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In the 1980s, the terms global warming and climate change became more common, often being used interchangeably. [29] [30] [31] Scientifically, global warming refers only to increased surface warming, while climate change describes both global warming and its effects on Earth's climate system, such as precipitation changes. [28]
Some climate change effects: wildfire caused by heat and dryness, bleached coral caused by ocean acidification and heating, environmental migration caused by desertification, and coastal flooding caused by storms and sea level rise. Effects of climate change are well documented and growing for Earth's natural environment and human societies. Changes to the climate system include an overall ...
The five components of the climate system all interact. They are the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere, the lithosphere and the biosphere. [1]: 1451 Earth's climate system is a complex system with five interacting components: the atmosphere (air), the hydrosphere (water), the cryosphere (ice and permafrost), the lithosphere (earth's upper rocky layer) and the biosphere (living things).
Anthropogenic climate change is caused by human activity, as opposed to changes in climate that may have resulted as part of Earth's natural processes. [3] Global warming became the dominant popular term in 1988, but within scientific journals global warming refers to surface temperature increases while climate change includes global warming ...
Climate change and the associated warming of the ocean will lead to widespread changes to the Earth's climate and weather system including increased tropical cyclone and monsoon intensities and weather extremes with some areas becoming wetter and others drier. [14] Changing wind patterns are predicted to increase wave heights in some areas.
Global climate change will probably make it more complex and expensive to ensure water security. [50] It creates new threats and adaptation challenges. [51] This is because climate change leads to increased hydrological variability and extremes. Climate change has many impacts on the water cycle.
Thus, both effects are considered to each other out, and the warming from each unit of CO 2 emitted by humans increases temperature in linear proportion to the total amount of emissions. [ 8 ] : 746 Further, some fraction of the greenhouse warming has been " masked " by the human-caused emissions of sulfur dioxide , which forms aerosols that ...
[2] [3] Climate change represents long-term changes in temperature and average weather patterns. [4] [5] This leads to a substantial increase in both the frequency and the intensity of extreme weather events. [6] As a region's climate changes, a change in its flora and fauna follows. [7]