in climate and the related effects on human societies. The IPCC AR6 WG2 report has a detailed discussion of the effects of rapid climate change.

Q20: Why are certain proposals to change the article discarded, deleted, or ignored? Who is/was Scibaby?

A20: Scibaby is/was a long term abusive sock-master (or coordinated group of sock masters) who has created 1,027 confirmed sock puppets, another 167 suspected socks, and probably many untagged or unrecognized ones. This page lists some recent creations. His modus operandi has changed over time, but includes proposing reasonably worded additions on the talk page that only on close examination turn out to be irrelevant, misinterpreted, or give undue weight to certain aspects. Scibaby is banned, and Scibaby socks are blocked as soon as they are identified. Some editors silently revert his additions, per WP:DENY, while others still assume good faith even for likely socks and engage them.

Q21: What about this really interesting recent peer-reviewed paper I read or read about, that says...?

A21: There are hundreds of peer-reviewed papers published every month in respected scientific journals such as Geophysical Research Letters, the Journal of Climate, and others. We can't include all of them, but the article does include references to individual papers where there is consensus that they best represent the state of the relevant science. This is in accordance with the "due weight" principle (WP:WEIGHT) of the Neutral point of view policy and the "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information" principle (WP:IINFO) of the What Wikipedia is not policy.

Q22: Why does the article define "climate change" as a recent phenomenon? Hasn't the planet warmed and cooled before?

A22: Yes, the planet has warmed and cooled before. However, the term "climate change" without further qualification is widely understood to refer to the recent episode and often explicitly connected with the greenhouse effect. Per WP:COMMONNAME, we use the term in this most common meaning. The article Climate variability and change deals with the more general concept.

Q23: Did the CERN CLOUD experiment prove that climate change is caused not by human activity but by cosmic rays?

A23: No. For cosmic rays to be causing global warming, all of the following would have to be true, whereas only the italicized one was tested in the 2011 experiment:^[28]

Solar magnetic field must be getting stronger
The number of cosmic rays reaching Earth must be dropping
Cosmic rays must successfully seed clouds, which requires:

Cosmic rays must trigger aerosol (liquid droplet) formation,
These newly-formed aerosols must grow sufficiently through condensation to form cloud-condensation nuclei (CCN),
The CCN must lead to increased cloud formation, and
Cloud cover on Earth must be declining.

Perhaps the study's lead author, Jasper Kirkby, put it best: "...it [the experiment] actually says nothing about a possible cosmic-ray effect on clouds and climate, but it's a very important first step."^[29]

Q24: I read that something can't fix climate change. Is this true?

A24: Yes, this is true for all plausible single things including: "electric cars", "planting trees", "low-carbon technology", "renewable energy", "Australia", "capitalism", "the doom & gloom approach", "a Ph.D. in thermodynamics". Note that it is problematic to use the word "fix" regarding climate change, as returning the climate to its pre-industrial state currently appears to be feasible only over a timeframe of thousands of years. Current efforts are instead aimed at mitigating (meaning limiting) climate change. Mitigation is strived for through the combination of many different things. See Climate change mitigation for details.

References

^ ^a ^b Powell, James (20 November 2019). "Scientists Reach 100% Consensus on Anthropogenic Global Warming". Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society. 37 (4): 183–184. doi:10.1177/0270467619886266. S2CID 213454806. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
^ ^a ^b "Commission for Climatology Frequently Asked Questions". World Meteorological Organization. Archived from the original on 5 May 2020. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
^ Harris, Tom. "Scientists who work in the fields liberal arts graduate Al Gore wanders through contradict his theories about man-induced climate change". National Post. Archived from the original on 30 August 2011. Retrieved 11 January 2009 – via Solid Waste & Recycling. {{cite web}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; 4 February 2012 suggested (help)
^ Arriola, Benj. "5 Good Arguments Why GlobalWarming is NOT due to Man-made Carbon Dioxide". Global Warming Awareness Blog. Retrieved 11 January 2009.
^ Ahlbeck, Jarl. "Increase of the Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Concentration due to Ocean Warming". Retrieved 11 January 2009.
^ Kirby, Simon (11 April 2007). "Top scientist debunks global warming". Herald Sun. Retrieved 11 January 2009.
^ Brahic, Catherine (16 May 2007). "Climate myths: Human CO2 emissions are too tiny to matter". New Scientist. Retrieved 11 January 2009.
^ "More Notes on Global Warming". Physics Today. May 2005. Retrieved 10 September 2007.
^ Battle, M.; et al. (2000). "Global Carbon Sinks and Their Variability Inferred from Atmospheric O2 and d13C". Science. 287 (5462): 2467–2470. doi:10.1126/science.287.5462.2467.
^ The Royal Society (2005). "Ocean acidification due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide". Retrieved 9 May 2012.
^ "Met Office: Climate averages". Met Office. Archived from the original on 24 February 2009. Retrieved 23 January 2009.
^ Climate Central (18 January 2017). "2016 Was the Hottest Year on Record". Climate Central. Retrieved 1 February 2017.
^ The Saga of Erik the Red, 1880, English translation by J. Sephton, from the original Eiríks saga rauða.
^ "Cold Hard Facts". Tamino. 8 January 2009. Retrieved 21 January 2009.^{[dead link‍]}
^ Peterson, T. C.; et al. (2008). "The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 89 (9): 1325. Bibcode:2008BAMS...89.1325P. doi:10.1175/2008BAMS2370.1.
^ Gwynne, Peter (28 April 1975). "The Cooling World". Newsweek. p. 64.
^ Verger, Rob (23 May 2014). "Newsweek Rewind: Debunking Global Cooling". Newsweek.
^ Gwynne, Peter (21 May 2014). "My 1975 'Cooling World' Story Doesn't Make Today's Climate Scientists Wrong". insidescience.org.
^ Ravilious, Kate (28 February 2007). "Mars Melt Hints at Solar, Not Human, Cause for Warming, Scientist Says". National Geographic News. Archived from the original on 2 March 2007. Retrieved 6 March 2008.
^ Ravilious, Kate (28 February 2007). "Mars Melt Hints at Solar, Not Human, Cause for Warming, Scientist Says (page 2)". National Geographic News. Archived from the original on 2 March 2007. Retrieved 6 March 2008.
^ Marcus, Philip; Shetty, Sushil; Asay-Davis, Xylar (November 2006). Velocities and Temperatures of Jupiter's Great Red Spot and the New Red Oval and Implications for Global Climate Change. American Physical Society. Retrieved 9 May 2007.
^ Goudarzi, Sara (4 May 2006). "New Storm on Jupiter Hints at Climate Change". Space.com. Retrieved 9 May 2007.
^ Philip, Marcus S. (22 April 2004). "Prediction of a global climate change on Jupiter" (PDF). Nature. 428 (6985): 828–831. Retrieved 9 May 2007.
^ Yang, Sarah (21 April 2004). "Researcher predicts global climate change on Jupiter as giant planet's spots disappear". University of California, Berkeley. Retrieved 9 May 2007.
^ Elliot, J. L.; et al. (10 July 2003). "The recent expansion of Pluto's atmosphere". Nature (424): 165–168. doi:10.1038/nature01762.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^ Foerster, Jim. "What's The Difference Between Private Weather Companies And The National Weather Service?". Forbes.
^ Eilts, Mike (27 November 2018). "The Role of Weather—and Weather Forecasting—in Agriculture". DTN.
^ "What do the CERN experiments tell us about global warming?". Skeptical Science. 2 September 2011.
^ Brumfiel, Geoff (23 August 2011). "Cloud Formation May Be Linked to Cosmic Rays". Scientific American.

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Move logs: Global warming
Climate change

Discussions:

RM, Global warming → Climate change, Not moved, 11 June 2018, discussion
RM, Global warming → Climate change, Moved, 21 August 2020, discussion

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Sarah McBroom (March 27, 2007). "Conservapedia.com -- an encyclopedic message from the right". Scripps Howard News Service.
Michael Booth (April 30, 2007). "Grading Wikipedia". The Denver Post.
"Topics that spark Wikipedia 'edit wars' revealed". BBC News. July 18, 2013.
Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies (August 15, 2015). "On Wikipedia, politically controversial science topics vulnerable to information sabotage". Science Daily.
"The guardians of Wikipedia's climate page: An intensely devoted core keeps a bastion of climate science honest". Mashable. November 11, 2020.
"Climate change: Conspiracy theories found on foreign-language Wikipedia". BBC. November 18, 2021.
Marco Silva (December 24, 2021). "Climate change: Small army of volunteers keeping deniers off Wikipedia". BBC.

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/Terminology section /General discussion

This page has archives. Sections older than 21 days may be automatically archived by when more than 8 sections are present.

Moving History Section Up

The recent discussions about terminology section reminded me of this. Can we move History section and its subsections up, after Terminology section? It seems like a more logical and chronological place. Terminology, History, and then the rest of the article. Bogazicili (talk) 19:27, 9 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In its current state, I'd rather not. It's has a lot of details that should not be moved to such a prominent place, and the consensus paragraph(s) moved there have not yet been integrated properly. Femke (alt) (talk) 19:30, 9 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In most Wikipedia articles, history section is usually on top, after terminology or etymology sections. What has not been integrated btw? Second and third paragraphs? Bogazicili (talk) 19:35, 9 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No, please don't move the history section up. I don't think it's what people primarily are looking for when reading Wikipedia articles on science type topics. History at the start makes sense for articles on cities or countries perhaps but I don't think the history section needs to be first when it comes to science and technology type articles. For comparison purposes: Note that at WikiProject Medicine there was also a broad consensus to move history towards the end which is how it's done for most disease articles for example. EMsmile (talk) 20:49, 9 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Don't move. Here, History is not as important as /* Terminology */ because of public confusion of the terms CC and GW that defines the very scope of this article. Though the Scientific Consensus sub-section would be good for informing skeptics (the ones who read, anyway), consensus among editors here seems to be to downplay Consensus content as it is perceived to be defensive or reactive to denialism. —RCraig09 (talk) 21:25, 9 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the public is confused about the terms CC and GW. I think it's more of an issue with the euphenism treadmill. Crescent77 (talk) 22:44, 14 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry but I think the history is less important than other sections so should not be moved Chidgk1 (talk) 19:17, 5 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Question about anchor HTML code

Do we still need these anchors here for the section on solar activity? === Solar and volcanic activity ===. I wonder if the snytax is outdated: It seems to cause an error when I use the excerpt template to transcribe this section to climate change mitigation. Could I just delete the string? EMsmile (talk) 10:51, 10 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I've taken it out now and it did fix my problem with the excerpt at climate change mitigation. If we do need this kind of anchor here, is there an updated HTML syntax that works better? If not, I could use the "noinclude" tags to prevent transcription of this section to the other article. EMsmile (talk) 11:11, 10 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Information about oceans and ocean acidification in the lead?

I feel that the topic of oceans is underrepresented in the lead and wonder if we could add one sentence about the effects of climate change on oceans? I see that the issue of ocean acidification is framed in the lead and in the main text as "just" a "long term issue". I think this is misleading as those changes are already happening now and are having an impact. Also, there is so much more to oceans than just warming and a lowering pH value. The first sentence of the article effects of climate change on oceans will be too long but I am just adding it here to show that there are so many effects on the ocean. I think this needs to come out more clearly, in the lead and in the main text: There are many significant effects of climate change on oceans including: an increase in sea surface temperature as well as ocean temperatures at greater depths, more frequent marine heatwaves, a reduction in pH value, a rise in sea level from ocean warming and ice sheet melting, sea ice decline in the Arctic, increased upper ocean stratification, reductions in oxygen levels, increased contrasts in salinity (salty areas becoming saltier and fresher areas becoming less salty),^[1] changes to ocean currents including a weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, and stronger tropical cyclones and monsoons.^[2] EMsmile (talk) 22:48, 15 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

And I have changed "more acidic ocean water" to "reducing pH value" in the lead as we are still a long way off from having a pH less than 7, so it's not acidic yet but a lower pH than before. I think it would be good to mention the technical term - ocean acidification - in the lead once, instead of just wikilinking to it behind "more acidic" or "lower pH value"? I know it's a "complicated word" but it might need to be introduced. EMsmile (talk) 22:48, 15 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Cheng, Lijing; Trenberth, Kevin E.; Gruber, Nicolas; Abraham, John P.; Fasullo, John T.; Li, Guancheng; Mann, Michael E.; Zhao, Xuanming; Zhu, Jiang (2020). "Improved Estimates of Changes in Upper Ocean Salinity and the Hydrological Cycle". Journal of Climate. 33 (23): 10357–10381. Bibcode:2020JCli...3310357C. doi:10.1175/jcli-d-20-0366.1. ISSN 0894-8755.
^ IPCC, 2019: Summary for Policymakers. In: IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate [H.-O. Pörtner, D.C. Roberts, V. Masson-Delmotte, P. Zhai, M. Tignor, E. Poloczanska, K. Mintenbeck, A. Alegría, M. Nicolai, A. Okem, J. Petzold, B. Rama, N.M. Weyer (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009157964.001.

EMsmile (talk) 22:48, 15 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Mention inequity between polluters and pollutees in the lead

I was reading this today:

But it's important to understand that the majority of the world's population growth is concentrated in poorer countries with significantly lower emissions rates. They're not the ones creating the situation. But in reality, they're the ones having to face the consequences of this over-consumption in the West. They suffer disproportionately. Despite the growth in their populations, they're actually responsible for a very tiny percentage.
— Andrea Wojnar, India representative for the United Nations Population Fund, as quoted by NPR

...and then I read our article about climate change and was surprised that this point wasn't in the lead, and is instead mentioned further down in the body:

Countries that are most vulnerable to climate change have typically been responsible for a small share of global emissions.
— First sentence of Climate change § Policies and politics

I think the inequity between those causing climate change and those suffering from it is an important-enough aspect of the topic to be in the first paragraph of the lead, or at least somewhere in the lead. What do others think? Levivich (talk) 00:04, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Generally agree: I think it's a good idea to add a sentence to what's now the second paragraph, which focuses on effects of climate change. The sentence could include an explicit reference or internal link to climate justice, given the theme of COP27. —RCraig09 (talk) 00:32, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I also agree with this suggestion. I anyway think that the lead is on the short side (currently 447 words). My personal preference would be for a slightly longer lead, up to 600 words is my gut feeling. The issues of "per capita emissions", and links between emissions and wealth/overconsumption are important. (does anyone want to head over to the climate change mitigation article which is in dire need of improvement and where we are grappling with similar issues? See the chapter on "demand"). EMsmile (talk) 09:24, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The lead, not just its first paragraph, is about 500 words. Many discussions here have focused on keeping its length in check. —RCraig09 (talk) 20:38, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Agree The second paragraph is too long already (139 words, whereas an easy-to-understand paragraph is roughly 50–100 words), but the third paragraph has space left and already talks about the geopolitics (Paris agreement), so is the more logical space. Putting it in the first paragraph would require a restructuring of the lead, which I'm not that keen on, but I'm not against it in principle. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:08, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Conditionally agree based on editing the third paragraph, but I want to see the text proposed here on the talk page before the edit happens. That paragraph should also be updated to talk about Cop 27 (and maybe less about Paris) so it appears more up to date. I'd also want the edits to explain the issue in plain language and avoid off putting ideological buzz words like climate justice, reparations, people of color, disproportionality, and so on. Efbrazil (talk) 18:52, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think COP27 will really survive the 10-year test; I don't see evidence of lasting importance from the current news cycles. What about copying the existing text to the lead? —Femke 🐦 (talk) 19:06, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree with copying the existing body sentence, "Countries that are most vulnerable to climate change have typically been responsible for a small share of global emissions", to the lead. The body text links "vulnerable to climate change" to Climate change vulnerability. I think it'd be great if we could also work in a link to Climate justice. Maybe like this: Countries that are most vulnerable to climate change have typically been responsible for a small share of global emissions.? Levivich (talk) 19:46, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The current third paragraph reads like it was authored in 2015 and then never updated. Shouldn't we have a way to talk about the latest commitments? I don't care if we say Cop27 or just link to it, but it seems like we should say something like "as of 2022, blah blah blah". Efbrazil (talk) 21:03, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Editors: post your proposed addition(s) to the lead, with the understanding others may edit them here:

Second paragraph is changed to only cover the environment, with human impacts moved to the next (new) paragraph:
Due to climate change, deserts are expanding, while heat waves and wildfires are becoming more common.[5] Increased warming in the Arctic has contributed to melting permafrost, glacial retreat and sea ice loss.[6] Higher temperatures are also causing more intense storms, droughts, and other weather extremes.[7] Rapid environmental change in mountains, coral reefs, and the Arctic is forcing many species to relocate or become extinct.[8] Even if efforts to minimise future warming are successful, some effects will continue for centuries. These include sea level rise, and oceans with an increased temperature and lowered pH values.[11]
Third paragraph is people, including from second paragraph, adaptation from last paragraph, and a new sentence at the end on how poor countries are less able to adapt:
Climate change threatens people with food and water scarcity, increased flooding, extreme heat, more disease, and economic loss. Human migration and conflict can also be a result.[9] The World Health Organization (WHO) calls climate change the greatest threat to global health in the 21st century.[10] Communities may adapt to climate change through efforts like better coastline protection or by expanding access to air conditioning, but some impacts are unavoidable. Poorer countries are responsible for a small share of global emissions, yet they have the least ability to adapt and are most vulnerable to climate change.
Fourth paragraph unchanged:
Many of these impacts are already felt at the current 1.2 °C (2.2 °F) level of warming. Additional warming will increase these impacts and may trigger tipping points, such as the melting of the Greenland ice sheet.[12] Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, nations collectively agreed to keep warming "well under 2 °C". However, with pledges made under the Agreement, global warming would still reach about 2.7 °C (4.9 °F) by the end of the century.[13] Limiting warming to 1.5 °C will require halving emissions by 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.[14]
Last paragraph just has final sentence cut since it was moved to the new third paragraph:
Reducing emissions requires generating electricity from low-carbon sources rather than burning fossil fuels. This change includes phasing out coal and natural gas fired power plants, vastly increasing use of wind, solar, and other types of renewable energy, and reducing energy use. Electricity generated from non-carbon-emitting sources will need to replace fossil fuels for powering transportation, heating buildings, and operating industrial facilities.[16][17] Carbon can also be removed from the atmosphere, for instance by increasing forest cover and by farming with methods that capture carbon in soil.[18]

I've added a local-edit quote box per Efbrazil's suggestion. I'm still thinking that despite its length the second paragraph is a better destination for equity-related content, but it's not a strong opinion. I agree with Efbrazil to avoid preachiness, though an internal link to Climate justice is OK. —RCraig09 (talk) 20:38, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! I didn't understand the numbered approach, so I just removed the numbers from the box. Feel free to add that back with an explanation.

Regarding the text, I think we need to explain the basis for vulnerability. It's not a geographic quirk or an example of white liberals feeling guilty, it's about whether a country has sufficient wealth to adapt. I understand there are island nations that are particularly screwed due to geography, but that's really a separate issue. For instance, Miami beach is similarly screwed, but we don't seek justice for the people that live there. Similarly, with water access we aren't worried about the plight of oil rich countries with desalination plants.

We mention adaptation in the fourth paragraph now, so that's awkward. We really need to mention adaptation before we mention how countries have differing abilities to adapt.

To resolve all that, I restructured the intro to add a paragraph for humans, which seems major, but it's really just moving sentences around. Hopefully everyone loves the idea and I didn't just open a can of worms :) Efbrazil (talk) 21:46, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

On first read and without having done a side by side comparison, I think this new lead rearrangement is an improvement over the current lead--thanks. (Btw in case anyone might find it useful: {{textdiff}}.) Levivich (talk) 23:29, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Ditto, Levivich's 23:29 first sentence. As I understand it, Efbrazil's proposed changes look large but appear to involve adding one single sentence while re-arranging existing content, an idea I agree with. I like the separation of physical versus human effects along the lines in this graphic. (I had inserted numbers 1.___ 2.___ 3.___ anticipating alternative individual sentences, but that seems unnecessary now.) —RCraig09 (talk) 04:15, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good (I want to lodge another protest against this sandboxing, I find it difficult to follow what's changed).

A risk of a 5-paragraph lead is that it expands beyond 500 words in the future. Let's all ensure that this does not happen. We've done too much to improve readability to throw that away by increasing text length. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:13, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Here is the {{textdiff}} of the current and proposed lead. Levivich (talk) 17:23, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, that helps Levivich! I think the sandboxing thing Craig started was good for what he did (one entirely new sentence). I shouldn't have stuffed my proposal into the sandbox, because it was a much larger edit, and this difftext template helps make it a lot more clear.

I think the comment box can be good for driving consensus sometimes. It removes the ownership aspect over text, helps make the proposal stand out to new visitors, and means minor edits like typo fixes can be made without a huge bloat to the comment thread. I agree I misused it here, but it's good sometimes.

I agree on limiting text growth going forward. I think we have sufficient consensus here so I'll go ahead with the edit. Efbrazil (talk) 18:17, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think the new organization is an improvement, as for years it seems we've been perfecting the trees but neglecting the forest. :-) That is why the large-sandbox use was not a misuse in this case. I favor sandbox edits on Talk Pages since several editors can see the most recent "clean" version; I think edit histories are less important in these preliminary discussions and can obscure what's important. —RCraig09 (talk) 18:53, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

+ Of course, I agree in principle with restricting lead lengths. However, I think most lay readers won't go much beyond the lead (except for "looking at the pictures" perhaps), so it's important to be more ~complete in the lead about what's possibly the most important article on Wikipedia. —RCraig09 (talk) 18:57, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It's not even a bad thing, that readers only read leads or that editors should spend a ton of time on perfecting leads. An accurate, up-to-date summary of "climate change" (or any important topic) that can be read in 5-10 minutes and is easily accessible by everyone in the world, is extremely useful, and far more-so than the version that takes 30-60 minutes to read. We are mortal and life is short, so leads matter. Levivich (talk) 19:03, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Question about aerosols in "Drivers of recent temperature rise"

I wonder why aerosols come second in the section "Drivers of recent temperature rise" (even before land surface changes) even though aerosols are complicated as they can contribute to warming and cooling. Could we drop them to third place? So far it looks like this in the table of contents:

3 Drivers of recent temperature rise
3.1 Greenhouse gases
3.2 Aerosols and clouds
3.3 Land surface changes
3.4 Solar and volcanic activity
3.5 Climate change feedback

In comparison, in the article Attribution of recent climate change (less well developed than the climate change article of course) it looks like this:

3 Key attributions
3.1Greenhouse gases
 3.1.1 Water vapor
3.2Land use
 3.2.1Livestock and land use
3.3 Aerosol

I am asking today because I had included the same list and ordering in the article climate change mitigation but another editor (User:Hedgehoque) deleted the aerosols bullet point from the list saying: Sorry to remove aerosols again. But as commented earlier they are no driver for temperature rise. Quoting the excerpt: "aerosols having a dampening effect". If you want to include them, we need a separate list for this kind.. So I would like to get the story straight for how the aerosol issue is included best in the "drivers of recent temperature rise" section for all three articles. EMsmile (talk) 22:44, 16 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

See the "I'm confused" section below, which was inspired by this question.

The way the IPCC breaks things down is they say land surface changes are a minor dampener on climate change because they put the CO₂ impacts of deforestation into the "greenhouse gases" bucket, not the land use bucket. Land surface change to them is just reflectivity and irrigation impacts, which are minor dampeners.

Anyhow, that's not the approach we're taking here, which means we might be wrong. I don't see why we have a section on greenhouse gases and a section on land use that is a source of greenhouse gases, but not a section on the primary greenhouse gas source: fossil fuel use.

Further, the section is named "Drivers of recent temperature rise", but in fact only greenhouse gases are a driver. All the other subsections are either dampeners or feedbacks or sources of greenhouse gases or just non-factors, like solar activity.

Aerosols are a dampener but are a key part of the equation for how much warming we have. They are responsible for the lack of warming prior to 1970, and air pollution regulations combined with increasing CO₂ concentrations drove warming that has happened since.

So, upshot is I'd want a deeper reorganization that just putting aerosols third. Maybe this:

3 Causes of recent global temperature change

3.1 Greenhouse gases

3.1.1 Fossil fuel use

3.1.2 Land use changes

3.2 Aerosols and clouds

3.3 Solar and volcanic activity

3.4 Climate change feedbacks Efbrazil (talk) 21:52, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your reply. I am still confused: I wonder if the section heading "Causes of recent global temperature change" is basically poorly worded (if later on aerosols is a sub-heading). Maybe better: "Causes of recent climate change" (or "Drivers of recent climate change")? In the graphic that you mentioned below (here) it's called "Physical drivers of climate change" but perhaps that's a different listing. EMsmile (talk) 22:16, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's better, but I think better still is "Attribution of recent climate change", which is the main subtopic title. It's better because only greenhouse gases are the cause, all the other stuff we talk about in that section is not a contributor.

So maybe this:

3 Attribution of recent climate change

3.1 Greenhouse gases

3.1.1 Fossil fuel use

3.1.2 Land use changes

3.2 Aerosols and clouds

3.3 Solar and volcanic activity

3.4 Climate change feedbacks

Thoughts? Efbrazil (talk) 23:50, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, on reading through all the content, my proposal won't work without a serious rewrite I don't have time for. So I changed the header to "Attribution of recent temperature rise" and left it at that for now. Efbrazil (talk) 00:26, 19 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'm confused regarding land use as a driver of climate change

I'm confused, I'm hoping someone can offer clarity. The latest IPCC report shows land use changes as being a net negative (cooling) factor on balance. See here, which is just a reflection of SPM.2c: File:Physical Drivers of climate change.svg. SPM.4 repeats the assertion that land use change has a net cooling effect and is talked about along with aerosols.

That obviously runs against the other sources we have, which report land use changes as being a significant contributor to carbon emissions. For instance, here from the global carbon project: File:CO2 Emissions by Source Since 1880.svg

Can somebody explain the disparity here? I have a few theories, but I don't know if they are true. One is that the IPCC is just looking at warming influence change from 2010 - 2019 and finds land use change in that particular decade was net negative, maybe due to irrigation / reflectivity changes and because they are ignoring how much future warming is being banked by land use emissions today. Or maybe the IPCC was ignoring deforestation when they came up with their graphic, since they are qualifying land use changes as being irrigation and reflectivity, although the graphic makes it sound like its looking at all key factors. Anybody know what's actually going on here? Efbrazil (talk) 22:46, 17 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

You're right: the deforestation part of it is reflected in the CO2 bar, rather than the land use change bar. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:21, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, that makes sense. I changed the graphic from saying "Land-use changes" to saying "Irrigation and albedo". Efbrazil (talk) 21:07, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Efbrazil what software or tool did you use to create or change the graphic by the way? I am thinking of embarking on the process to learn how to make my own graphics for Wikipedia. In the past, I've only ever used Excel or Powerpoint for this... EMsmile (talk) 22:17, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's mostly all I use. For that graphic I put the data in Excel, pasted the chart into Powerpoint, then added the text there along with stuff like the curly braces, exported as svg from powerpoint, then touched up the svg in notepad to get the fonts right and remove some weird span breaks in the text so that localization can be done. It's not very elegant I'm afraid. For a minor edit like that text change I mentioned I simply check the file out, open it in notepad, make the text change, then check it back in. No localization or anything else gets messed up that way.

The other thing you can use is inkscape, which is an open source svg editor that works pretty well. It's pretty heavy duty though- feels a bit like an adobe product in terms of having a hundred toolbar buttons on screen at once. I use that to edit svg files visually. Efbrazil (talk) 23:34, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Research Process and Methodology - FA22 - Sect 201 - Thu

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 21 September 2022 and 8 December 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Sssara7 (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Jaynean (talk) 00:13, 30 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Adding an english translation of a german video produced by public tv about carbon dioxide as a climate factor

I have just discovered that the page is restricted from editing. However the German version of this article has an information video about carbon dioxide's effect as a climate factor.

I have translated the audiotrack of the original video and uploaded the derived work to wikimedia commons and wanted to include the video also to this article. However I don't want to qualify for sanctions which is why I am opening the topic here and hope someone can help me!

-- Renepick (talk) 22:32, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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[4] Arriola, Benj. "5 Good Arguments Why GlobalWarming is NOT due to Man-made Carbon Dioxide". Global Warming Awareness Blog. Retrieved 11 January 2009.

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[7] Brahic, Catherine (16 May 2007). "Climate myths: Human CO2 emissions are too tiny to matter". New Scientist. Retrieved 11 January 2009.

[8] "More Notes on Global Warming". Physics Today. May 2005. Retrieved 10 September 2007.

[9] Battle, M.; et al. (2000). "Global Carbon Sinks and Their Variability Inferred from Atmospheric O2 and d13C". Science. 287 (5462): 2467–2470. doi:10.1126/science.287.5462.2467.

[10] The Royal Society (2005). "Ocean acidification due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide". Retrieved 9 May 2012.

[11] "Met Office: Climate averages". Met Office. Archived from the original on 24 February 2009. Retrieved 23 January 2009.

[12] Climate Central (18 January 2017). "2016 Was the Hottest Year on Record". Climate Central. Retrieved 1 February 2017.

[13] The Saga of Erik the Red, 1880, English translation by J. Sephton, from the original Eiríks saga rauða.

[14] "Cold Hard Facts". Tamino. 8 January 2009. Retrieved 21 January 2009.^{[dead link‍]}

[15] Peterson, T. C.; et al. (2008). "The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 89 (9): 1325. Bibcode:2008BAMS...89.1325P. doi:10.1175/2008BAMS2370.1.

[16] Gwynne, Peter (28 April 1975). "The Cooling World". Newsweek. p. 64.

[17] Verger, Rob (23 May 2014). "Newsweek Rewind: Debunking Global Cooling". Newsweek.

[18] Gwynne, Peter (21 May 2014). "My 1975 'Cooling World' Story Doesn't Make Today's Climate Scientists Wrong". insidescience.org.

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