...Climate Change Regulations Paper University of Phoenix SCI 362 April 2, 2012 Climate Change Regulations Climate change is an intricate comparison of numerous geological, atmospheric, and ecological sources. Often the viewpoint of climate change is distilled into an oversimplification of global warming. Global warming is mostly understood in lay terms as the warming of the earth due to the overproduction of greenhouse gasses. In reality, climate change is, “a measure of changes in the statistical properties of the climate system when considered over periods of decades or longer, regardless of cause.” There are three main views pertaining to climate change; global warming, solar irradiance, and natural cycles of the atmosphere. Global warming is the viewpoint that human influences have and are altering the atmosphere by raising the temperature of the planet. This viewpoint is the most widely accepted view from scientists around the world who believe that the release of large amounts of CO2 and Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) (amongst other gasses are creating a greenhouse effect. The effect of global warming is not completely known. While some sources such as environmental groups like Greenpeace, predict catastrophe, groups like NASA admit that the implications of global warming are not well known (NASA, 2011). The other view of climate change pertains to solar irradiance. The sun has affected the earth’s weather in the past and solar output has increased in...
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...for its shareholders go beyond regulatory compliance? It’s nice to think that the reasons behind such actions are of good nature – perhaps even philanthropic. And while there are definitely good intentions behind such decision-making, there is also value added for the corporation. Exelon has outlined their goals to be compliant to regulations and their desire to go further. They’ve also positioned themselves as a carbon free alternative for energy by investing heavily in nuclear. However, they are also making a large financial bet by taking this stake. While they are going beyond compliance for greenhouse gas emissions, they are certainly hoping to profit from this stance as well. Greenhouse Gas Regulations Greenhouse gases from anthropogenic sources are one of the main contributors to the rapid climate change that the Earth is now experiencing. As a prominent source for carbon emissions, utilities seem to be a logical place to impose standards. Despite the dire situation, there currently are not strict regulatory concerns for utilities in the United States as far as greenhouse gas emissions are concerned. The President recently proposed a Climate Action Plan that would limit the amount of carbon emissions from new power plant sources. But the standards are for new plants and not existing ones. There have been some attempts at applying the Clean Air Act to greenhouse gas emissions, but these efforts have failed to enact the reduction levels that are desired thus far. According...
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...Climate Change Regulation The global warming is an international situation; we could not hide the reality of danger and the problem we face. Atmospheric samples had been extracting from ice cores, and recent direct measurements, delivering concise data “that atmospheric CO2 has increased since the Industrial Revolution”. The Earth's climate has changed over the history of the world, ones of these changes was the ice age 7,000 ago according to scientists here began modern climate era and human civilization these changes had been attribute to climate very small variations in the orbit and which in turn changed the amount of solar energy received Earth. According to studies by the United States Environmental Agency (EPA), the Earth's average temperature has increased by 1.4 ° C over the past century, the estimated to increase from 2° to 11.5 ° F in the next hundred years, these temperature changes that seem insignificant can be define in large and extremely dangerous changes in climate and weather. Today the problems of climate change is focus in the global warming as a major cause are the humans and their activities which contribute to air pollution right through the release of greenhouse gases, “The IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, issued in 2007, concluded that human-produced air pollutants have caused most of the climate warming observed over the last 50 years.” We can observe over the past century the human been daily life and their survival style contributing to increase...
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...Geography Research Response Paper What will be the environmental, sociopolitical, and economic impacts of 21st century climate change? * Environmental * A springtime “ozone hole” has developed in the last 30 years over Antarctica (Mann 30) * Without an ozone layer, unhealthy levels of UV radiation would reach Earth’s surface, making the planet largely uninhabitable (Mann 30) * Basic theoretical considerations as well as detailed climate-model simulations indicate a likely increase in the average intensity of tropical cyclones and hurricanes in all major formation basins (Mann 56) * We know that mountain glaciers over the world are disappearing, and that this disappearance is generally related to increased melting due to warmer atmospheric temperatures (Mann 58) * The combination of decreased summer precipitation and increased evaporation due to warming surface temperatures is predicted to lead to a greater tendency for drought in many regions (Mann 90) * Other likely impacts of climate change over the next century include increases in extreme weather phenomena, and rising sea levels due to melting ice and warming of the oceans (Mann 90) * Sea level is predicted to rise because water expands as it warms, and melting ice is also likely to have a major impact on the sea level (Mann 98) * Coastal regions will be subject to increased exposure to flood and storm damage, more intense coastal surges, and altered patterns...
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...2014 Making It Clear The climate of Earth has been a topic of discussion for ages. As time goes on the question about climate that seems to recur the most is: “Why does the world climate change?” Today that question has turned into a matter of debate on whether or not global climate change is a natural process or it is caused primarily by humans. While many people have tried to account reasons that humans cause climate change, most theories don’t gain support. Some ideas though, such as those concluded by “renowned” scientists gain ground based on actual data gathered in the field and not just theories. One thing all those scientists have in common though that makes them credible is that they have gathered information to support their claims. That data is used all around the world as a base for governments and agencies to...
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...CLIMATE CHANGE IN DECEMBER 2009, as the Copenhagen climate conference fell apart, the chairman of Greenpeace UK, John Sauven, said “the city of Copenhagen is a crime scene tonight, with the guilty men and women fleeing to the airport.” His remark captured some of the salient characteristics of climate policy: the importance of treaties and regulation; the central role of politicians, advocacy groups and non-governmental organisations such as Greenpeace; the pervasive moral certainty; and, though this was only in the background, the commitment to renewable energy, especially wind and solar power, as the primary means of cutting carbon emissions. For many people, the great problem of climate change has been a failure of regulation and political will. If only, they say, the obligations of the Kyoto accord had been more comprehensive, the regulations stricter, or if more money had gone into renewables. Then the world might have reined in the temperature rise and the public would not have become so sceptical about climate change. Not so, says Dieter Helm of Oxford University. It is not the failure of the regulations that is the problem but their basic design. They have caused people to focus on the most expensive ways of mitigating climate change, rather than the cheapest, imposing high costs for little gain. Moreover, by concentrating on their own carbon production, and how to reduce it, Europeans have ignored the impact of their continued demand for goods made using carbon- intensive...
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...IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE POLICIES ON THE GROWTH OF THE INDIAN ECONOMY Submitted by: Kriti Bhardwaj Date: 1st December, 2010 1 ABSTRACT The most contentious global debate today is the obligations of the developed and the developing countries to take steps to reduce their carbon footprint. Though climate change is a danger for all countries-developed and developing alike, the quantum of responsibility for mitigating climate change is a debatable issue. There is a perceived divide between the obligations of the two worlds in which our planet is divided. The source of virtually all past emissions i.e. the developed world has a greater responsibility to take steps to reduce their carbon emissions substantially and help in stabilizing the environment which they disturbed to a large extent. This is the reason why they are subjected to binding targets of reducing their emissions by a set amount in all international agreements. However, the developing world is gearing towards development at a very fast pace and all development and industrialization pre-supposes the need of higher emissions. Due to this, the emission levels of this part of the world are bound to increase even more rapidly. Mitigating climate change in developing countries poses a fundamental challenge. For developing nations as a whole...
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...Climate Change and Corporate Environmental Responsibility Dewan Mahboob Hossain (1) Jahangir Alam Chowdhury (2) (1) Dewan Mahboob Hossain Assistant Professor Department of Accounting & Information Systems University of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh Email: dewanmahboob@univdhaka.edu (2) M. Jahangir Alam Chowdhury, PhD (Stirling, UK) Professor, Department of Finance, and Executive Director Center for Microfinance and Development University of Dhaka Dhaka - 1000, Bangladesh. Email: mjac_dubd@yahoo.com Introduction Abstract Climate change, as an international environmental issue, is getting a lot of attention. The negative effects of climate change have become one of the most talked about issues among Governments, scientists, environmentalists and others. It is said that business activities are affecting the climate negatively. In order to minimize the negative effects of climate change, the activities of the businesses should be controlled and encouraged to perform in a socially responsible manner. The article focuses on the responsibilities and the responses of businesses on climate change issues. The article first highlights on two prominent issues: Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Environmental Responsibility. Then the article introduces climate change as an international environmental concern. Then, by going through several published literature, the article highlights various responsibilities of business towards climate...
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...their impact in terms of lives lost and livelihoods disrupted tends to fall most heavily on the poor in developing countries. Climate change threatens to heighten these impacts in many areas, both by changing the frequency and/or intensity of extreme events and by bringing changes in mean conditions that may alter the underlying vulnerability of populations to hazards. The result in the decades to come may be an increase in the global burden of weather-related disasters: events that can threaten the sustainability of development processes and undermine progress toward poverty reduction. Holistic management of disaster risk requires action to reduce impacts of extreme events before, during and after they occur, including technical preventive measures and aspects of socio-economic development designed to reduce human vulnerability to hazards. Approaches toward the management of climate change impacts also have to consider the reduction of human vulnerability under changing levels of risk. A key challenge and opportunity therefore lies in building a bridge between current disaster risk management efforts aimed at reducing vulnerabilities to extreme events and efforts to promote climate change adaptation. There is a need to understand better the extent to which current disaster management practices reflect future adaptation needs and assess what changes may be required if such practices are to address future risks. At the World Conference on Disaster Reduction (WCDR) in Kobe,...
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...threatened by the new global pressures that have been posing challenges on degradation an depletion of the natural resources. The global pressures may include competition to access of water, land, minerals and other fundamental resources, increase in the population of various countries thus posing pressure in land, there has been an increase in the demand for energy due to increased number of people thus having many industries for provision of employment and manufacture of food. Thus our vital resources face danger of depletion and damage if no proper regulations and rules are not set to allow these resources to be protected. Demand for natural resource will increase by the year 2050 mostly in developing countries. Eradication of poverty in the developing countries may pose pressures to the natural available resources. The impact of this will be degradation of water, clean air, soil, forest, wet lands and cause global climate all these...
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...MKT01760 Tourism Planning Environments Assignment 2 – Proposal for preparation of a tourism plan or policy Due Date: Week 8 Position Statement “Climate change is one of the most significant challenges facing tourism today. Australia’s tourism industry, like all sectors, contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. The industry is also susceptible to climate change impacts, with some of Australia’s most iconic natural attractions and World Heritage Areas particularly sensitive to changes in climate conditions” (Australian Government website, 2010). “Tourism is fundamental to Australia’s economy. The direct GDP contribution of the tourism industry was $38.9 billion in 2006-07. However, many of these tourism-related goods and services contribute to significant GHG emissions. (Tourism Australia, 2008). As stated by Tourism Queensland, 2009, “internationally and domestically our competitors are gearing up so they can promote themselves as climate friendly destinations. Queensland must act if we are to be competitive”. They have also stated ways to make this a reality. Some actions include: Promote environmentally responsible and safe use of your product/service to visitors; monitor the sustainability performances of main competitors; pursue a carbon neutral option for your product or service. Tourism Queensland was established in 1979 (Tourism Queensland, 2009), Tourism Queensland is a statutory body under the...
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...still uncertain but, whatever the effects of global warming may be, there is no doubt that the consequences are going to be massive, in the form of diseases, food shortages and economic decline. Gamble, J.L., et al. (2008) Analyses of the Effects of Global Change on Human Health and Welfare and Human Systems. U.S.C.C.S.P. This article highlights an assessment directed by EPA which provides a harsh study on the diversity of instruments by which global warming might negatively impact human health in the United States (US). It further states that heat-related disease will likely increase over years, as will deaths linked to air pollution. Collectively, severe events will impact health and welfare and human systems (Gamble, et at, 2008). For instance, floods could contaminate our drinking water and wildfires could increase air pollution. An experienced scientist, Gamble investigated the effect of climate change on human health and developed a model of studies. He found that climate change increases temperatures and shockingly, more people are expected to die from carbon dioxide (CO2). The author is forthcoming, descriptive, and his work is well-researched. Backlund, P., et al. (2008) The Effects of Climate Change on Agriculture, Land Resources, Water Resources, and Biodiversity in the United States. The journalist’s research affirms that food security...
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...EFFECTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE ON THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF VIET NAM Literature Review 3 I. General 3 1. Geographical location & Vietnam’s climate 3 a. Geographical location 3 b. Climate 3 2. Effects of geographical & climate on Vietnam’s economy: 6 a. Effects of geographical location to Vietnam’s economy: 6 II. Definition, causes and actual situation of Viet Nam under climate change 7 1. Definition of climate change 8 2. Causes of climate change: 8 a. Natural causes 8 b. Human causes 9 c. Greenhouse gases and their sources 9 3. Actual situation in Vietnam: 12 III. Impact of Climate change on Viet Nam economy 14 1. Impact of Climate change on economy in general: 14 2. Climate change directly affects every economic sector 15 a. Impacts of climate change on agriculture, forestry and fisheries 15 b. Impact of climate change on industry sector 20 c. .Impacts of climate change on tourism sector 20 d. Impacts of climate change in components of the economy. 22 IV. Policies to deal with problems caused by climate change 26 1. Opportunities 26 2. Meeting the Challenges of Climate Change 26 The Three Approaches in Brief: 27 References 35 Literature Review There are many studies that have examined the effects of climate change on Vietnam’s economy. The majority of findings stated that climate change have negative impacts on Vietnam’s economy and suggest possible adaptation or mitigation measures to lessen the adverse impacts. The economies of some countries...
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...Monday to cut carbon pollution from the nation’s power plants 30 percent from 2005 levels by 2030, according to people briefed on the plan. The proposed rule amounts to the strongest action ever taken by the United States government to fight climate change. Coal-fired power plants are the largest source of the greenhouse gas emissions that scientists blame for trapping heat in the atmosphere and dangerously warming the planet. The rule could trigger a fundamental transformation of the nation’s energy systems – if it withstands an expected onslaught of legal and legislative attacks. In his first term, Mr. Obama tried but failed to push a sweeping climate change bill through Congress. But now, as many Republicans question the science of climate change, and even as many Democrats from coal-dependent states fear that a climate change bill could damage their economies, Mr. Obama is moving ahead on his own. He is using the executive authority under the 1970 Clean Air Act to issue the regulation. Under the proposal to be unveiled on Monday, states will be given a wide menu of policy options to achieve the pollution cuts. Rather than immediately shutting down coal plants, states will be allowed to reduce emissions by making changes across their electricity systems – by installing new wind and solar generation, energy-efficiency technology and by starting or joining state and regional “cap-and-trade” programs, in which states agree to cap carbon pollution and buy and sell...
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...The Effects of Climate on Phytoplankton Introduction Phytoplankton are dependent on climate and are affected greatly by the drastic climate change. Phytoplankton are “floating and swimming algae and photosynthetic prokaryotic organisms of lakes and oceans” (Nester 2012). “Climate change is not restricted to temperature change, but cloudiness and hence surface irradiance are predicted to change as well” (Klauschies 2012). Climate change that effects phytoplankton depends on cell size and food web structure. (Winder 2012). Phytoplankton contribute to only 45,000 μm3) (Klauschies 2012). Each size of phytoplankton has a unique sensitivity to temperature, light and nutrients (Klauschies 2012). “The small-sized algae comprised autotrophic pico-...
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