Climate change dictionary
The media is full of jargon as climate change becomes a hot topic - here's a guide to help you through some of the most common terms.
Adaptation
Adaptation as a response to climate change, involves changing our lifestyles and infrastructure to cope with the effects of climate change; For example, a coastal community might adapt by building up sea defences, whereas a farming community might need to adapt by growing different types of crops as seasons change.
Carbon footprint
A carbon footprint is a way of expressing the amount of CO2 emitted as a result of a person's day-to-day life. For a business, it is the CO2 emitted as a result of its operations. Carbon footprints are usually expressed in tonnes of carbon dioxide emitted per year. They are calculated from information such as travel, burning of fossil fuels (eg: to heat buildings) and use of non-renewable electricity. The average carbon footprint of a UK citizen has been estimated to be 11.5 tonnes per year.
Extreme weather events
With the devastating Mozambique floods in 2000 and the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the phrase 'extreme weather events' has became popular parlance in the press. Scientists are worried by the increasing frequency and intensity of hurricanes, flooding, drought, as well as the loss of drinking water sources, reduction in productive farm land and increasing geographical spread of infectious diseases such as malaria. The consequences are serious for the whole world, and in particular for poorer countries who have the least ability to adapt.
Fossil fuels
The term fossil fuels refers to oil, coal and natural gas. Burning them to produce energy is among the biggest contributors to increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere. One of the ways of responding to climate change is to look at alternative ways to produce energy - for example, from wind, wave power, solar and geothermal energy.
Global warming / climate change
The terms "climate change" and "global warming" are often used to mean the same thing. Global warming emphasises the rise in average temperatures. Climate change is a more general term and reflects the fact that certain parts of the Earth may not simply get warmer but may suffer other types of changes to the climate, reflected in extreme weather events.
Greenhouse gases and the greenhouse effect
The Earth gets its heat straight from the Sun, but some of it gets reflected back out into space. Fortunately, certain gases in the atmosphere act like a greenhouse, keeping the heat in. The gases which cause this effect are known as greenhouse gases. The main greenhouse gas coming from human activities is carbon dioxide (CO2), but others include methane, nitrous oxide, (H)CFCs and SF6. Farming and landfills are major sources of methane. As the atmospheric concentration of these gases increases, more solar energy is trapped, like a blanket, over the earth. As a result, temperatures on earth are rising.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
The IPCC was established in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organisation and the United Nations Environmental Programme. It brings together a group of experts working to understand climate change - its potential impacts and options to tackle it. The group produces up-to-date assessment reports on climate change. The fourth report has recently been published.
Kyoto Protocol
Sponsored by the United Nations, the Kyoto Protocol is an agreement between countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. It was established in Japan in 1997 but didn't become international law until 2004. As of February 2007, 168 countries have ratified the treaty with the US and Australia as notable exceptions. Under Kyoto, industrialised nations agree to cut their CO2 emissions by a set percentage, but developing nations are excluded from binding targets for reducing emissions.
Mitigation
Mitigation refers to activities which try to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere; Major examples are energy efficiency, which reduces the amount of fossil fuels which need to be burned - and renewable energy, which creates energy through methods which don't produce greenhouse gases.
Offsetting
Offsetting involves calculating the total amount of carbon dioxide that will be emitted from a certain activity, for example plane travel or a conference call. The person or group carrying out that activity then donates money to a project which is designed to reduce the same amount of carbon dioxide emissions, typically in the developing world; For example, this could be a renewable energy development in India, but tree planting has also been a common activity in offsetting.
Ozone depletion
Damage to the ozone layer was a hot topic in the 1980s. CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons), used in fridges and aerosols, were to blame. Businesses and governments took action to phase them out and it is expected that the ozone hole will disappear by the end of this century. Although ozone depletion is a distinct issue to climate change, CFCs and similar gases also contribute to the greenhouse effect.
Renewable energy
Otherwise known as green or environmentally-friendly energy, renewable energy comes from natural sources that won't run out. These include the wind, the sun, the waves and biofuels such as wood, manure or flaxseed oil. Producing biofuels in large quantities is sometimes criticised, however, if it appears that large amounts of land which could be used in other ways are being devoted to biofuel crops.
Stern Review
In 2006, economist Sir Nicholas Stern published a report - The Stern Review - on the economics of climate change. His main conclusion was that the cost to the world's economy of not acting immediately to tackle climate change is far greater (at 20% of global gross domestic product) than the cost of taking action now (only 1%. In his report, Stern warns of a number of worst-case scenarios. For example, in the face of inaction on climate change up to 200 million people worldwide could become refugees as their homes are hit by drought or flooding.
