4 Chapter 1 WHAT IS CLIMATE CHANGE If you say It was sunny this morning but it rained this afternoon you aren't talking about climate You're talking about weather Weather is whatever is happening in the air outside Types of weather include clouds wind snow air temperature and rain Climate is related to weather but it can't be observed in the same way weather can To observe climate scientists must study weather in an area over decades They look for trends and calculate averages Hail is a type of weather Climate change can affect weather but climate and weather are two different things
5 MOST APPS AND TV FORECASTS GIVE INFORMATION ABOUT WEATHER NOT CLIMATE You can think of climate as a menu It shows the weather options that are most likely to happen in a place In a desert area for instance the weather is likely to be hot and dry Weather is the daily special Today we are having rain with a side of strong winds Weather is what actually happens each day
6 Temperatures are rising in Antarctica This is an example of climate change A place may have a weather daily special that is not on its climate menu It may have record breaking cold temperatures or rainfall amounts If this unusual weather is rare it will not change the climate menu If unusual weather keeps happening it becomes the new normal weather Then climate change has occurred
7 Mercury's Rising We are living in a time when climate is changing Starting in 1880 scientists could look at temperatures from around the world They figured out the average temperature for the entire planet for that year They have done this for every year since The temperatures from the 1880s are different from recent temperatures The twenty hottest years on record have all happened since 1995 The five hottest years have all happened since 2010 So the world is getting warmer Dry cracked soil where plants cannot grow can be a symptom of global warming
