Climate Change

Ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century.

• All Earth processes are the result of energy flowing and matter cycling within and among the planet’s systems. This energy is derived from the sun and Earth’s hot interior. The energy that flows and matter that cycles produce chemical and physical changes in Earth’s materials and living organisms.
• The planet’s systems interact over scales that range from microscopic to global in size, and they operate over fractions of a second to billions of years. These interactions have shaped Earth’s history and will determine its future.

• Weather and climate are influenced by interactions involving sunlight, the ocean, the atmosphere, ice, landforms, and living things. These interactions vary with latitude, altitude, and local and regional geography, all of which can affect oceanic and atmospheric flow patterns.
• Because these patterns are so complex, weather can only be predicted probabilistically.
• The ocean exerts a major influence on weather and climate by absorbing energy from the sun, releasing it over time, and globally redistributing it through ocean currents.

Human activities, such as the release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth’s mean surface temperature (global warming). Reducing the level of climate change and reducing human vulnerability to whatever climate changes do occur depend on the understanding of climate science, engineering capabilities, and other kinds of knowledge, such as understanding of human behavior and on applying that knowledge wisely in decisions and activities.

• When the motion energy of an object changes, there is inevitably some other change in energy at the same time.
• The amount of energy transfer needed to change the temperature of a matter sample by a given amount depends on the nature of the matter, the size of the sample, and the environment.
• Energy is spontaneously transferred out of hotter regions or objects and into colder ones.

• Develop and use a model to describe phenomena.
• Develop a model to describe unobservable mechanisms.
• Develop a model to generate data to test ideas about designed systems, including those representing inputs and outputs.
• Develop a model to predict and/or describe phenomena.

• Collect data to produce data to serve as the basis for evidence to answer scientific questions or test design solutions under a range of conditions.
• Plan an investigation individually and collaboratively, and in the design: identify independent and dependent variables and controls, what tools are needed to do the gathering, how measurements will be recorded, and how many data are needed to support a claim.
• Conduct an investigation and evaluate the experimental design to produce data to serve as the basis for evidence that can meet the goals of the investigation.

• Cause and effect relationships may be used to predict phenomena in natural or designed systems.
• Relationships can be classified as causal or correlational, and correlation does not necessarily imply causation.
• Phenomena may have more than one cause, and some cause and effect relationships in systems can only be described using probability.

• Models can be used to represent systems and their interactions—such as inputs, processes and outputs—and energy, matter, and information flows within systems.
• Systems may interact with other systems; they may have sub-systems and be a part of larger complex systems.

• Within a natural or designed system, the transfer of energy drives the motion and/or cycling of matter.
• Matter is conserved because atoms are conserved in physical and chemical processes.
• The transfer of energy can be tracked as energy flows through a designed or natural system.
• Energy may take different forms (e.g. energy in fields, thermal energy, energy of motion).

• Explanations of stability and change in natural or designed systems can be constructed by examining the changes over time and processes at different scales, including the atomic scale.
• Stability might be disturbed either by sudden events or gradual changes that accumulate over time.
• Small changes in one part of a system might cause large changes in another part.
• Explanations of stability and change in natural or designed systems can be constructed by examining the changes over time and forces at different scales.

Analyze geoscience data to make the claim that one change to Earth's surface can create feedbacks that cause changes to other Earth systems.

Use a model to describe how variations in the flow of energy into and out of Earth’s systems result in changes in climate.

• Earth’s systems, being dynamic and interacting, cause feedback effects that can increase or decrease the original changes.
• Evidence from deep probes and seismic waves, reconstructions of historical changes in Earth’s surface and its magnetic field, and an understanding of physical and chemical processes lead to a model of Earth with a hot but solid inner core, a liquid outer core, a solid mantle and crust. Motions of the mantle and its plates occur primarily through thermal convection, which involves the cycling of matter due to the outward flow of energy from Earth’s interior and gravitational movement of denser materials toward the interior.
• The geological record shows that changes to global and regional climate can be caused by interactions among changes in the sun’s energy output or Earth’s orbit, tectonic events, ocean circulation, volcanic activity, glaciers, vegetation, and human activities. These changes can occur on a variety of time scales from sudden (e.g., volcanic ash clouds) to intermediate (ice ages) to very long-term tectonic cycles.

• The foundation for Earth’s global climate systems is the electromagnetic radiation from the sun, as well as its reflection, absorption, storage, and redistribution among the atmosphere, ocean, and land systems, and this energy’s re-radiation into space.
• Gradual atmospheric changes were due to plants and other organisms that captured carbon dioxide and released oxygen.
• Changes in the atmosphere due to human activity have increased carbon dioxide concentrations and thus affect climate.
• Current models predict that, although future regional climate changes will be complex and varied, average global temperatures will continue to rise. The outcomes predicted by global climate models strongly depend on the amounts of human-generated greenhouse gases added to the atmosphere each year and by the ways in which these gases are absorbed by the ocean and biosphere.

• Though the magnitudes of human impacts are greater than they have ever been, so too are human abilities to model, predict, and manage current and future impacts.
• Through computer simulations and other studies, important discoveries are still being made about how the ocean, the atmosphere, and the biosphere interact and are modified in response to human activities.

• Conservation of energy means that the total change of energy in any system is always equal to the total energy transferred into or out of the system.
• Energy cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be transported from one place to another and transferred between systems.
• Mathematical expressions, which quantify how the stored energy in a system depends on its configuration (e.g. relative positions of charged particles, compression of a spring) and how kinetic energy depends on mass and speed, allow the concept of conservation of energy to be used to predict and describe system behavior.
• The availability of energy limits what can occur in any system.
• Uncontrolled systems always evolve toward more stable states—that is, toward more uniform energy distribution (e.g., water flows downhill, objects hotter than their surrounding environment cool down).

• Use a model to provide mechanistic accounts of phenomena.
• Develop and use a model based on evidence to illustrate the relationships between systems or between components of a system.
• Use a model to predict the relationships between systems or between components of a system.

• Plan and conduct an investigation individually and collaboratively to produce data to serve as the basis for evidence, and in the design: decide on types, how much, and accuracy of data needed to produce reliable measurements and consider limitations on the precision of the data (e.g., number of trials, cost, risk, time), and refine the design accordingly.
• Science investigations use diverse methods and do not always use the same set of procedures to obtain data.
• New technologies advance scientific knowledge.
• Scientific inquiry is characterized by a common set of values that include: logical thinking, precision, open-mindedness, objectivity, skepticism, replicability of results, and honest and ethical reporting of findings.

• Empirical evidence is required to differentiate between cause and correlation and make claims about specific causes and effects.
• Systems can be designed to cause a desired effect.
• Cause and effect relationships can be suggested and predicted for complex natural and human designed systems by examining what is known about smaller scale mechanisms within the system.

• When investigating or describing a system, the boundaries and initial conditions of the system need to be defined and their inputs and outputs analyzed and described using models.
• Models (e.g., physical, mathematical, computer models) can be used to simulate systems and interactions—including energy, matter, and information flows— within and between systems at different scales.
• Models can be used to predict the behavior of a system, but these predictions have limited precision and reliability due to the assumptions and approximations inherent in models.

• Energy cannot be created or destroyed–only moved between one place and another place, between objects and/or fields, or between systems.
• In nuclear processes, atoms are not conserved, but the total number of protons plus neutrons is conserved.
• The total amount of energy and matter in closed systems is conserved.
• Energy drives the cycling of matter within and between systems.
• Changes of energy and matter in a system can be described in terms of energy and matter flows into, out of, and within that system.
• Energy cannot be created or destroyed—it only moves between one place and another place, between objects and/or fields, or between systems.

• Much of science deals with constructing explanations of how things change and how they remain stable.
• Change and rates of change can be quantified and modeled over very short or very long periods of time. Some system changes are irreversible.
• Feedback (negative or positive) can stabilize or destabilize a system.
• Systems can be designed for greater or lesser stability.