Are We at a Climate Tipping Point?

2020 ◽  
Vol 119 (813) ◽  
pp. 34-36
Author(s):  
Pamela McElwee
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Political Leaders

Political leaders once again failed to commit to adequate action against climate change, but its increasingly visible impacts have galvanized citizen activists.

Buddhist Environmental Ethics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie Kaza
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Ethics ◽  
Social Ethics ◽  
Human History ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Human Environment ◽  
Current Thinking ◽  
Moral Dimensions ◽  
Ethical Response ◽  
Promising Avenue

Global pressures on human–environment systems are higher than ever before in human history, generating broad ethical engagement in many quarters. Citizen calls for moral response from world religious and political leaders have grown more urgent as pressures mount. Buddhist philosophy contains a wealth of insight and moral guidance regarding human–environment relations, offering a promising avenue for ethical response. This chapter reviews work to date in Buddhist environmental ethics, noting influences from and on Western ethics and areas of tension in current thinking. Arguments are made for complementary development of both individual virtue ethics and constructivist social ethics. Moral dimensions of consumerism and climate change are examined as case studies, drawing on Buddhist values such as non-harming, compassion, meditative awareness, and skilful means.

A Forested Wetland at the Tipping-Point: 17-Year, Demographic Evidence of Widespread Recruitment Failure Due to Climate Change

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan P. Evans ◽  
Sarah McCarthy-Neumann ◽  
Angus Pritchard ◽  
Jennifer Cartwright ◽  
William Wolfe
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Forested Wetland ◽  
Recruitment Failure

scholarly journals Modeling Subtropical Forest Changes under Climate Change and Close-to-Nature Silviculture: Is There a Tipping Point in an Uncertain Future in Southern China?

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (17) ◽  
pp. 6992
Author(s):  
Zhuo Wu ◽  
Erfu Dai ◽  
Wenchuan Guan
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sustainable Forest Management ◽  
Southern China ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Timber Harvesting ◽  
Forest Harvesting ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
Climate Change Scenarios ◽  
Harvesting Intensity

Subtropical forests face pressure from both rapidly changing climate and increasing harvest activity in southern China. However, the interactive effects of various spatial processes on forests are not well known. The objective of the present study was to answer the question of how forest aboveground biomass (AGB) changes under alternative climate change and harvesting scenarios and to determine whether there will be a tipping point for forest AGB before 2300. Our simulation results show that, although total forest AGB did not reach a tipping point before 2300 under possible climate change and harvesting scenarios, the slope of the total forest AGB showed a decreasing trend around 2100 and 2200. Moderate climate warming was conducive to AGB accumulation, except for in the high emissions Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP8.5) scenario. Our results also indicate that timber harvesting is adaptable to the accumulation of biomass under climate change scenarios. Harvesting intensity was a key variable affecting forest AGB more than harvesting frequency. Our findings will help develop more sustainable forest management strategies that can adapt to potential climate change scenarios, as well as determining the effectiveness of implementing alternative forest harvesting policies.

Cooperating internationally over water: explaining l'espace OMVS

2012 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-199
Author(s):  
Undala Alam
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
Regional Cooperation ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Debt ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
International Rivers ◽  
Senegal River ◽  
Pan Africanism ◽  
Increasing Demand

ABSTRACTSince the early 1960s, Guinea, Mali, Mauritania and Senegal have cooperated over the Senegal river. Contrary to the norms of managing international rivers, the riparians have subjugated their sovereignty and incurred national debt to jointly develop the benefits from their shared river, despite intra-basin tensions and conflict. The Senegal experience highlights an alternative path to tackling the consequences of climate change, poor water management and increasing demand. In seeking to explain the intensity of international cooperation displayed in the basin, this article examines the characteristics of international rivers and the Senegal basin's history, and concludes that Pan-Africanism, francophonie and the political leaders' attitudes to regional cooperation shaped l'espace OMVS.

scholarly journals A Change in the Climate: New Interpretations and Perceptions of Climate Change through Artistic Interventions and Representations

2010 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 294-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lesley Duxbury
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Cognitive Change ◽  
Scientific Data ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Media ◽  
Artistic Interventions ◽  
General Populations ◽  
Changing World

Abstract The uncertainties concerning climate change debated daily in the media polarize political leaders and the general public alike. While daily weather is something that can be experienced by everyone and changes in the weather can be accounted for within the timeframe of a human lifetime, climate change is more difficult to comprehend or connect with in an appreciable way because of its remoteness in time and unpredictability. General populations can be alienated by the overwhelming proliferation of scientific data and statistics and, in the face of potentially cataclysmic events, feel paralyzed and incapable of action. Scientific evidence alone may not be working to encourage or initiate changes in behaviors with the potential to curtail the perceived changes to life as we know it. This paper sets out to explicate alternative ways of comprehending and addressing some of the complex problems of climate change through art by focusing on the ways people perceive and sense the changing world around them. It contends that artists have the potential to engage society in emotional and experiential ways to promote behavioral and cognitive change. Drawing on the work of certain artists and art commentators, this paper argues that, far from being a purely imaginative or aesthetic activity, art is integral to meaningful communication between humans and the changing world.

Prospects for renewable energy in 2017

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Renewable Energy ◽  
Electric Power ◽  
Primary Source ◽  
The United States ◽  
Paris Agreement ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Content Type

Subject Prospects for renewable energy in 2017. Significance The United States and China, the world’s two largest economies as well as the largest carbon emitters, announced their ratification of the Paris Agreement in September. Earlier this year, prices for renewable energy in select regions set historic lows below fossil-fired plants. Renewable energy seems to have passed the tipping point towards gradual adoption as the primary source of electric power while also hopefully preventing catastrophic climate change.

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