Download or read book Glaciers and the Changing Earth System written by Mark Dyurgerov and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Glaciers and Ice Sheets in the Climate System written by Andrew Fowler and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-10-28 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our realisation of how profoundly glaciers and ice sheets respond to climate change and impact sea level and the environment has propelled their study to the forefront of Earth system science. Aspects of this multidisciplinary endeavour now constitute major areas of research. This book is named after the international summer school held annually in the beautiful alpine village of Karthaus, Northern Italy, and consists of twenty chapters based on lectures from the school. They cover theory, methods, and observations, and introduce readers to essential glaciological topics such as ice-flow dynamics, polar meteorology, mass balance, ice-core analysis, paleoclimatology, remote sensing and geophysical methods, glacial isostatic adjustment, modern and past glacial fluctuations, and ice sheet reconstruction. The chapters were written by thirty-four contributing authors who are leading international authorities in their fields. The book can be used as a graduate-level textbook for a university course, and as a valuable reference guide for practising glaciologists and climate scientists.
Download or read book Global Change and the Earth System written by Will Steffen and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2005-12-29 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Global Change and the Earth System describes what is known about the Earth system and the impact of changes caused by humans. It considers the consequences of these changes with respect to the stability of the Earth system and the well-being of humankind; as well as exploring future paths towards Earth-system science in support of global sustainability. The results presented here are based on 10 years of research on global change by many of the world's most eminent scholars. This valuable volume achieves a new level of integration and interdisciplinarity in treating global change.
Download or read book Monitoring Climate Change Impacts written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2010-11-27 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The stresses associated with climate change are expected to be felt keenly as human population grows to a projected 9 billion by the middle of this century, increasing the demand for resources and supporting infrastructure. Therefore, information to assess vulnerabilities to climate change is needed to support policies and investments designed to increase resilience in human and Earth systems. There are currently many observing systems that capture elements of how climate is changing, for example, direct measurements of atmospheric and ocean temperature. Although those measurements are essential for understanding the scale and nature of climate change, they do not necessarily provide information about the impacts of climate change on humans that are especially relevant for political and economic planning and decision making. Monitoring Climate Change Impacts tackles the challenge of developing an illustrative suite of indicators, measurements (and the locations around the globe where the measurements can be applied), and metrics that are important for understanding global climate change and providing insight into environmental sustainability. Eight panels provided input on: cryosphere, land-surface and terrestrial ecosystems, hydrology and water resources, atmosphere, human health and other dimensions, oceans (both physical and biological/chemical), and natural disasters. The book also provides an illustrative set of metrics that are likely to be affected by climate change over the next 20-25 years and, when taken together, can potentially give advance warning of climate-related changes to the human and environment systems.
Download or read book The Great Ice Age written by R. C. L. Wilson and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Great Ice Age documents and explains the natural climatic and palaeoecologic changes that have occurred during the past 2.6 million years, outlining the emergence and global impact of our species during this period. Exploring a wide range of records of climate change, the authors demonstrate the interconnectivity of the components of the Earths climate system, show how the evidence for such change is obtained, and explain some of the problems in collecting and dating proxy climate data. One of the most dramatic aspects of humanity's rise is that it coincided with the beginnings of major environmental changes and a mass extinction that has the pace, and maybe magnitude, of those in the far-off past that stemmed from climate, geological and occasionally extraterrestrial events. This book reveals that anthropogenic effects on the world are not merely modern matters but date back perhaps a million years or more.
Download or read book The Secret Lives of Glaciers written by M. Jackson and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our planet has over 400,000 glaciers and ice caps scattered across its surface, some 5.8 million square miles of ice. Fascinatingly, where there are glaciers, there are people, and the two have been interacting for the entirety of human history. But we know so little about that interaction, those human stories of glaciers. The Secret Lives of Glaciers explores glacier diversity in Iceland, highlighting the rich social and cultural context and variability amongst glaciers and people. Investigating glaciers and people together teaches us about how human society experiences being in the world today amidst increasing climatic changes and anthropogenic transformation of all of Earth's systems.
Download or read book Earth System History and Natural Variability Volume II written by Vaclav Cilek and published by EOLSS Publications. This book was released on 2009-07-15 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Earth System: History and Natural Variability theme is a component of Encyclopedia of Natural Resources Policy and Management, in the global Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), which is an integrated compendium of twenty one Encyclopedias. The Theme on Earth System: History and Natural Variability with contributions from distinguished experts in the field, presents a description of the cosmic environment around our planet influencing the Earth in a number of ways through variation of solar energy or meteorite impacts. The structure of the Earth and its rocks, waters and atmosphere is described. The Theme focuses on geological and evolutionary processes through the history of Earth's epochs and biomes since the Early Earth to the Quaternary. The unifying processes between the Earth's life and its rocks, waters and atmosphere are global natural cycles of carbon, sulfur and other elements that connect and influence the rate of geological processes, climate change, biological evolution and human economy. These five volumes are aimed at the following five major target audiences: University and College students Educators, Professional practitioners, Research personnel and Policy analysts, managers, and decision makers and NGOs.
Download or read book Earth System Responses to Global Change written by Harold A. Mooney and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 1993-08-03 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is an analysis of the responses of North and South American west coasts, which presently have remarkably analogous geographic patterns but are predicted to become asymmetrical in the coming decades due to climate and land use change.
Download or read book Thriving on Our Changing Planet A Decadal Strategy for Earth Observation from Space written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2019-06-18 with total page 29 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We live on a dynamic Earth shaped by both natural processes and the impacts of humans on their environment. It is in our collective interest to observe and understand our planet, and to predict future behavior to the extent possible, in order to effectively manage resources, successfully respond to threats from natural and human-induced environmental change, and capitalize on the opportunities â€" social, economic, security, and more â€" that such knowledge can bring. By continuously monitoring and exploring Earth, developing a deep understanding of its evolving behavior, and characterizing the processes that shape and reshape the environment in which we live, we not only advance knowledge and basic discovery about our planet, but we further develop the foundation upon which benefits to society are built. Thriving on Our Changing Planet: A Decadal Strategy for Earth Observation from Space (National Academies Press, 2018) provides detailed guidance on how relevant federal agencies can ensure that the United States receives the maximum benefit from its investments in Earth observations from space, while operating within realistic cost constraints. This short booklet, designed to be accessible to the general public, provides a summary of the key ideas and recommendations from the full decadal survey report.
Download or read book The White Planet written by Jean Jouzel and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2016-12-13 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A gripping journey through the icy regions of our changing planet From the Arctic Ocean and ice sheets of Greenland, to the glaciers of the Andes and Himalayas, to the great frozen desert of Antarctica, The White Planet takes readers on a spellbinding scientific journey through the shrinking world of ice and snow to tell the story of the expeditions and discoveries that have transformed our understanding of global climate. Written by three internationally renowned scientists at the center of many breakthroughs in ice core and climate science, this book provides an unparalleled firsthand account of how the "white planet" affects global climate—and how, in turn, global warming is changing the frozen world. Jean Jouzel, Claude Lorius, and Dominique Raynaud chronicle the daunting scientific, technical, and human hurdles that they and other scientists have had to overcome in order to unravel the mysteries of past and present climate change, as revealed by the cryosphere--the dynamic frozen regions of our planet. Scientifically impeccable, up-to-date, and accessible, The White Planet brings cutting-edge climate research to general readers through a vivid narrative. This is an essential book for anyone who wants to understand the inextricable link between climate and our planet's icy regions.
Download or read book Monitoring Climate Change Impacts written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2010-10-27 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The stresses associated with climate change are expected to be felt keenly as human population grows to a projected 9 billion by the middle of this century, increasing the demand for resources and supporting infrastructure. Therefore, information to assess vulnerabilities to climate change is needed to support policies and investments designed to increase resilience in human and Earth systems. There are currently many observing systems that capture elements of how climate is changing, for example, direct measurements of atmospheric and ocean temperature. Although those measurements are essential for understanding the scale and nature of climate change, they do not necessarily provide information about the impacts of climate change on humans that are especially relevant for political and economic planning and decision making. Monitoring Climate Change Impacts tackles the challenge of developing an illustrative suite of indicators, measurements (and the locations around the globe where the measurements can be applied), and metrics that are important for understanding global climate change and providing insight into environmental sustainability. Eight panels provided input on: cryosphere, land-surface and terrestrial ecosystems, hydrology and water resources, atmosphere, human health and other dimensions, oceans (both physical and biological/chemical), and natural disasters. The book also provides an illustrative set of metrics that are likely to be affected by climate change over the next 20-25 years and, when taken together, can potentially give advance warning of climate-related changes to the human and environment systems.
Download or read book Meltdown written by Jorge Daniel Taillant and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-04 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We hear about pieces of ice the size of continents breaking off of Antarctica, rapidly melting glaciers in the Himalayas, and ice sheets in the Arctic crumbling to the sea, but does it really matter? Will melting glaciers change our lives? Absolutely.The ice ages and the interglacial periods like we live in now are built and destroyed by glaciers. Glaciers hold three quarters of our freshwater, yet we don't have laws to protection them from climate change. Melting glaciers raise the seas, alter global ecosystems, warm our climate and bring onfloods that swamp millions of acres of land destroying coastal ecosystems and leaving hundreds of millions homeless. Healthy glaciers help keep our planet cool by reflecting solar heat away from the Earth and provide critical freshwater supply to billions that live within their meltwater runoffbasins. But melting glaciers alter ocean temperature, warm the atmosphere and cause havoc to the ocean currents and to the global jet stream, causing inclement weather, prolonged and recurrent droughts, heavy rains and intense, frequent and unpredictable storms. As glaciers melt away, their criticalenvironmental functions and services will wither. And as climate change warms their core, their weakening internal structure will cause a growing number of glacier tsunamis that can send deadly massive ice blocks, rocks, earth and billions of liters of water rushing down mountain valleys that takeout anything in their path. It has happened before in the Himalayas, in the Central Andes, in the Rockies and Western Cascades, and in the European Alps and it will happen again. As glaciers melt so do the vast swaths of permafrost environments that thrive in their surroundings, where thawingmillenary terrain rich in ice but also in methane gas captured hundreds of thousands of years ago, is now released into the atmosphere intensifying climate change even further.In his new book Meltdown, Jorge Daniel Taillant takes readers deeper into the cryosphere and connects the dots between climate change, glacier melt and the impacts that receding glacier ice brings to livability on Earth, to our environments and to our neighborhoods. He walks us through thelittle-known realm of the periglacial environment, a world where invisible subsurface rock glaciers with solid ice cores that will outlive exposed glaciers in our warming climate, but will they suffice to maintain our cryosphere and climate ecology in balance? In two closing chapters Taillant looksat actions that can help stop climate change and save glaciers and also contrasts how society, politics and our leaders have responded to address the COVID-19 pandemic and yet largely failed to address the even larger looming and escalating crisis of climate change.Meltdown is about glaciers and their unfolding demise during one of the most critical moments of our climate crisis. We may still be in time to save the cryosphere, if we can reconsider glaciers in a whole new light and understand the critical role they play in our own sustainability and if we canawaken to see how through glacier melt, geological ages are changing right before our eyes.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of Snow Ice and Glaciers written by Vijay P. Singh and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2011-06-29 with total page 1301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The earth’s cryosphere, which includes snow, glaciers, ice caps, ice sheets, ice shelves, sea ice, river and lake ice, and permafrost, contains about 75% of the earth’s fresh water. It exists at almost all latitudes, from the tropics to the poles, and plays a vital role in controlling the global climate system. It also provides direct visible evidence of the effect of climate change, and, therefore, requires proper understanding of its complex dynamics. This encyclopedia mainly focuses on the various aspects of snow, ice and glaciers, but also covers other cryospheric branches, and provides up-to-date information and basic concepts on relevant topics. It includes alphabetically arranged and professionally written, comprehensive and authoritative academic articles by well-known international experts in individual fields. The encyclopedia contains a broad spectrum of topics, ranging from the atmospheric processes responsible for snow formation; transformation of snow to ice and changes in their properties; classification of ice and glaciers and their worldwide distribution; glaciation and ice ages; glacier dynamics; glacier surface and subsurface characteristics; geomorphic processes and landscape formation; hydrology and sedimentary systems; permafrost degradation; hazards caused by cryospheric changes; and trends of glacier retreat on the global scale along with the impact of climate change. This book can serve as a source of reference at the undergraduate and graduate level and help to better understand snow, ice and glaciers. It will also be an indispensable tool containing specialized literature for geologists, geographers, climatologists, hydrologists, and water resources engineers; as well as for those who are engaged in the practice of agricultural and civil engineering, earth sciences, environmental sciences and engineering, ecosystem management, and other relevant subjects.
Download or read book Glaciers and Climate Change written by J. Oerlemans and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text brings together meteorology and the theory of glacier flow, providing a fundamental understanding of how glaciers respond to climate change. Attention is paid to the microclimate of glaciers and the physical processes regulating the exchange of energy and mass between glacier surface and atmosphere. Simple analytical and numerical models are used to: · investigate glaciers sensitivity to climate change · estimate response times · make an interpretation of historical glacier records · assess the contribution of glacier melt to sea-level rise Modern developments in glacier research, including satellite measurements are discussed in detail, making this a valuable reference source.
Download or read book The Physics of Glaciers written by W. S. B. Paterson and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2016-10-27 with total page 491 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This updated and expanded version of the second edition explains the physical principles underlying the behaviour of glaciers and ice sheets. The text has been revised in order to keep pace with the extensive developments which have occurred since 1981. A new chapter, of major interest, concentrates on the deformation of subglacial till. The book concludes with a chapter on information regarding past climate and atmospheric composition obtainable from ice cores.
Download or read book The Physics of Glaciers written by Kurt M. Cuffey and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2010-06-18 with total page 721 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Physics of Glaciers, Fourth Edition, discusses the physical principles that underlie the behavior and characteristics of glaciers. The term glacier refers to all bodies of ice created by the accumulation of snowfall, e.g., mountain glaciers, ice caps, continental ice sheets, and ice shelves. Glaciology—the study of all forms of ice—is an interdisciplinary field encompassing physics, geology, atmospheric science, mathematics, and others. This book covers various aspects of glacier studies, including the transformation of snow to ice, grain-scale structures and ice deformation, mass exchange processes, glacial hydrology, glacier flow, and the impact of climate change. The present edition features two new chapters: “Ice Sheets and the Earth System and “Ice, Sea Level, and Contemporary Climate Change. The chapter on ice core studies has been updated from the previous version with new material. The materials on the flow of mountain glaciers, ice sheets, ice streams, and ice shelves have been combined into a single chapter entitled “The Flow of Ice Masses. Completely updated and revised, with 30% new material including climate change Accessible to students, and an essential guide for researchers Authored by preeminent glaciologists
Download or read book Advancing the Science of Climate Change written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2011-01-10 with total page 526 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for-and in many cases is already affecting-a broad range of human and natural systems. The compelling case for these conclusions is provided in Advancing the Science of Climate Change, part of a congressionally requested suite of studies known as America's Climate Choices. While noting that there is always more to learn and that the scientific process is never closed, the book shows that hypotheses about climate change are supported by multiple lines of evidence and have stood firm in the face of serious debate and careful evaluation of alternative explanations. As decision makers respond to these risks, the nation's scientific enterprise can contribute through research that improves understanding of the causes and consequences of climate change and also is useful to decision makers at the local, regional, national, and international levels. The book identifies decisions being made in 12 sectors, ranging from agriculture to transportation, to identify decisions being made in response to climate change. Advancing the Science of Climate Change calls for a single federal entity or program to coordinate a national, multidisciplinary research effort aimed at improving both understanding and responses to climate change. Seven cross-cutting research themes are identified to support this scientific enterprise. In addition, leaders of federal climate research should redouble efforts to deploy a comprehensive climate observing system, improve climate models and other analytical tools, invest in human capital, and improve linkages between research and decisions by forming partnerships with action-oriented programs.