Exploration 3C

A Comparison of Very Recent and Past Warming Trends

You have just seen that the rate of change for increasing temperature anomalies is greater over the more recent decades than over the span of time since the industrial revolution in the 1880s. But how does this recent rate of change compare to rate of change determined from the ice core data?

You will need to review your response to Investigation 4.1, Exploration 1, Question 7 (Antarctica) and Investigation 4.1, Exploration 2, Question 8 (Greenland). Fill in these rates of change and the 125-Year and 25-Year rates of change in the table.

table

Compare the average rate of increase of temperature anomalies for the glacial-interglacial periods to the rates of change over the last 125 and 25 years to answer the following questions.

  1. How many times greater is the rate of temperature change for 1885-2010 (since the industrial revolution) than the average for the three Antarctica glacial-interglacial cycles?
  2. How many times greater is the rate of temperature change for 1985-2010 than the average for the three Antarctica glacial-interglacial cycles?
  3. How does the rate of temperature change for 1985-2010 compare to the average for the three Greenland glacial-interglacial periods?
  4. How many times greater is the rate of temperature change for 1985-2010 than the average of the last 125 years?