Met6: The scientific consensus on why Earth's temperature is increasing (v1.1)

 We now know the earth's temperature is increasing and also know the key components in play that influences the earth's temperature. 

Now without further ado, I will state why earth’s temperature has been increasing (at least since 1970). This is the overwhelming scientific consensus. The consensus that it is due to human activity is overwhelming. There is also a very strong consensus that greenhouse gases are the primary factor.

Human caused verdict consensus percent: >99% (2021 study). This human role in climate change is considered "unequivocal" and "incontrovertible". 

These scientific organizations have not issued statements in a void; they echo the findings of individual papers published in refereed scientific journals. The Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) maintains a database of science papers. Over 88,125 English language scientific papers have been published since 2012. Multiple studies of this database (based on sampling) show evidence of overwhelming agreement among climate scientists. 

Statement on climate change from 18 scientific associations.

"Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver." (2009)

American Association for the Advancement of Science

"Based on well-established evidence, about 97% of climate scientists have concluded that human-caused climate change is happening."

American Chemical Society

"The Earth’s climate is changing in response to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and particulate matter in the atmosphere, largely as the result of human activities." (2016-2019)

American Geophysical Union

"Based on extensive scientific evidence, it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. There is no alterative explanation supported by convincing evidence." (2019)

American Medical Association

"Our AMA ... supports the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s fourth assessment report and concurs with the scientific consensus that the Earth is undergoing adverse global climate change and that anthropogenic contributions are significant." (2019) 

American Meteorological Society

"Research has found a human influence on the climate of the past several decades ... The IPCC (2013), USGCRP (2017), and USGCRP (2018) indicate that it is extremely likely that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-twentieth century." (2019)

American Physical Society

"Earth's changing climate is a critical issue and poses the risk of significant environmental, social and economic disruptions around the globe. While natural sources of climate variability are significant, multiple lines of evidence indicate that human influences have had an increasingly dominant effect on global climate warming observed since the mid-twentieth century." (2015) 

The Geological Society of America

"The Geological Society of America (GSA) concurs with assessments by the National Academies of Science (2005), the National Research Council (2011), the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2013) and the U.S. Global Change Research Program (Melillo et al., 2014) that global climate has warmed in response to increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases ... Human activities (mainly greenhouse-gas emissions) are the dominant cause of the rapid warming since the middle 1900s (IPCC, 2013)." (2015)

International Academies: Joint Statement

"Climate change is real. There will always be uncertainty in understanding a system as complex as the world’s climate. However there is now strong evidence that significant global warming is occurring. The evidence comes from direct measurements of rising surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures and from phenomena such as increases in average global sea levels, retreating glaciers, and changes to many physical and biological systems. It is likely that most of the warming in recent decades can be attributed to human activities (IPCC 2001)." (2005, 11 international science academies) 

U.S. National Academy of Sciences

"Scientists have known for some time, from multiple lines of evidence, that humans are changing Earth’s climate, primarily through greenhouse gas emissions."

U.S. Global Change Research Program

"Earth’s climate is now changing faster than at any point in the history of modern civilization, primarily as a result of human activities." (2018, 13 U.S. government departments and agencies)

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

“It is unequivocal that the increase of CO2, methane, and nitrous oxide in the atmosphere over the industrial era is the result of human activities and that human influence is the principal driver of many changes observed across the atmosphere, ocean, cryosphere, and biosphere.

“Since systematic scientific assessments began in the 1970s, the influence of human activity on the warming of the climate system has evolved from theory to established fact.”

List of Worldwide Scientific Organizations

The following page lists the nearly 200 worldwide scientific organizations that hold the position that climate change has been caused by human action.
http://www.opr.ca.gov/facts/list-of-scientific-organizations.html

 Here is a graph of greenhouse gas emissions in the world. 







Per capita greenhouse emission of some key countries. 


In Hawaii where I live, Energy (fossil fuels - primarily for power and transport sectors) constitutes 85.8% of greenhouse gas emissions. AFOLU (Agriculture/Forestry/Other Land Use) is 6.1%. IPPU (Industrial Processes/Product Use) is 4.1%. Waste is 4.0%. Emissions are dominated by CO2 (88.9%), followed by Methane (5.4%), followed by HFC's and PFCs - chlorofluorocarbons and hydrofluorocarbons (4%) and NO2 (1.7%). Total emissions were 16.32 MMT CO2 equivalent in 2020 which reduces to 13.64 MMT CO2 equivalent after factoring in carbon sinks (like from photosynthesis).   

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