Climate change

ISSUES

The greenhouse effect is a well-known mechanism. It was discovered in the 19th Century : Joseph Fourier described it as early as 1824. Briefly: the gases in the atmosphere absorb some of the energy of sunlight and, in doing so, heat the planet. The more gases there are, the more they heat the planet. There are many gases: water vapour, CO2, methane, nitrous oxide, etc. Thanks to these gases, the Earth's average temperature is compatible with our existence. Without them, it would go down to -18°C.
In 1896, the Swedish researcher Arrhenius calculated that if the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere doubled, the average temperature would go up by 4°C.
A historical modification
Human activity has considerably increased certain greenhouse gases. For CO2, the world atmospheric concentration went from about 280 ppm (parts per million) in 1750 to 380 ppm in 2005. This increase is mainly due to the use of fossil fuels (transport...

NEWS

Sorry, most of the news are only available in French language for the moment.

FRANCE - PARIS - Nicolas Sarkozy a réclamé jeudi à Paris une nouvelle méthode de travail sur le réchauffement climatique,...

CHINA - Une étude réalisée par la Carnegie Institution de Washington révèle que près d’un tiers des émissions de CO2 associées...

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - NEW YORK - L'ONU a chargé mercredi une organisation scientifique internationale de renom de superviser les travaux de...

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DEBATES

Why scientists must be the new climate sceptics

New Scientist

The source of the problems is been well documented: the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, UK,...

Tabloid Climate Science

The first story was timed to appear just before December’s...

Overcoming the Copenhagen Failure

It was, of course, nice that world leaders could agree that...

FOCUS

A climate Seattle

The Seattle demonstrations, during the 1999 WTO summit put alter-globalization on the international agenda and influenced negotiations for years. If the Copenhagen summit causes popular mobilization on such a...

VIDEOS

03/03/2010	The ACT ON CO2 campaign launches its Bedtime Stories TV advert on 9...	18/02/2010	Si la neige n'était pas tombée juste avant le début des Jeux Olympes de...
09/02/2010	Robert Gallaire, a glaciologist working in the Andes explains the...	05/02/2010	François Gemenne, researcher at the IDDR, explains some of the...

GREEN TIPS

In Albi, light is cheap

The town of Albi has installed which are more eco-friendly. These produce good quality white light which...

INDICATORS

Carbon dioxide emissions
Ecological footprint
Total Primary Energy Supply

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