دسته‌ها

Climate change and desertifi cation

چکیده:

Human activities—primarily burning of fossil fuels and changes in land cover—are modifying the concentration of atmospheric constituents or properties of the Earth’s surface that absorb or scatter radiant energy. Global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide have increased markedly as a result of human activities since 1750 and now far exceed pre-industrial values determined from ice cores spanning many thousands of years.
The global atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide increased from a pre-industrial value of about 280 ppm to 379 ppm in 2005. That of methane increased from a pre-industrial value of about 715 ppb to 1732 ppb in the early 1990s, and was 1774 ppb in 2005. The global atmospheric nitrous oxide concentration increased from a pre-industrial value of about 270 ppb to 319 ppb in 2005.