Climate Change

The earth’s climate has changed throughout history. However, earth’s climate is now changing faster than at any point in the history of modern civilization, primarily as a result of human activities.Thousands of studies conducted by researchers around the world have documented increases in temperature at Earth’s surface, as well as in the atmosphere and oceans. Many other aspects of global climate are changing as well. Human activities, especially emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases from fossil fuel combustion, deforestation, and land-use change, are the primary driver of the climate changes observed in the industrial era.

Nowadays, climate change has risen concern for people around the globe. Researchers, institutes, companies even individuals have all paid close attention on the climate change. Topics varies from global warming, sea level change, sea ice meltdown to emission of greenhouse gases.

Therefore, I would like to looking into 4 aspects of climate change data. I’ll be making data visulized and trying to find out the answer to the following four questions:

Four aspects of research

1. Question 1: How does the global temperature trend in recent years?

The temperature gradually increase, the world is getting warmer. According to an ongoing temperature analysis conducted by scientists at GISS, the average global temperature on Earth has increased by a little more than 1° Celsius (2° Fahrenheit) since 1880. We collected data from https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/carbon-dioxide/ to show the change of the global temperature recent years.

2. Question 2: What’s the relationship between Global Warming and Carbon dioxide(CO2) ?

Many lines of evidence demonstrate that human activities, especially emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases from fossil fuel combustion, deforestation, and land-use change, are primarily responsible for the climate changes observed in the industrial era, especially over the last six decades. The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide, the largest contributor to human-caused warming, has increased by about 40% over the industrial era. This change has intensified the natural greenhouse effect, driving an increase in global surface temperatures and other widespread changes in Earth’s climate that are unprecedented in the history of modern civilization.In Figure 2, we can see that daily average reading for atmospheric CO2 on the planet has been increasing since 1960. And in figure 3, we can see the CO2 emissions by fuel type.

3. Question 3: How does global warming affect sea level changes?

The sea level is rised too. Sea levels are rising as the oceans warm, ice melts and water expands. From figure 4, we can see sea levels have already risen about a foot and could rise several more feet by the end of the century.

4. Question 4: How does global warming affect the United States? We may all have noticed that recent years the temperature in the United states become higher and higher. Summer became so hot to bear, so I colleted data of the US states Average Land Temperature. From the figure 5, we can find the change of temperature easily by animation.

Figure 2. Carbon Dioxide Through the Years

Figure 3. Carbon Dioxide emissions by source