what has happened to carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere since the 1850s
Jan 17, 2017 | 12:00 PM
An Inconvenient Truth And then and Now: What'due south Changed for Our Climate Since 2006?
An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power will exist released in theaters July 28, 2017.
If y'all saw An Inconvenient Truth featuring old Vice President Al Gore back in 2006, chances are you left the theater a little stunned and asking a whole lot of questions. Questions like, "What can we do?" "What can I do?"
If and then, you weren't the only one. Fortunately.
Xi years agone the groundbreaking film prompted millions to start asking questions about the climate crisis and doing something about it, helping shape the modernistic climate move we know today. And in the decade since, a lot has inverse as a result. Climate scientific discipline has fabricated major advances, helping us better understand the challenge we face up. Renewable energy, such as solar and wind, is cheaper than fossil fuel-based electricity in many parts of the world. Electric cars are even condign mainstream (well, for some).
But as much progress as we've seen over the past decade, there's nonetheless a lot of work to exercise to build the sustainable future our planet needs. Let'due south have a wait at what's inverse – for improve or for worse – in the fight against the climate crisis over the past 11 years.
Solar Ability Is Booming
1 of the biggest success stories in climate solutions is the growth of solar ability. In 2015, the US installed 7,260 megawatts direct current (MWdc) of photovoltaic solar which was the largest annual total in history and a giant bound from the 105 MWdc installed in 2006. That'due south more than a half dozen,800-percent increase.
It gets better. Solar reached a new record in early on 2016 when the one-millionth solar installation came online in the U.s.. And according to a report past GTM Inquiry, the US solar market place is projected to grow 119 percent in 2016 alone – adding more than double the amount of capacity installed final yr. We could go on (and on) almost the rapid growth and benefits of solar energy, but yous get the thought: solar is here to stay.
Carbon Emissions Are Rising
Carbon emissions account for between 65–76 percent of the greenhouse gases from human activity, causing the Globe's temperature to rise at its fastest rate in millions of years. While natural variance in the Earth's carbon bike leads to some fluctuations in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels, overall, nosotros can see a clear connection between fossil fuels and these levels, which have increased about 40 percentage since pre-industrial times. Just what'due south scary is that in the last 11 years alone, CO2 levels have increased 5.5 percent, jumping from 382 parts-per-million (PPM) in July 2006 to 404 PPM in April 2016. Which means more heat trapped in our atmosphere.
Electrical Cars Accept Taken the World by Storm
Y'all might have started spotting electric cars on the road more and more in recent years as both major manufacturers like Chevrolet and Nissan and boutique firms like Tesla Motors have seen their real market potential. But while electric cars take gained infrequent notoriety in the by decade, they're really a novelty of the past.
British engineer, Thomas Parker, invented the first electric motorcar in 1884, which used rechargeable batteries. Gasoline-powered cars hadn't gained much traction yet, just by the 1930s, engine improvements and the invention of the electrical starter fabricated gasoline-fueled cars a better, cheaper option. You know what happens afterward that.
Fast frontwards to 2003 when Tesla Motors launched, a company that fix out to prove electric cars could exist a more efficient and environmentally-friendly pick than gasoline-powered cars. Tesla's kickoff electric automobile, the Tesla Roadster, launched to the public in 2008 and dramatically shifted how consumers views these vehicles. Since and so, more and more than manufacturers from BMW to Kia to Mercedes Benz take launched their own electric vehicles, taking the engineering science mainstream and reaching 1 million sales globally in September 2015.
Global Surface Temperatures Are Increasing
It's no secret that 14 of the fifteen hottest years ever recorded have occurred since 2001. Final year was the hottest year on record, and 2016 is on pace to be even warmer.
These record-breaking temperatures become crystal articulate when they're displayed visually. The nautical chart below shows how global surface temperatures have varied from the long-term averages since 1880. Look at the trend beginning around 1950 and you'll see temperature changes steadily increasing throughout the second half of the twentieth century. And within the past decade alone, global temperatures have deviated from the long-term boilerplate past 0.63 degrees Celsius (i.13 degrees Fahrenheit) in 2006 to 0.87 degrees Celsius (1.57 degrees Fahrenheit) in 2015. All of this to say our planet is warming like never before in recent history – and it'south only getting hotter.
Sea Levels Are Ascension
Sea levels have been ascension for the past century – and the pace has simply increased in the past decade as glaciers melt faster and water temperatures increase, causing oceans to expand. The chart beneath shows sea-level changes from 1993–2006 where, from June 2006 to January 2016, sea levels increased nigh 41.24 millimeters (one.62 inches).
You lot tin can imagine how this change would affect the half of the global population that lives in towns and cities within 60 kilometers (37 miles) of the coast, including eight of the world'due south 10 largest cities. These rising sea levels puts millions of people at hazard worldwide as storms intensify and more extreme flooding occurs.
Globe Leaders Signed the Paris Agreement
In 2006, concerted international action on climate change was nonetheless just sputtering along. The Kyoto Protocol – the first serious try at setting international targets for reducing emissions – had gone into result the year before, merely the US never ratified the agreement and splits between developed and developing nations meant information technology never worked quite as well every bit had been hoped. Only what these failings did was kickstart a search for a improve model of international cooperation on climate action. It wasn't smooth sailing all the way, as the heartbreak of Copenhagen showed in 2009, when negotiators simply walked out and talks on a new climate treaty dissolved. But in the years that followed, countries kept talking and kept working on a new kind of framework that could bring nations at every phase of development together to solve our common challenge, leading to the landmark Paris Agreement in December 2015.
Information technology wasn't easy getting in that location, but the Paris Agreement represents a real turning point. Formally signed on Globe Day 2016, the bargain is the first of its kind to set global targets for reducing carbon emissions and includes commitments from major carbon emitters like the US, People's republic of china, and India.
Our Future Is Bright
Yes, we have a lot of work alee to cease the climate crisis. But in the past 11 years, the world has made incredible progress in areas like advancing climate science, speedily growing renewable energy technologies, and international cooperation. And while we're not going to claim An Inconvenient Truth was solely responsible for all these developments, what the film did was bring the challenge of the climate crisis out into the open up and into mainstream culture like never before. The result was people in every time zone started request themselves what they could do – and got working on the answers.
Thanks to their answers and all the breakthroughs higher up, today we know we can solve it, if nosotros stay committed to this path – and if our world leaders follow through with their commitments to reducing emissions in the Paris Agreement. And that'southward a truth worth sharing.
Watch the trailer for An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, which premiered at the Sundance Flick Festival and will be released in theaters July 28, 2017.
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Source: https://www.climaterealityproject.org/blog/inconvenient-truth-then-and-now
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