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"For the first time in human history, we
need to relate to the risk of destabilizing the entire
et," one of the authors of the study, Professor John
Rockstrom of Stockholm University, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. His
colleague, Professor Will Steffen, believes that “past a certain threshold, curbing greenhouse gas emissions,
biodiversity loss, or land-use change… may not reverse or even slow the trends
of Earth System degradation, with potentially catastrophic consequences.”
The
report is based on the idea of nine ‘boundaries’ that originated in 2009. Each
phase stands for boundaries within which humanity can live sustainably and what
that would entail.
Each
is marked by an irreversible change to our environment and, once reached, is
followed by a period where we can either act or let it all slip further. And “given the pace of change, we can no
longer exclude the possibility of reaching critical tipping points that could
abruptly and irreversibly change living conditions on Earth,” the
report says.
Back
in September, a WWF report said that the Earth has crossed three of out the
nine identified "planetary
boundaries,” which it described as “potentially catastrophic changes to life as we know it,”
including biodiversity, carbon dioxide levels and nitrogen pollution from
fertilizers.
Scientists
consider climate change to be at the top of this list of planetary boundaries, the
researchers believe.
"We
are at a point where we may see abrupt and irreversible changes due to climate
change," Rockstrom continued, referencing particularly
the danger of melting Arctic ice sheets, which would release large amount of
greenhouse gases.
According
to the study, our planet was “remarkably
stable state” for almost 12,000 years. This however changed roughly
100 years ago, according to Carpenter, who said that “everything important to civilization”
occurred during that precise stretch of time – from agriculture to the
industrial revolution.
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The paper was discussed at
the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in January 2014, presented as a
wake-up call to policymakers. It will also be incorporated into the UN’s
upcoming global strategy in September, for when the current Millennium
Development Goals expire.
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Satellite Images To
Monitor Ocean Acidification In Remote Areas From Space
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This image depicts total
ocean alkalinity from space.(Image by esa.int)
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Meanwhile a group of international
researchers is developing "pioneering techniques" to monitor the
acidity of oceans from space, using satellites that can orbit the Earth up to
700 km above us in hard-to-reach areas, like the Arctic, much faster than
before.
According to the
scientists, a number of existing satellites can be used for the task, including
the European Space Agency's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) sensor that
was launched in 2009 and NASA's Aquarius satellite launched in 2011.
"Satellites are
likely to become increasingly important for the monitoring of ocean
acidification, especially in remote and often dangerous waters like the Arctic.
It can be both difficult and expensive to take year-round direct measurements
in such inaccessible locations," said lead researcher Dr Jamie Shutler, of the
University of Exeter.
"We are pioneering
these techniques so that we can monitor large areas of the Earth's oceans
allowing us to quickly and easily identify those areas most at risk from the
increasing acidification," he said.
Each year, over a quarter
of global CO2 (carbon dioxide) emissions from burning fossil fuels and cement
production are absorbed by the planet's oceans. This process makes the seawater
become more acidic and as a result more difficult for some marine life to
exist. Growing CO2 emissions, along with the rising acidity of seawater, could
devastate some marine ecosystems over the next century, ecologists warn, and
that's why endless monitoring of changes in ocean acidity is vital. A report
issued before a United Nations climate summit in New York put 2014 world carbon
emissions 65 percent above levels in 1990, despite repeated promises of curbs
and a shift to renewable energies. It said world emissions could reach 43.2
billion tons in 2019, with 12.7 billion from China alone, as the number one
carbon emitter.
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Reuters / Balazs Koranyi
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Current
methods of measuring temperature and salinity to determine acidity are
restricted to in situ tools and measurements from research vessels. Since such
vessels are expensive to run and operate, the approach limits the sampling only
to small areas of the ocean, however.
The groundbreaking
techniques use satellite mounted thermal cameras to take ocean temperatures,
while microwave sensors check salinity. These measurements can be used to
assess ocean acidification more quickly and over much larger areas than has
been possible before, researchers say.
"In recent years,
great advances have been made in the global provision of satellite and in situ
data. It is now time to evaluate how to make the most of these new data sources
to help us monitor ocean acidification, and to establish where satellite data
can make the best contribution," said Dr Peter Land from Plymouth Marine
Laboratory, the lead author of the paper, set to be published on Tuesday in the
journal Environmental
Science and Technology.
Scientists from the University of Exeter, Plymouth Marine Laboratory, Institut français de recherche pour l'exploitation de la mer (Ifremer) and the European Space Agency took part in the research.
Originally published in RT.comScientists from the University of Exeter, Plymouth Marine Laboratory, Institut français de recherche pour l'exploitation de la mer (Ifremer) and the European Space Agency took part in the research.
