全球气候变化及其影响

全球气候变化及其对社会与自然系统产生的影响已日益受到全世界各国政府与广大民众的关注。与天气和气候有关的灾害给人类生命财产造成的损失日益增大,社会与生态系统似乎变得日趋脆弱。人们关心刚刚过去的20世纪的天气与气候发生了什么变化,更希望了解未来的21世纪,人类居住的地球会出现什么样的气候情景。根据一些国家和地区的观测记录、研究成果以及科学家们对气候变化的评估与预测展望,对全球气候变化问题进行概括。首先阐明20世纪地区性气候变化的事实;并根据政府间气候变化委员会(IPCC)科学技术报告中关于20世纪全球气候变化进行的总结性评估以及对21世纪全球气候变化的预测,作为阐述过去与未来全球气候变化的主要依据。同时,还介绍了一些科学家对IPCC关于全球气候变化的结论所持的不同观点或质疑。还就气候变化对社会与自然系统可能产生的影响略作论述。

Global climate change and its impacts

Governments and their citizens in different countries around the world are increasingly concerned with the potential impact of climate change on society and the environment.Society is also becoming increasingly vulnerable to severe weather events and climate extremes,which are projected to increase in frequency in a warmer world.It is thus important to understand recent changes in global climate and the occurrence of extreme events in the late 20th century,to better deal with projected climate change scenarios for the 21th century.This paper summarizes the results of climate change studies over different countries and regions.The results are based on scientific articles,reports and assessments already available in the literature.We first introduce regional climate variations in the late 20th century based on observations and analysis.We then discuss climate change scenarios based on the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) scientific report.Uncertainties in climate change projections and opinions of skeptics of human-induced climate change are also reviewed.Finally,the potential impact of climate change on society and the environment will be briefly addressed.