The natural greenhouse effect
The enhanced greenhouse effect
The modern temperature record
The role of the oceans
Nature’s controls
Conclusion
Common Confusion
Some Common Excuses
What you can do

THE NATURAL GREENHOUSE EFFECT

The sun's radiation warms our planet and, on average, the earth radiates back to space the same amount of energy which it gets from the sun. The “greenhouse” gases in earth's atmosphere, while largely transparent to the incoming radiation from the sun, absorb most of the infrared emitted by earth's surface. Clouds also absorb infrared well. The end result is that part of the infrared emitted by the earth gets trapped by the atmosphere.

Under clear sky, roughly 60-70 % of the natural greenhouse effect is due to water vapour, which is the dominant greenhouse gas in earth's atmosphere. Next important is carbon dioxide, followed by methane, ozone and nitrous oxide.

THE ENHANCED GREENHOUSE EFFECT

Since around 1800 and especially during the past few decades, human activities have increased the atmospheric levels of several greenhouse gases particularly; carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O).

Adding greenhouse gases renders the atmosphere more opaque to outgoing infrared radiation. An enhanced greenhouse effect disturbs earth's radiation balance: less infrared gets out, while the sun keeps shining. This cannot last, the balance must be restored. At least one of the following things must happen: earth's surface and atmosphere may warm or other changes in earth's climate system may act to curb the enhanced greenhouse effect.

In short, something has to give. Playing with the earth's radiation balance will change the climate in some way: the earth's surface will most probably warm, although it is uncertain by how much and how swiftly.

In addition, there will probably be other changes, some of which, like changes in the water cycle, are even harder to predict and may become more troublesome than warming itself.

THE MODERN TEMPERATURE RECORD

To the best of our current knowledge, the increase in temperature is between 1.5 and 4.5°C for a CO₂ doubling, with a best estimate of 2.5 °C.

Since 1890, average global surface temperature went up by about 0.5 °C with an uncertainty of roughly 0.15°C either way: the true warming is likely to lie somewhere between 0.3 and 0.6 °C.

About 0.3 °C warming until 1940 and 0.1 °C cooling until 1975 were followed by renewed warming.

Both rising CO₂ levels and stratospheric ozone depletion tend to cool the stratosphere.

The geographic and vertical (in the atmosphere) pattern of the temperature changes suggests an influence from human-made greenhouse gases and aerosols as well as from stratospheric ozone depletion.

Taking into account numerous factors that can affect climate, climatologists can only say that the observed changes are consistent with (though no proof for) the estimated range of climate sensitivity to greenhouse gases.

Aerosols are airborne particles that are far tinier than a pin head. In the troposphere (the lower part of our atmosphere), human-made aerosols have greatly increased since about 1850. They present a large source of uncertainty in assessing human influences on climate. They can influence climate in two ways. Under clear sky they scatter and absorb solar radiation; some of the scattered sunlight goes back to space (the direct effect). Acting as cloud condensation nuclei, they may enhance reflectivity and life-time of clouds (indirect effect).

Sulphur dioxide from fossil fuel burning, yielding sulphate particles after oxidation, is presently the largest source of human-made aerosols. Another large source is organic and elemental carbon from burning of tropical forests and savannahs. Globally averaged, human-made aerosols may currently cancel about 50 % of the warming effect of human-made greenhouse gases. So far, though, the uncertainty range is large, stretching from roughly 10 to 100%.

Moreover, global averages are misleading. Even if the global averages of aerosol and greenhouse gas forcing, cancel, their different distributions may cause climatic changes. With life-spans of up to over 100 years, human-made greenhouse gases are fairly evenly distributed.

Most tropospheric aerosols are washed out after about a week and they are unevenly distributed. Human-made sulphate aerosols occur mainly downwind of northern industrialised areas (that’s us). Most biomass smoke rises from tropical land areas during the dry season. Cutting back sulphur dioxide emissions or biomass burning reduces the aerosol load quickly, leaving the more long-lived greenhouse gases.

Incidentally, roughly one third of the tropospheric sulphate load has natural origins, mainly oceanic dimethyl sulphide and volcanic sulphur dioxide. Violent volcanic eruptions, like Pinatubo 1991, give rise to stratospheric sulphate aerosols which, being more long-lived than their tropospheric cousins, tend to warm the stratosphere and to cool the troposphere and earth surface for a few years.

Coarser aerosols include mineral dust raised by wind blowing over dry soils. Human influences such as over-cultivation and soil erosion may have up to doubled the flux of mineral dust. Mineral dust is most abundant over North Africa, the Arabian Sea, and South Asia. It scatters sunlight and absorbs the earth’s outgoing infrared. One study suggests that these two effects largely cancel at the top of the atmosphere. If so, mineral dust has little effect on earth's overall radiation balance, although it regionally cools the surface and warms the air, which in turn may affect atmospheric circulation. However, as with sulphate aerosols and biomass smoke, there are large uncertainties.

Pinning down aerosol effects more precisely is tough because aerosols are hard to measure. Size, shape, composition and regional distribution of the particles vary. So do their effects on climate. Aerosols cause not just local but also distant responses, because heat or rather, in the case of many aerosols, coolness is transported by the atmosphere and ocean. Assessing the climatic effects of aerosols involves modelling of regional climates and of clouds, both of which are not yet very reliable.

THE ROLE OF THE OCEANS

It is not known whether it will take decades or centuries until equilibrium is approached for a given enhanced level of greenhouse gases. Much of this uncertainty stems from the poorly known behaviour of the ocean. The ocean covers about 70 % of the globe, transports large amounts of heat, and is the major source of atmospheric water vapour. The atmosphere and land are affected by variations of the ocean surface only, which in turn depend on the coupling between the ocean surface and the deeper ocean. With its huge heat capacity, the ocean slows down climate change. On the other hand, due to the deep ocean's slow response, temperature may continue to rise for centuries after stabilisation of greenhouse gas levels.

The topmost layer of the ocean – the so-called `mixed layer', being warmer and less dense than the deeper layers, tends to stay on top. Cool, particularly salty (thus dense) surface water sinks and deep water forms in the northern North Atlantic and near Antarctica. Subsurface water wells up near eastern margins of oceans. For other regions of the ocean, the extent to which surface and deeper waters are exchanged is less clear.

The replacement time for the deep ocean is many centuries.

How much heat will the ocean's deeper layers store before things really get going? Already in a "stable" climate, ocean circulation is likely to vary a good deal. A changing climate may entail major changes in ocean currents. For instance, North Atlantic deep water formation may decline or become more variable, which may inhibit warming or even produce cooling. Unfortunately, not even the ocean's present state is fully known. This should improve over the next decade, but tracking down natural variations lasting decades to centuries may be not so easy. Exchange processes between surface and deeper layers of the ocean are among the many weaknesses of the ocean models.

Improving the models is difficult as the lack of observational data hinders judging whether or not a given model behaviour is reasonable.

For illustration, imagine a CO₂ rise to twice the pre-industrial level until about 2050, with CO₂ remaining constant thereafter.

Assume that other greenhouse gases and human-made aerosols remain at their 1990 levels. For this scenario, 15 out of 16 leading US climate scientists offered a best guess of between 2 and 4 °C surface warming by the year 2300, with widely varying time responses. The sixteenth expert estimated 0.3 °C and didn't provide a time response.

By 2050, nine of the 15 respondents expected roughly 50 to 70 % of the eventual warming, in line with recent estimates from climate models. The remaining six divided equally between swifter and slower warming. By 2100 most participants expected 80 % or more of the eventual warming, two suspected a sluggish response of below 25 %.

These numbers shouldn't be taken too seriously, yet they highlight the dilemma. Interestingly, all 16 researchers estimated some chance, between 8 and 40 %, that uncertainty about climate sensitivity could grow by a quarter or more after a 15-year research programme.

NATURE'S CONTROLS

If nothing except surface and air temperature changed (and if human-made aerosols vanished), then a CO₂ doubling would eventually warm earth's surface by 1 - 1.2 °C.

However, there are feedback loops - nature’s own action:

• Water vapour (probably reduce warming)
• Ice-snow reduction (assumed to increase warming)
• Clouds (may reduce or may increase warming)
• Biological (may reduce or may increase warming)

It is widely assumed that warming, which tends to enhance evaporation, will increase the water vapour content of the troposphere. This should amplify the warming, as water vapour is the dominant greenhouse gas.

Snow and ice reflect much of the incident sunlight back to space, thus a reduction of snow and ice cover is likely to enhance warming. Details remain hazy because feedbacks between cloud cover and changes in sea ice and snow cover are poorly understood. Another hurdle is the interplay between atmosphere, surface of the ocean, and sea ice.

Low clouds tend to cool, high clouds tend to warm. High clouds tend to reflect less sunlight back to space than low clouds. Clouds are generally good absorbers of infrared, but high clouds have colder tops than low clouds, so they emit less infrared spacewards. To further complicate matters, cloud properties may change with a changing climate, and human-made aerosols may complicate the effect of greenhouse gas forcing on clouds. With fixed clouds and sea ice, models would all report climate sensitivities between 2 and 3 °C for a CO₂ doubling. Depending on whether and how cloud cover changes, the cloud feedback could almost halve or almost double the warming.

Natural carbon dioxide movements already occur throughout the year between:

• Atmosphere and plants
• Plants and the soils
• Soils and the atmosphere
• Atmosphere and the surface ocean
• Surface ocean and the deep ocean

Human-made CO₂ comes from:

• Fossil fuel burning, cement production
• Changes in tropical land use

Carbon dioxide is stored in:

• Atmosphere
• Oceans
• Northern Hemisphere forest re-growth (e.g. Berryman’s Wood and the Dingle)

Except for atmospheric CO₂, carbon storages and natural fluxes are hard to measure. Their estimates vary somewhat across the literature. Volcanic CO₂ plays a role on geological timescales only.

CO₂ uptake by land plants through photosynthesis is roughly balanced by plant and soil respiration. Depending on whether photosynthesis exceeds or falls below respiration, the net result is CO₂ removal or release. Today, photosynthesis is probably slightly ahead. In future, climatic changes or rising CO₂ level may trigger feedbacks that curb or speed up the rise of atmospheric CO₂, such as.

• CO₂ fertilisation should promote photosynthesis and draw down some
• CO₂, as long as respiration doesn't catch up
• Warming may stimulate or slow down photosynthesis or respiration, depending, among others, on soil moisture
• The mix of species in ecosystems is likely to shift, which in turn may affect atmospheric CO₂
• Dieback of vegetation can release CO₂

The overall effect of these and other feedbacks is hard to tell. Ecosystem models tentatively suggest that carbon storage in vegetation and soils may eventually win out. Temporarily, however, carbon may be released, especially if large and rapid changes should cause forests to die back.

Turning to the ocean, a sea surface warming of 1 °C may increase atmospheric CO₂ through degassing. More importantly, marine life takes up and releases carbon annually. Marine biological production occurs largely in the sunlit surface and is thought to be limited mostly by nitrogen. Surface nutrient supplies (e.g. nitrogen) are replenished primarily through transport from deeper ocean layers. The export of organic carbon from the surface to deeper ocean layers, known as the biological pump, is not or only little affected by CO₂ availability, but it may be affected by changes in temperature, cloud cover, ocean currents, nutrients availability, or ultraviolet radiation.

These and other marine biological processes are complex. Researchers cannot yet say how they will respond to disturbances.

Biological feedbacks on climate are not limited to the carbon cycle. For instance, dimethyl sulphide (DMS) from the ocean is a major natural source of tropospheric sulphate aerosols. Shifts in DMS production may affect marine cloud cover and surface temperature. DMS production is hard to predict, because it depends, among many others, on the local biomass and mix of species.

Back to the land, spreading of boreal forest into tundra may lead to warmer winters. Trees protrude above the snow-covered ground, they reflect less sunlight back to space than snow-covered tundra. During, and after glaciation, the expansion of boreal forests amplified the warming of northern land areas. The reverse process, displacement of boreal forest by tundra, probably played a role in the onset of the last glaciation.

For another example, rising CO₂ tends to improve the water-use efficiency of vegetation. Plants may then release less water vapour to the ambient air. Regionally, this may warm the surface and affect precipitation and soil moisture.

These few illustrations show that, for better or for worse, human land-use, such as de- or reforestation can make a difference.

Natural climatic variability

What course would earth's temperature have taken without human influences? We don't know. Too little is known about natural climatic fluctuations lasting decades to centuries.

Some players that may cause climatic variations on this time scale:

• Atmospheric variability including shifts of the polar front
• Variations in the circulation of the North Atlantic and Pacific Ocean
• Solar variability
• Volcanism

During the Holocene (about 10,000 years ago) these factors, taken together, probably did not cause global mean surface temperature changes to exceed 1 °C. Unravelling climate's natural vagaries may take a long time, because sufficiently long and detailed climatic records are scarce.

The Little Ice Age, from about 1450 to the 19th century, and the Medieval Warm Period, from perhaps the 9th to the 14th century

Data, including historical, tree ring, coral and ice core records, are sparse especially for the tropics and southern oceans. The global patterns of the climatic changes and the mechanisms behind these changes are not yet known. It used to be thought that both the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age were globally more or less uniform. Now the available data suggest that no major global cooling or warming period occurred during the past millennium. Instead, regional cooling and warming appear to have been common.

For illustration:

• Summers in northwest Sweden were, by and large, warmer than their 1860-1959 mean between AD 1000 and 1200 and, again, between 1400 and 1550. From 1200 to 1400, summers tended to be cooler
  
  
• Year-round sea surface temperatures in the Sargasso Sea appear to have taken a similar course. On the other hand, summer temperatures over the northern Urals show more or less the opposite pattern with cool summers around AD 1000 and warm summers between 1200 and 1400
  
  
• Over Northern Hemisphere land areas, summers tended to be cool during the 16th, 17th and 19th century, though with strong regional differences. Chinese summers, for instance, were unusually cool, around 1650. This spell was weaker over the northern Urals and at other Arctic location, it is absent or barely noticeable in a central European and in some North American records.

There are not yet enough data to tell whether the so-called Medieval Warm Period, globally averaged, was warmer than the Little Ice Age, let alone the present century. The Little Ice Age, though not a global cooling spell, was probably, on average, cooler than the last hundred years. The warming since around 1900 appears to be one of the globally most uniform temperature shifts during, at least, the past several centuries.

Without knowing natural climatic variations reasonably well, elucidating their causes is difficult. Even the causes of well-known events can be hard to identify. 1976-77 the behaviour of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation appears to have changed. El Nino episodes became more frequent, sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific tended to be high, and precipitation over the tropics and subtropics from Africa to Indonesia declined. While some model results suggest that greenhouse gas induced climate change may look similar, it is still open whether this was human-made climate change or a natural fluctuation.

Ice record of greenhouse gases and last glaciation

During the past millennium, until about the 19th century, atmospheric greenhouse gas levels varied little and hence, during that time, probably contributed little to climatic variations. On a longer time scale, changes of greenhouse gas levels probably contributed significantly to the cooling and warming of the last two glacial cycles. Ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica indicate that there was a close link between greenhouse gases and temperature. In spite of this, the effect is hard to quantify.

Perhaps more importantly: How cold was the last ice age? This is not yet clear. Tropical oceans, for instance, may have been between 1 and 5 °C cooler than they are now and Greenland may have been several degrees colder than previously thought.

CONCLUSION
We need to know more on just about everything...

Current climate models tend to predict gradual climate change. This is no guarantee against unpleasant surprises. Climate models as well as the knowledge fed into the models are far from perfect.

Rapid changes in atmospheric circulation, of ocean currents, in ecosystem functioning, or in the West Antarctic ice sheet's behaviour may not be likely, yet such risks can, at present, neither be excluded nor quantified.

Vice versa, sudden climatic shifts during the last ice age do not imply that similar shifts must necessarily happen in the near future: during glaciation the ice sheets were much larger and less stable than they have been for the past 10,000 years. Past climates help to understand the climate system's workings, but they do not readily reveal what to expect. Our climate seems to be headed for a "warm atmosphere-cold pole combination" which may be unique in earth history. There is no completely satisfactory geological equivalent.

Much of the public debate focuses on warming; an admittedly likely reaction of the climate system. Disturbing earth's radiation balance, however, may change the climate in a host of other potentially serious ways. Warming need not even be the practically most relevant part of the response. This is why many climatologists prefer the term `climate change' over `global warming'.

For example, spatial and seasonal patterns of precipitation, evaporation, soil moisture and river runoff may shift. These in turn may affect agriculture and freshwater availability, which are critical for many poor countries and a potential source of migrations and conflicts. Cloud patterns, ocean currents, atmospheric circulation or the distribution of extreme weather events may change. Terrestrial and marine life will be affected and may in turn affect the climate via changes, for instance, of carbon storage, or evaporation. The risk of rapid climate change is linked to many other problems of concern, like population growth, poverty, loss of biodiversity, or stratospheric ozone depletion.

Building a balanced public perception of the risks posed by climate change is difficult. There is an almost irresistible temptation to view extreme weather events, like droughts or storms, as signs of climate change, even if they are well within the limits of natural variability. At the same time, gradual change tends to go unnoticed. Natural climatic variability can lead to temporary cooling; these would be perceived as all-clears by many.

Human-made greenhouse gases and aerosols will change our climate. It is uncertain by how much, how swiftly and with what twists the climate will change. This is the problem; since uncertainty cuts two ways. The present best estimates may well overstate the risk, but they may well understate it.

Climate change resembles a gamble with high stakes.

Current knowledge of the carbon cycle suggests that atmospheric CO₂ will respond sluggishly to CO₂ emissions changes. The response of the climate system to a given CO₂ level takes decades or longer. Barring surprises, the lag time between changes in CO₂ emissions and their eventual effects on climate is very long.

It is an open question how soon the uncertainties can be narrowed down, and whether climatologists will be able to predict details reliably before they start to happen in the real world. There is a natural inclination to wait and see until we know what we shall have to face.

By then, of course, it may be too late.

COMMON CONFUSION
The jargon does not reflect the seriousness of the situation, so beware:

• Climate change suggests a slow and steady predictable change. In reality we face a rapid and unpredictable flip-flop between extreme weather events.
  
  
• Global warming suggests a slow steady increase in temperatures, like warming a bath. In reality it will not be steady, and local weather chaos may include extremes of cold as well as heat.
  
  
• Talking of climate suggests something scientific and outside people's concern. But the reality in people's lives will concern violent changes in weather.
  
  
• Scientists talk of the uncertainties of climate change. There are no uncertainties about the reality of change, only the exact nature those changes will take.
  
  
• Avoid getting bogged down in the atmospheric science – it’s the causes and impacts to be concerned about.
  
  
• Avoid saying that the Greenhouse Effect is the problem - it's the emission of greenhouse gases that’s the problem.
  
  
• Avoid saying that sea level rise itself is due to melting ice caps - the expansion of water as it heats up is more important.
  
  
• Avoid saying that the UK is going under water – in the next 50 years sea level rise will affect only some coastal areas.
  
  
• Avoid getting confused with the hole in the ozone layer- there are connections between the two, but they are complex and the ozone hole, itself, does not directly lead to climate change.

SOME COMMON EXCUSES

Almost all of the arguments against climate change originate in the 20-year long public relations campaign by the oil, gas and coal industries to fight against international attempts to control greenhouse gas emissions. In the US this counter campaign has to date cost over £20 million. We should remember that companies and governments have always "created" experts to justify their arguments. Tobacco companies have "scientists" to claim that nicotine is not addictive, asbestos companies have "doctors" to claim that asbestos does not lead to asbestosis of the lungs, and confectionery companies have "dentists" to claim that sugar does not lead to tooth decay.

It’s a classic ploy by vested interests.

So, there is always going to be someone that says:

"Scientists don't agree that there is global warming."
Remember, no one argues against the fact that greenhouse gas concentrations are going up extremely rapidly. No one argues that changing this will change the way the atmosphere behaves. The debate is about whether those changes will cause global warming and are the cause of the global temperature increases.

The strongest argument is the simple weight of expert opinion. Out of 2,000 scientists involved in the United Nations processes, around 10, sometimes called "climate sceptics", argue that there is no climate change or argue that burning fossil fuels is not a problem (some even argue both!).

All 10 of these scientists are directly funded by the fossil fuel industry.

"Sunspots or changes in the tilt of the earth cause climate change."
It's true that changes in solar output and tilt have historically had a major influence on climate change. But tilt changes very slowly and solar output has not changed sufficiently recently to explain the measured changes in global temperature. Again, the UN scientists are very clear that current changes are human-made. Anyway, sunspots or no sunspots, when we change the gases in the atmosphere, we will change the way that it holds in the heat from the sun.

"10 years ago you warned of an ice age, now it's a heat wave! These are all scare tactics."
The concerns over an ice age were always a fringe theory 30 years ago - the science has moved forward and is now is extremely strong. Climate change is not predictable and extreme cold as well as heat is entirely possible if ocean currents change significantly.

"You said it would be hot - but it's freezing today/last winter. Where's the warming?"
Warming is measured across global averages and that local patterns will still vary greatly. "Warming" may be a misnomer on a local level, as we're talking about increasingly extreme weather events (which may include extreme cold), interspersed with periods of more “normal” weather.

"Maybe with all this uncertainty, we should just wait and see and then take action."
There is a 40-100 year lag time before we feel the full effects of changes in the atmosphere. Politicians have been arguing for "waiting and seeing" for 20 years and the weather is already showing dramatic changes and what we’re experiencing now is the result of emissions in the 1960s and before. To wait any further with such a long lead time, we’d just be dumping our indecision onto our grandchildren. Also remember that we invest all the time in insurance against uncertainties. The government spend tens of billions of pounds a year on the armed forces to defend ourselves against outside risks that are impossible to estimate. At the moment the risk of climate change is far better established than the risk of enemy invasion!

"We can’t afford to reduce our emissions - it would destroy our economy."
Wrong. Immediate reductions of 20-30% can be made through simple investments in energy efficiency and conservation and lead to major savings on fuel imports and overheads. Renewable energy can provide jobs and new industries. The changes require substantial investment, but since when does investment do anything other than strengthen the economy?

"A bit of warming is just what we need in grey cold Purton."
Purton is not going to become the Barbados of Wiltshire - and if it did every wood, garden and hedgerow would die. Yes it may get warmer, but droughts, floods, and extreme cold may also be part of the picture. Generally in the UK, scientists predict hotter, dryer summers but also wetter, greyer winters with increased flooding and storms - so not much fun then. And there will be a huge price to pay elsewhere- so we can't afford to be selfish.

"This is a left-wing/anarcho plot to overthrow capitalism/stop me enjoying my car etc."
Remember, Margaret Thatcher, the heads of British Petroleum and Shell Oil, the Confederation of British Industry, and the Insurance industry all now acknowledge the threat and make strong statements of concern. Tony Blair calls it the "most serious" challenge of the 21st Century. Can all these people be part a global conspiracy? Hardly likely! In fact, the only government leader who has denied the problem is George W Bush whose political campaign was largely funded by oil companies.

"It’s the fault of cows farting."
Yes, cow farts do contain methane and play some role. But this is a very minor cause - and one often seized on by people trying to marginalise the issue. A far greater source of methane is from old landfill sites and coal mines.

POLITICS

Tony Blair calls it the "most serious" challenge of the 21st Century.

Former Vice-President Al Gore is touring the world promoting his new book and film, the hard hitting 'An Inconvenient Truth'. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/)

The US is a huge burner of fossil fuels, twice as much per person as Britain and this is a serious problem. We need to put pressure on the US, of course, but we have a responsibility too to take a lead and sort out our own role. No-one ever wins a court case by arguing that there are bigger criminals about!

It's also true that China and India also have rapidly increasing emissions and that within 25 years the developing world emissions will exceed those of the currently rich world. So, they will need to play a part in controlling emissions. Nonetheless, their emissions per person are still way below ours (we emit ten times as much per person as in India). Do remember, that the greenhouse gases currently in the atmosphere are the result of the rich world’s emissions over the past 100 years, so we bear a historical responsibility.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

We're told that we can't change the world, but of course nothing is ever going to change if people believe that and don't even try. In reality it's not that hard at all, as history shows us again and again, all it needs is a few people to believe they can make a difference. Everyone knows we have a problem and everyone's waiting for someone else to do something.

We can be the start. So, what’s the plan?

1. YOU have to be the start - after all we can’t ask other people to do something that we refuse to do.
   
   
2. Next, influence your friends, neighbours or village group to do the same. There are also some extra things that you can do in a group.
   
   
3. If you are really keen then support national campaigns (e.g. the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust’s Climate Friendly Communities - try not to get hung up on the acronym which is CFC, which as we all now know is the recognised acronym for chlorofluorocarbon - a greenhouse gas! they do really need to change the name of their initiative!).
   
4. Finally, demand that our MP pushes our own government to take far more of a lead in pushing for real change in the United States.

To be fair, probably only 1 and 2 ought to be expected of us all.

So, what’s the plan?

The solution to climate change is simple - we have to dramatically cut our greenhouse gas emissions and move out of the fossil fuel age.

Reductions come from three methods:

• Reducing demand for energy
• Increasing the efficiency of the energy that we do use
• Replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy

We need to do all three of these together.

BUT REMEMBER

The campaign for renewable technology is strong and well supported by environment groups. It is sexy and exciting and futuristic. But it is not the whole solution – it is cutting emissions that counts, which needs dramatic changes in efficiency and demand changes.

The scale of the problem is so huge that we will rightly feel that our personal changes are not going to make much of a contribution. This is just a start, and that the real change comes from spreading the word, persuading other people to change and political organising.

CHANGING OUR ENERGY INTENSIVE LIFESTYLES

We have to think carefully about how we live and find ways of living more simply.

Simple ways of reducing demand for energy include:

• Turning off lights in rooms we are not in
• Turning down our home heating, especially in rooms we don't use much
• Buying locally grown food and support local farmers
• Grow some of our own vegetables
• Re-using materials as much as we can
• Not driving everywhere in the village

And think about:

• Whether or not we need to buy a new car so frequently
• Whether or not we could buy a second-hand car instead of a brand new one
• Whether or not we need to fly abroad for every holiday
• Whether or not we really need out of season vegetables and flowers flown from faraway locations?
• Whether or not we really need to drink mineral water in a plastic bottle brought in from abroad?
• Whether or not we really need to sit outside a pub on a cold day under a heater?

So, here’s the plan:

Action you can take
Alert your family, friends, neighbours about what you could do:

• Turn off lights when not in room
• Turn down home heating
• Turn off the PC at weekends
• Buy locally-grown food
• Grow some of our own vegetables
• Buy in-season vegetables and flowers
• Use tap water instead of bought mineral water
• Set up your own garden compost heap
• Re-use materials as much as we can
• Use re-useable nappies
• Not driving everywhere in the village
• Use a bicycle more often
• Buy a new car less frequently
• Buy a second-hand car instead of a new one
• Fly abroad less frequently for holidays
• Sit inside the pub on a cold day

Action your village organisation can take
Talk about what your group or organisation could do collectively:

• Walk to meetings
• Car share to bring members to meetings
• Compare energy efficiencies of the meeting venues
• Buy your meeting refreshments locally (or make them)
• Share agendas, minutes etc
• Put the agenda on a flip chart so all can see
• If you meet during the day, do you need the light on?
• Find out and publicise what the local transport company is doing about providing more buses, of the right size and when they are wanted
• Find out and publicise what the local authority is doing, itself, are any of its activities not taking account of reducing emissions?
• Produce local guide to help people buy local produce
• Organise a group allotment
• Organise a local food market
• Think “energy usage” when you next hold a village event
• Organise a community compost

INCREASING EFFICIENCY

Our use of energy is wasteful and highly inefficient. Increasing efficiency involves achieving the same level of service with less energy. Surprisingly, the single biggest producer of greenhouse gases is not heavy industry; it is our homes - using nearly half of all the energy in the country.

Electricity is the first place to look for efficiencies - so much energy is wasted in generating, transmitting and then using electricity that it delivers only one quarter of the energy in the original fuel. Using electricity for heating and cooking is extremely wasteful. A new domestic condensing gas boiler delivers more than three times as much heat from a unit of gas than heating using electricity generated from that same gas. Electrical appliances can be very inefficient too - new models of fridges and freezers (half the electricity use in the average home) use half as much energy as old models.

So, here’s the plan:

Action for you
Alert your family, friends, neighbours about what you could do:

• As existing light bulbs stop working, replace with energy efficiency ones
  Ensure the maximum insulation is in the roof space (where it is possible of course!)
• Ensure the maximum insulation is in the wall space (where it is possible of course!)
• Replace single glazing with double glazing
• Switch off your winter central heating as soon as possible
• Ventilate rooms or spaces rather than air condition

Action for your village organisation
Talk about what your group or organisation could do collectively:

• Select meeting venue based on its energy efficiency
• Exert pressure on the local authority to publicise its energy efficiency actions

RENEWABLE ENERGY

Renewable energy draws on new technologies - solar, wind and tidal/wave power - which use natural energy sources rather than burning fossil fuels. Many electricity companies already offer to supply consumers with electricity from renewable sources.

There are many pilot projects already running which show the potential of renewable sources:

• Wind power - by 2010 Denmark will produce a third of its national electricity from renewable sources
• Solar electric panels (called photovoltaic panels) by 2020 Germany will install 100,000 houses
• Solar hot water - many people in UK already heat their water directly with solar energy

The price of solar energy is already falling dramatically and the new wind technologies are already producing electricity at a lower price than coal generation. All that is needed is sufficient investment and an end to the huge hidden subsidies to fossil fuel generation.

Action you can take
Alert your family, friends, neighbours about what you could do:

• Switch to green electricity
• Install solar panels for hot water

Action your village organisation can take
Talk about what your group or organisation could do collectively:

• Select meeting venue if it has switched to green electricity
• Select meeting venue if it has solar panels installed
• Exert pressure on the local authority to publicise its renewable energy actions

SOME FALSE SOLUTIONS

"We can all plant trees and it will be OK."
Tree planting is a bit of a red herring; trees only soak up carbon dioxide whilst growing, but when they die/decay or are burnt they release it. So tree planting buys a little time - its benefits are temporary.

BUT it is an important symbol of concern, focuses attention on the problem and helps to change behaviour.

"Technology can fix it."
There are lots of "solutions" around - pumping carbon dioxide underground, setting up mirrors in space to reflect sunlight, seeding oceans with iron filings to encourage plankton growth. These projects are mostly funded by oil companies which have a strong interest in encouraging "business as usual".

It’s very doubtful if they will be enough to have a long term benefit.

"New car technology."
There is huge investment by car and oil companies into hydrogen, electric, and fuel cell cars. The big question is: what about the huge amounts of energy that will still go into the steel, plastics, and manufacture of the cars.

More efficient, less polluting cars will help, of course, but we still need to control and limit car use for many other reasons.

"I do my bit - I recycle."
This is something people often say. But whilst recycling is a good thing to do for many reasons it is a very small part of the climate solution (composting food waste is the most useful component as it reduces methane production in landfill sites).

We could do far more by insulating and draught-proofing our homes than relying on recycling to reduce emissions.

This article may be downloaded as a PDF file

Adobe Acrobat PDF reader