Natural variability can explain much of Earth's average temperature variation since the end of the last ice age, but over the past century, global average temperature has risen from near the coldest to the warmest levels in the past 11,300 years.
Despite uncertainties around future precipitation change, it is clear that as temperatures rise in Colorado, the state is expected to face significant challenges to managing water resources, according to a new report.
Earth’s hottest periods occurred before humans existed. Those ancient climates would have been like nothing our species has ever seen.
Across the globe, changes in salinity over time generally match changes in precipitation: places where rainfall declines become saltier, while places where rainfall increases become fresher. Where did saltiness change over the past decade?
The annual average concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere stood at 395.3 parts per million (ppm) in 2013—a 27 percent increase compared to conditions before the Industrial Revolution. On May 9, 2013, the daily average concentration of CO2 surpassed 400 ppm for the first time at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii.
Globally-averaged surface temperature for 2013 was 0.36 - 0.38° Fahrenheit above the 1981–2010 average, placing it among the top 10 warmest years since record-keeping began.
From the strongest typhoon ever observed to historically high atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, the State of the Climate in 2013 report provides a complete rundown on the state of Earth's climate and how it is changing.
Why on Earth are climate scientists so interested in the West Antarctic ice sheet? This remote region of the seventh continent has been the subject of many recent research explorations--the results of which have been described in the news with words like “collapse,” “irreversible,” and “huge.”
Jacqueline Kozak Thiel, Hawaii's State Sustainability Coordinator, talks about the state's unique sustainability challenges and how the island chain is planning for climate change.
Every year hundreds of scientists from scores of countries team up to give the Earth's climate a comprehensive physical. Edited by NOAA scientists and published by the American Meteorological Society, the State of the Climate in 2015 draws on tens of thousands of observations of everything from forest fires to fish migration to catalog climate variability and change.