Climate change affects the social and environmental factors of health, clean air, safe drinking water, sufficient food and secure shelter. Between 2020 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause 25000 deaths per year from malaria and heat stress. It will be the most difficult to deal with a weak health infrastructure in developing countries. The direct costs to health are estimated at between 2 and 4 billion dollars a year by 2030.
What Causes Climate Change?
Human activities such as burning fossil fuels change the atmosphere around them. These changes cause the atmosphere to capture more heat than before. The gases keep the earth warm and the plants hot.
How Much Is Earth’s Climate Changing Right Now?
As temperatures rise, the intensity and amount of rainfall during storms such as hurricanes will increase. Similarly, droughts and heat waves are expected to increase as the climate changes. Change of the temperature of the earth can have big impacts on the health of plants and animals too.
Food and health
It has classified climate change as the greatest threat to global health in the 21st century. By the 2100, the global population could face climate conditions that are life threatening due to the combined effects of extreme heat and humidity. Further warming could reduce the yields of major crops in the world. Production in low-latitude countries will likely be affected negatively while effects at higher latitudes could be positive or negative. Climate change poses a higher risk of water stress in regions dependent on the already dry and isolated glacier water.
The world resource institute predicts that more fish will be caught but that less fish will be available for fishing. More will be available to be fished. The young are particularly vulnerable to food shortages. In extreme heat, children and older people are at risk. Global warming is threatening food security. In the period from 1981 to 2010, it has caused a reduction in global yields of soybeans and maize.
The biggest health threat
Past emissions have already changed the climate. Universal health coverage is seriously jeopardized by this. It increases the burden of disease and introduces new obstacles to accessing health services when they are most needed. It will seriously harm the realization of universal health coverage.
Land surface changes
Vegification type influences temperature in a region. It affects how much heat is lost by the sun and how much light is reflected into space. Deforestation can also affect temperatures by modifying the release of chemical compounds that influence clouds and by changing the wind patterns. At latitudes closer to the equator, a gain in albedo as the forest is replaced by snow leads to a cooling effect. The main causes of depredation are the permanent change from forest to agricultural land, logging to produce forest products, and wildfires. According to the study, the degradation of forests is aggravated by climate change. These effects are estimated to have led to a moderate cooling in the global context dominated by an increase in surface salinity. In the absence of trees, it releases carbon dioxide which prevents them from absorbing more carbon dioxide in the future.
How will climate change in the future?
A major advance has been made in observation theory and modelling of the earth’s climate system. These advances have allowed them to project climate change with increasing confidence. It is expected that the earth will continue to heat up significantly more over the next several decades to centuries. It is a challenging scientific problem to project what these ranges will mean for the climate experienced in any particular place. With the advance of regional and local scale models, estimates are continually improving.
Solar and volcanic activity
If the physical climate models only take into account variations in solar output and volcanic activity they are unable to reproduce the rapid warming observed in the recent decades. It would both heat up and then heat up again if solar variations were to be blamed for the warming. In the industrial era, volcanic activity had minimal effects on global temperature. This signal lasts twice as long if the sun is the primary energy source of the earth. The temperature signals last about two times longer if the earth is not the primary energy source and the sun is not the main energy source for the earth’s climate. From the early 1600s onwards, the effect of solar radiation has been directly measured by 100 satellites and indirect measurements are available.
Infrastructure
The physical infrastructure includes bridges, roads, ports, electrical grids, and other parts of transportation and communication systems. Extreme weather events can cause damage to existing structures and facilities such as flooding or fires. Some communities are projected to potentially end up below sea level by 2100 and face decisions around managed retreat and climate adaptation. The impacts of climate change are being studied by researchers and can provide recommendations on best practices.
Adaptation
Adaptability is not evenly distributed across different countries and regions. Even in many countries, there is a significant gap between the necessary and available funding, despite the implementation of climate change policy. Changes in the climate can be prevented by switching to more sustainable diets, diversification, and improved genetic control for increased tolerance to the changing climate. If everything goes well, a planned retreat may be necessary.
The first two decades of the 21st century saw an increase in adaptive capacity in most low and middle income countries with improved access to basic sanitation and electricity, but progress is slow. Everyone can avoid strenuous work or air conditioning. Insurance allows for risk sharing but is often hard to get for people with lower incomes. Using early warning systems can reduce climate vulnerability. Plant mangroves or encourage other coastal vegetation to help buffer storms. It is a carbon sink but plantation in unsuitable areas can increase climate impacts. It may lead to a reduction in emissions from transport and building. Examples of synergy include increased food production which has large benefits for adaptation and mitigation of effects.
The retreat may be needed if all else fails. There are synergies between adaptation and mitigation but there are also trade-offs. It offers short-term benefits while mitigation offers longer-term advantages.
Policies and politics
The benefits of phasing out coal to improve public health and local environments outweigh the costs in almost all parts of the country. When non-exporters of fossil fuels switch to clean energy, they face stranded assets because non-importers of fuels win economically. Climate change and its impacts are recognized in the goals of sustainable development. There are common goals of water and food conservation.
Policy options
As of 2019, carbon pricing covers about 20 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon can be priced through carbon taxation and emissions trading systems. Direct fuel subsidies reached $319 billion in 2017, and indirect costs reached $52 billion. In communities with many fossil fuel workers, additional investments would be required. Despite the reduction in use of fossil fuels, job opportunities are being lost.
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