scholarly journals Natural solutions to climate change. Greenhouse gases, high-energy crops and the future of the world

EMBO Reports ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 508-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Hunter
Earth ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-71
Author(s):  
Dhurba Neupane ◽  
Pramila Adhikari ◽  
Dwarika Bhattarai ◽  
Birendra Rana ◽  
Zeeshan Ahmed ◽  
...  

Climate prediction models suggest that agricultural productivity will be significantly affected in the future. The expected rise in average global temperature due to the higher release of greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere and increased depletion of water resources with enhanced climate variability will be a serious threat to world food security. Moreover, there is an increase in the frequency and severity of long-lasting drought events over 1/3rd of the global landmass and five times increase in water demand deficits during the 21st century. The top three cereals, wheat (Triticum aestivum), maize (Zea mays), and rice (Oryza sativa), are the major and staple food crops of most people across the world. To meet the food demand of the ever-increasing population, which is expected to increase by over 9 billion by 2050, there is a dire need to increase cereal production by approximately 70%. However, we have observed a dramatic decrease in area of fertile and arable land to grow these crops. This trend is likely to increase in the future. Therefore, this review article provides an extensive review on recent and future projected area and production, the growth requirements and greenhouse gas emissions and global warming potential of the top three cereal crops, the effects of climate change on their yields, and the morphological, physiological, biochemical, and hormonal responses of plants to drought. We also discuss the potential strategies to tackle the effects of climate change and increase yields. These strategies include integrated conventional and modern molecular techniques and genomic approach, the implementation of agronomic best management (ABM) practices, and growing climate resilient cereal crops, such as millets. Millets are less resource-intensive crops and release a lower amount of greenhouse gases compared to other cereals. Therefore, millets can be the potential next-generation crops for research to explore the climate-resilient traits and use the information for the improvement of major cereals.


2021 ◽  

Abstract This book is a collection of 77 expert opinions arranged in three sections. Section 1 on "Climate" sets the scene, including predictions of future climate change, how climate change affects ecosystems, and how to model projections of the spatial distribution of ticks and tick-borne infections under different climate change scenarios. Section 2 on "Ticks" focuses on ticks (although tick-borne pathogens creep in) and whether or not changes in climate affect the tick biosphere, from physiology to ecology. Section 3 on "Disease" focuses on the tick-host-pathogen biosphere, ranging from the triangle of tick-host-pathogen molecular interactions to disease ecology in various regions and ecosystems of the world. Each of these three sections ends with a synopsis that aims to give a brief overview of all the expert opinions within the section. The book concludes with Section 4 (Final Synopsis and Future Predictions). This synopsis attempts to summarize evidence provided by the experts of tangible impacts of climate change on ticks and tick-borne infections. In constructing their expert opinions, contributors give their views on what the future might hold. The final synopsis provides a snapshot of their expert thoughts on the future.


Author(s):  
Nancy Langston

Lake Superior is one of the fastest warming lakes in the world, leading to enormous changes in its ecosystems and human communities. How might changing climates affect the mobilization of contaminants in the Lake Superior basin? How might those contaminants affect resiliency toward climate change? And what can we do about it?


Author(s):  
Jaewon Jung ◽  
Sungeun Jung ◽  
Junhyeong Lee ◽  
Myungjin Lee ◽  
Hung Soo Kim

The interest in renewable energy to replace fossil fuel is increasing as the problem caused by climate change become more severe. Small hydropower (SHP) is evaluated as a resource with high development value because of its high energy density compared to other renewable energy sources. SHP may be an attractive and sustainable power generation environmental perspective because of its potential to be found in small rivers and streams. The power generation potential could be estimated based on the discharge in the river basin. Since the river discharge depends on the climate conditions, the hydropower generation potential changes sensitively according to climate variability. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the SHP potential in consideration of future climate change. In this study, the future prospect of SHP potential is simulated for the period of 2021 to 2100 considering the climate change in three hydropower plants of Deoksong, Hanseok, and Socheon stations, Korea. As the results, SHP potential for the near future (2021 to 2040) shows a tendency to be increased and the highest increase is 23.4% at the Deoksong SPH plant. Through the result of future prospect, we have shown that hydroelectric power generation capacity or SHP potential will be increased in the future. Therefore, we believe that it is necessary to revitalize the development of SHP in order to expand the use of renewable energy. Also, a methodology presented in this study could be used for the future prospect of the small hydropower potential.


2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Williamson

AbstractWhile climate change involves spatial, epistemological, social, and temporal remoteness, each type of distance can be bridged with strategies unique to it that can be borrowed from analogous moral problems. Temporal, or intergenerational, distance may actually be a motivational resource if we look at our natural feelings of hope for the future of the world, via Kant’s theory of political history, and for our children. Kant’s theory of hope also provides some basis for including future generations in a theory of justice.


Author(s):  
Nimra Kanwal ◽  
Nuhzat Khan

Buildings are the most important part of development activities, consumed over one-thirds of the global energy. Household used the maximum energy around the world, likewise in Pakistan residential buildings consumed about half of total energy (45.9% per year). The study aims to analyze the impact of building design on climate of Metropolitan City Karachi, Pakistan and to evaluate the change in urbanization patterns and energy consumption in the buildings. To have better understanding of the issues correlations was established amongst population, urbanization patterns, green area, number of buildings (residential and commercial), building design, energy consumption and metrological records (climate change parameters) by collecting the data from the respective departments. With the help of the collected data amount of carbon dioxide was estimated. The results reveled that during last 36 years the urban population of Karachi increased exponentially from 5,208,000 (1981) to 14,737,257 (2017) with increase in urbanized area from 8.35 km2 (1946) to 3,640 km2 (2017) that may led to reduce the green area of the city from 495,000 hectors (1971) to 100,000 hectors (2015). Moreover, the building’s design and numbers are being changed from 21 high-rise buildings (2009) to 344 (2017). It may be concluded that change in temperature pattern and climatic variability of the city may be due to increase in population and change in lifestyle that lead to high energy consumption that is prime source of increased in CO2 emission in the environment of Karachi city, However, Greenhouse Gases (GHG) releases are much lower than the levels reported from metropolitan cities around the world.


Author(s):  
Michael H. Fox

We, the teeming billions of people on earth, are changing the earth’s climate at an unprecedented rate because we are spewing out greenhouse gases and are heading to a disaster, say most climate scientists. Not so, say the skeptics. We are just experiencing normal variations in earth’s climate and we should all take a big breath, settle down, and worry about something else. Which is it? A national debate has raged for the last several decades about whether anthropogenic (man-made) sources of carbon dioxide (CO2 ) and other so-called “greenhouse gases“ (primarily methane and nitrous oxide) are causing the world to heat up. This phenomenon is usually called “global warming,” but it is more appropriate to call it “global climate change,” since it is not simply an increase in global temperatures but rather more complex changes to the overall climate. Al Gore is a prominent spokesman for the theory that humans are causing an increase in greenhouse gases leading to global climate change. His movie and book, An Inconvenient Truth, gave the message widespread awareness and resulted in a Nobel Peace Prize for him in 2008. However, the message also led to widespread criticism. On the one hand are a few scientists and a large segment of the general American public who believe that there is no connection between increased CO2 in the atmosphere and global climate change, or if there is, it is too expensive to do anything about it, anyway. On the other hand is an overwhelming consensus of climate scientists who have produced enormous numbers of research papers demonstrating that increased CO2 is changing the earth’s climate. The scientific consensus is expressed most clearly in the Fourth Assessment Report in 2007 by the United Nations–sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the fourth in a series of reports since 1990. The IPCC began as a group of scientists meeting in Geneva in November 1988 to discuss global climate issues under the auspices of the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program.


Author(s):  
Christian W. McMillen

There will be more pandemics. A pandemic might come from an old, familiar foe such as influenza or might emerge from a new source—a zoonosis that makes its way into humans, perhaps. The epilogue asks how the world will confront pandemics in the future. It is likely that patterns established long ago will re-emerge. But how will new challenges, like climate change, affect future pandemics and our ability to respond? Will lessons learned from the past help with plans for the future? One thing is clear: in the face of a serious pandemic much of the developing world’s public health infrastructure will be woefully overburdened. This must be addressed.


2011 ◽  
pp. 159-162
Author(s):  
Zsuzsanna Szántó

The backwardness of the rural areas compared to the cities poses a problem all over Europe. In Hungary, a relatively small size of the population lives in the capital, more than 80% of Hungarians live in rural cities or villages. The tension between the countryside and the cities is rather intensified and the symbiotic correlation would need to be restored. Many people migrate from the countryside, especially young adults, as they have no opportunities to find a job in their hometowns. This phenomenon poses big risks because getting a job is usually difficult everywhere and because fitting into a new environment always involves a lot of difficulties. Non-renewable energies are restricted and they will not be accessible after reaching a certain limit. People’s everyday activities and the functioning of the economy presuppose the availability of the necessary amount of energy. In the future, a solution that provides the longterm stability of energy for the world will become increasingly necessary. There is a huge potential in bioenergy, more specifically in biomass. The building of biomass plants and putting them into operation creates jobs in the rural spatial environments: a locally available resource that can help in creating the energy safety of the country and the reduction of the dependence on import. The production of energy crops or the crops whose purpose of use is energy could help in strengthening the multifunctional character of agriculture and it can represent a source of income for those living off agriculture under the current uncertain conditions.


Author(s):  
Henry Yonanda ◽  
Rudy Trisno

Millennials have been touted as the generation that will do something about global warming. Conversely, some social scientists studying generational differences have found evidence that younger generations are less likely to engage in civic matters like environmental activism. Lack of civic engagement among Millennials may reduce their likelihood of engaging in collective action on global warming. On the other hand, the world is drastically changing. Within the recent years, climate change has become a growing concern worldwide. The various modes of destruction imposed on the environment are targeted to be the catalyst to these changes. According to climate scientists, sea level rise is one of the most important impacts of global climate change. Fishermen as one of the professions that depend their life on the sea, is affected so much by this condition. This condition might destroy their houses on the coastal area. Urban Kampong in Jakarta as the most dense human settlements in urban area has become one of the main economic generator for a city. With all the contradict characteristics and forms, urban kampongs are the part of the city that cannot be separated from one to another. The existence of kampong has become the main embryo of the development of Jakarta. Jakarta is one of the biggest coastal city in the world. The coastline of this city has become the main economic generator for the coty and the nations. The existence of fishermen’s kampong in Jakarta has also become an essential program for the city, in order to fullfill the needs of fresh catch of sea products. Therefore, The project is aimed to create a sustainable and adaptive coastal kampong community, that has the resilience to the rising sea level. By concerning on the kampong’s behaviour, and doing research of the typological transformation of the kampong, the design is also expected to serve as an archetype fot the future development of endagered coastal settlements all across the country. several sustainable approach and behaviourial approach are also injected in this project to create a contextual design that would help the kampong to grow, and adapt to all the conditions, and situation in the future. AbstrakGenerasi milenial dianggap sebagai generasi yang akan melakukan perubahan nyata terkait dengan pemanasan global. Akan tetapi, beberapa studi pun menunjukan bukti bahwa generasi millenial justru memiliki kesadaran serta kepekaan yang tidak lebih tinggi dibandingkan dengan generas-generasi sebelumnya. Pada satu sisi, bumi kian melakukan perubahan yang begitu derastis. Berbagai macam kerusakan pun terjadi dalam berbagai jenis yang menjadi generator dari perubahan iklim yang drastis ini. Nelayan sebagai salah satu profesi yang menggantungkan nasibnya pada lautan, kian terganggu dengan kondisi ini. Hal ini menyebabkan kerusakan pada rumah-rumah di kawasan pesisir pantai. Kampung kota di Jakarta, sebagai permukiman terpadat di daerah urban menjadi salah satu kenerator utama pada suatu kota. Dengan segala karakteristiknya yang berbanding terbalik dengan perkotaan, kampung kota merupakan bagian yang tidak dapat dipisahkan dari suatu kota. Eksistensi suatu kampung telah menjadi embrio dari perkembangan kota Jakarta. Jakarta merupakan salah satu kota pesisir terbesar di dunia. Daerah pesisir dari kota ini telah menjadi generator ekonomi utama dari kota itu sendiri dan juga nasional. Keberadaan kampung nelayan di Jakarta pun menjadi salah satu program penting yang perlu mendapatkan perhatian. Maka dari itu, proyek ini bertujuan untuk menciptakan suatu komunitas kampung pesisir yang berkelanjutan, adaptif serta memiliki ketahanan terhadap kenaikan permukaan air laut yang terjadi. Metode perancangan pada proyek ini dibagi menjadi 2 bagian utama yaitu analisis mikro yang membahas mengenai tipe dan perilaku, serta analisis makro yang membahas proyek dari segi perancangan urban. Dengan menitik beratkan pada studi perilaku, dan melakukan riset mendalam terhadap transformasi tipologi yang terjadi pada kampung, desain ini diharapkan dapat menjadi suatu arketipe untuk pengembangan kampung di daerah pesisir di masa depan di seluruh Indonesia. Sehingga dapat disimpulkan, bahwa dengan adaptasi tipe, perilaku serta sistem berkelanjutan yang sesuai dan tepat, desain dari kampung nelayan berkelanjutan ini dapat menjadi suatu respon yang tepat dalam menjawab permasalahan yang terjadi di kampung-kampung pesisir.


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