scholarly journals Creating the Healthiest Nation: Climate Change and Environmental Health Impacts in Nigeria: A Narrative Review

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. p61
Author(s):  
Morufu Olalekan Raimi ◽  
Tonye Vivien Odubo ◽  
Adedoyin Oluwatoyin Omidiji
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Heat Waves ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation

Climate change is a “threat multiplier and a prime cause of universal threat to health in the 21st century, including 4th industrial revolution. The health effects of climate change will increase dramatically over the next few years and pose a risk to human life and the well-being of billions of people. As we all know, the milieu is fundamental to our sustained earth survival and environmental changes (natural and artificial) affect it either to the benefit or detriment of humans. Climate change is one of such changes in the physical environment which has grave consequences for the existence of mankind. Climate change is interestingly, no longer a speculative subject. There is a good international scientific consensus existing to show that this phenomenon is real and if recent global warming movements continue, temperature rise, ocean levels and more frequently weather conditions that is extreme (storms, heat-waves, droughts, floods, cyclones, etc.) may perhaps cause severe food shortages, loss of shelter, water, livelihoods, extinction of flora and fauna species. In the recent past, the earth has witnessed devastating weather-related events in different portions of the globe including hurricanes (e.g., Katrina and Rita in USA), tsunamis, typhoons, flooding especially in the Asian Continent, wild fires especially in Australia, USA, etc. Currently, the on-going flood incident in Pakistan that has so far claimed about 1,600 lives and rendered another four million people homeless is a sad reminder of the ugly and devastating consequences of global warming on the environment. There is no gainsaying the fact that humankind is paying dearly for the massive alterations in the environment that have induced changes in climate. This is because of frequent incidence of changes in climate related disasters in the world today. There is hardly any month that passes without an incident occurring in one part of the globe or another since the advent of the 21st century. Changes in climate has significant and potentially devastating health consequences, whether through direct actions (e.g., deaths resulting from heat wave and weather disasters) or disruption of complex biological methods (e.g., changes in infectious diseases patterns, supplies in fresh water and production of food).The report of the fourth assessment of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have globally submitted that “it is estimated that the health of millions of people is affected, for instance, malnutrition increases; deaths increase, diseases and injury; burden of increase diarrheal diseases; frequency of increased cardio-respiratory diseases caused by high levels of ground-level ozone in cities due to climate change; besides altered spatial distribution of some communicable diseases”. The association amongst changes in climate, its drivers, systemic effects, health and socioeconomic growth, mitigation and adaptation has been specified.

scholarly journals Global warming and climate change with reference to South Africa. Some perspectives

2008 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 294-306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gawie De Villiers ◽  
Giel Viljoen ◽  
Herman Booysen
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Storm Surges ◽  
Flood Damage ◽  
Coastal Areas ◽  
Sufficient Evidence

According to the geological history of the earth, climate change is an integral part of environmental changes that occurred over time. Sufficient evidence is provided of recurrent wet and dry and cold and hot periods due to natural circumstances. Since the industrial revolution human activities increasingly contribute to air pollution by releasing huge volumes of carbon dioxide and other gasses into the atmosphere, so much so that it is generally accepted that increase in global warming the past decades is directly linked to human activities. Observable signs of human induced climate change include increasing average temperatures at many places, melting ice caps in polar areas, rising sea levels on a global scale and coastal disturbances and damages due to storm surges on coastal areas in various countries, also in South Africa. Consensus from a number of hydrological-meteorological circulation models show, for South Africa, a rise in average annual winter and summer temperatures of between 1.5 and 3.0 degrees Centigrade the following number of decades with a strong possibility of an increase in rainfall in the eastern parts and a decrease in rainfall in the western parts. Bigger floods and longer droughts should occur more frequently as well as severe sea onslaught activities along the eastern and south-eastern coastal areas. The net impact of the predictions on the community is negative. There is though other scientists who indicate that no concrete proof of climate change in South Africa exists; including changes with regard to river floods and droughts. According to more beneficial than detrimental. Despite the differences in opinion about the relative contribution of natural and human activities to the present global warming, changes in hydrological and characteristics of floods in several parts of South Africa in the immediate past, necessitate modifications to available models and approaches to flood damage management and control. Flood conditions need to be managed with applicable models. Modifications are furthermore essential as a result of meaningful demographic, social, physical and economic changes in the working and living environments of people and communities.

Part II Predominant Security Challenges and International Law, Environmental Security, Ch.30 Climate Change and Security

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gupta Joyeeta ◽  
Bosch Hilmer
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Change Policy ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Adaptation Measures ◽  
Climate Change Issue ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Change Policy ◽  
Access To Water ◽  
Governance Institutions

This chapter describes the relationship between climate change and security. Successive reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have provided growing evidence of the impacts of climate change. Climate change can affect human well-being in terms of access to water, food, energy, and land, as well as in terms of risks to human health. Thus, climate change is seen as a driver of other socio-ecological problems worldwide. Climate change is also seen as a risk and threat multiplier, as it can exacerbate existing challenges faced by States, including poor governance institutions and poverty. However, climate change policy could potentially be a ‘threat minimizer’ if mitigation and adaptation measures are integrated into the development paradigm. Against this background, the chapter addresses the following issue: What is the nature of the security debate raised by the climate change issue and how is this being addressed within scholarly, policy, and legal fora? It looks at the different ways in which security has been defined in the literature and its diverse implications for law and policy.

scholarly journals Global Warming (GW) & Extreme Weather (EW) Link: Are Cold Extremes On The Rise?

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Co2 Emissions ◽  
Heat Waves ◽  
Extreme Weather ◽  
Ongoing Debate ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Earth’S Climate ◽  
Cold Extremes

The ongoing debate on the GW/EW link continues unabated; media and environmentalists have linked the warming of the earth’s climate (due to human-CO2 emissions) as being responsible for more extreme weather (EW) events in recent years. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a UN Climate Body) has identified several EW events (e.g., heat waves, droughts, floods) as being linked to the warming of the climate [1, 2, 3].

Climate Change and Liveability of Cities: an Assessment of Possible Health Threats Associated With Increased Temperatures in Cities

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter Leal Filho ◽  
Liza Tuladhar ◽  
Chunlan Li ◽  
Abdul-Lateef Babatunde Balogun ◽  
Marina Kovaleva ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Heat Waves ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Maximum Temperature ◽  
Adaptation Measures ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Impacts Of Climate Change

Abstract Climate change is associated with extreme weather events such as heat waves, droughts, floods, hurricanes, storms, and wildfires globally. Within cities, the impacts of climate change are quite conspicuous as the percentage of urban dwellers is expected to reach about 70% by 2050. As the planet warms up, temperatures in cities are likely to increase more than in rural areas. These dual challenges severely impact urban residents. This paper reports on a study on the impacts of climate change on the health and liveability of a set of 15 cities, in industrialised and developing countries from around the world. The assessment, based on the literature, examined the average temperature, maximum temperature and relative humidity of each city, and this data has been correlated with their liveability. It was complemented by a survey focused on residents of 109 cities from Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, North America Oceania. The findings show that developing countries seem to be especially struggling to adapt to the threats caused by increasing temperatures. Moreover, cities in industrialised countries are not immune to climate change impacts. The paper also outlines some mitigation and adaptation measures, which can be implemented to improve the liveability in cities and the well-being of their populations, and to make them more sustainable.

scholarly journals Rapid attribution analysis of the extraordinary heatwave on the Pacific Coast of the US and Canada June 2021

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sjoukje Y. Philip ◽  
Sarah F. Kew ◽  
Geert Jan van Oldenborgh ◽  
Faron S. Anslow ◽  
Sonia I. Seneviratne ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Pacific Northwest ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Daily Maximum ◽  
Attribution Analysis ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Temperature Records

Abstract. Towards the end of June 2021, temperature records were broken by several degrees Celsius in several cities in the Pacific northwest areas of the U.S. and Canada, leading to spikes in sudden deaths, and sharp increases in hospital visits for heat-related illnesses and emergency calls. Here we present a multi-model, multi-method attribution analysis to investigate to what extent human-induced climate change has influenced the probability and intensity of extreme heatwaves in this region. Based on observations and modeling, the occurrence of a heatwave with maximum daily temperatures (TXx) as observed in the area 45° N–52° N, 119° W–123° W, was found to be virtually impossible without human-caused climate change. The observed temperatures were so extreme that they lie far outside the range of historically observed temperatures. This makes it hard to quantify with confidence how rare the event was. In the most realistic statistical analysis, which uses the assumption that the heatwave was a very low probability event that was not caused by new nonlinearities, the event is estimated to be about a 1 in 1000 year event in today’s climate. With this assumption and combining the results from the analysis of climate models and weather observations, an event, defined as daily maximum temperatures (TXx) in the heatwave region, as rare as 1 in a 1000 years would have been at least 150 times rarer without human-induced climate change. Also, this heatwave was about 2 °C hotter than a 1 in 1000-year heatwave that at the beginning of the industrial revolution would have been (when global mean temperatures were 1.2 °C cooler than today). Looking into the future, in a world with 2 °C of global warming (0.8 °C warmer than today), a 1000-year event would be another degree hotter. It would occur roughly every 5 to 10 years in such global warming conditions. Our results provide a strong warning: our rapidly warming climate is bringing us into uncharted territory with significant consequences for health, well-being, and livelihoods. Adaptation and mitigation are urgently needed to prepare societies for a very different future.

Diatoms in Saline Lakes Paleoclimate and Paleoecology Interpretations

2007 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 149-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik J. Ekdahl
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Global Climate Change ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Light Availability ◽  
Ionic Concentration ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Environmental Response

Average global temperatures are predicted to rise over the next century and changes in precipitation, humidity, and drought frequency will likely accompany this global warming. Understanding associated changes in continental precipitation and temperature patterns in response to global change is an important component of long-range environmental planning. For example, agricultural management plans that account for decreased precipitation over time will be less susceptible to the effects of drought through implementation of water conservation techniques.A detailed understanding of environmental response to past climate change is key to understanding environmental changes associated with global climate change. To this end, diatoms are sensitive to a variety of limnologic parameters, including nutrient concentration, light availability, and the ionic concentration and composition of the waters that they live in (e.g. salinity). Diatoms from numerous environments have been used to reconstruct paleosalinity levels, which in turn have been used as a proxy records for regional and local paleoprecipitation. Long-term records of salinity or paleoprecipitation are valuable in reconstructing Quaternary paleoclimate, and are important in terms of developing mitigation strategies for future global climate change. High-resolution paleoclimate records are also important in groundtruthing global climate simulations, especially in regions where the consequences of global warming may be severe.

scholarly journals Assessing the Vulnerability of Marine Fisheries in China: Towards an Inter-Provincial Perspective

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 4302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qi Chen ◽  
Weiteng Shen ◽  
Bing Yu
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Adaptive Capacity ◽  
Fisheries Management ◽  
Vocational Training ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Marine Pollution ◽  
Marine Fisheries ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Adaptation Measures

China’s marine fisheries are undergoing large-scale environmental changes associated with climate change, marine pollution, and overfishing. The assessment of marine fisheries vulnerability has become extremely necessary for fisheries management and sustainable development. However, studies on China’s marine fisheries vulnerability remains sparse. This study aimed to provide an analysis of the inter-provincial level vulnerability of China’s marine fisheries under multiple disturbances. The vulnerability measure was composed of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity indicators specific to marine fisheries based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) definitions. Results showed that Liaoning, Hebei, Fujian, and Hainan provinces appeared to be the most vulnerable; Shanghai appeared to be less vulnerable among China’s 11 coastal provinces; and the key sources of vulnerability differed considerably among coastal regions. The high vulnerability regions could be divided into two different patterns according to the combination of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity, but they all had one thing in common: relatively low adaptive capacity. While some existing coercive measures to reduce dependence on fisheries were found to be helpful in China, the reality showed that appropriate adaptation measures such as improving fishermen’s education level and increasing vocational training may be helpful in enhancing the existing policy effectiveness.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Scientific “Consensus” on Global Warming

1996 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 333-348 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick J. Michaels ◽  
Paul C. Knappenberger
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Sulfate Aerosols ◽  
Climate Data ◽  
Consensus Process ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Extreme Scenario

Climate data support the “moderate” prediction of climate change (l-1.5°C) rather than the more extreme scenario (4°C or more). The moderate point of view was originally marginalized in the IPCC “consensus” process in both the 1990 First Assessment on Climate Change and in the 1992 Update prepared specifically for the Earth Summit and to provide backing for the Rio Framework Convention on Climate Change. It is now accepted, based on ground-based data, that the errors in those models are currently between 160% and 360%. If one compares them to the satellite data combined with the land record, the error rises to a maximum of 720%. In some recognition of this massive error, the 1995 IPCC “consensus” is that warming has been mitigated by sulfate aerosols. However, when that hypothesis is specifically tested, it fails. Further, data required to test the validity of the sulfate enhanced greenhouse models was withheld by the IPCC. despite repeated requests.

scholarly journals Community Adaptation Model of Food Security Due to Global Warming in Kulon Progo

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sri Rum Giyarsih
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Survey Methods ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Average Temperature ◽  
The Impact

Global warming is the increase in the average temperature of the Earth’s surface. According to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) average temperature of the Earth’s surface was global warming is the increase in the average temperature of the 0.74 ± 0.18 0C (1.33 ± 0.32 F) over the last hundred years. The impact of rising temperatures is the climate change effect on agricultural production. If the community does not craft made adaptation to global warming will have an impact on food security. This research aims to know the society’s adaptation to food security as a result of global warming and to know the influence of global warming on food security. The research was carried out based on survey methods. The influence of global warming on food security is identified with a share of household food expenditure and the identification of rainfall. Sampling was done by random sampling. The Data used are the primary and secondary data. Primary Data obtained through structured interviews and depth interview using a questionnaire while the secondary data retrieved from publication data of the Central Bureau Statistics B(BPS), Department of Agriculture and Climatology Meteorology and Geophysics (BMKG). The expected results of the study is to know variations of food security due to global warming in Kulon Progo Regency. Comprehensive knowledge through community participation and related Government increased food security that is used as the basis for drafting the model society’s adaptation to the impacts of global warming.

1. What is climate change?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Mark Maslin
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Greenhouse Gases ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Local Politics ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel

‘What is climate change?’ discusses what climate change is. Climate change is no longer just a scientific concern, but encompasses economics, sociology, geopolitics, national and local politics, law, and health just to name a few. Greenhouse gases (GHGs) play an important role in moderating past global climate. Why they have been rising since before the Industrial Revolution, and why are they now considered dangerous pollutants? Which countries have produced the most anthropogenic GHGs and how is this changing with rapid economic development? It is important here to consider the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and how it regularly collates and assesses the most recent evidence for climate change.

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