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Climate Change Backgrounders
(High School)
Climate Change Backgrounders consist of an “Overview” and three sets of background information:
- The Overview provides a snapshot of the world’s changing climate and its impacts
- The Basics set describes climate change, its causes and scientific research on the subject
- The Impacts set shows how climate change is affecting the planet – particularly the north.
- The Solutions set shows how we can reduce GHG emissions and slow climate change
To choose backgrounders to use for your class, click on the links below.
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Overview |
- How climate is changing worldwide and in the north
- How greenhouse gases affect the climate and how humans have contributed
- Current and expected impacts
- Solutions - what each of us can do to reduce greenhouse gases
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Basics |
- Greenhouse Effect basics - how it works, how the atmosphere traps heat
- Greenhouse gases - what they are, why carbon dioxide is important
- Why the north’s temperatures are expected to increase more than elsewhere
- What are the main GHGs, which have greatest impact, how they get into the atmosphere
- Carbon - how it is added to the atmosphere and how it is taken out
- Fossil fuels - where they come from and why they add CO2 to the atmosphere
- How melting permafrost contributes methane and CO2 to the atmosphere
- The difference between weather and climate
- How a region’s climate is mainly defined by temperature and moisture
- The movement of heat and moisture around the world
- The link between climate and biomes
- El Niño and la Niña - an examples of how our regional climates are interconnected
- Data collection from ice cores, tree rings, sediment analysis and indigenous information
- Melting ice patches in southern Yukon - what do they reveal?
- Current information-gathering - internationally and in northern communities
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Impacts |
- Changes in northern landscapes: permafrost, wetlands, changing plant and tree species
- Impacts on forests - trees can migrate, but can other forest elements?
- Forest fires on the increase and impacts on CO2 levels in the atmosphere
- Sea ice - thinning and melting, effects of more dark water surface
- Northwest Passage – a shipping future? Impacts on the north and Canada
- Rising sea levels, early break-up
- Snow cover and ice thickness – how are they related?
- Melting glaciers, impacts of increased freshwater on the “ocean conveyor belt”
- Caribou – what effect is climate change having on them?
- Moving north – moose and other animals
- Effects on small mammals
- Increased insects and parasites – impacts on wildlife and forests
- Impacts on fish – warmer water, more sedimentation, lower water levels, more parasites
- Changing bird populations – water birds, snow geese, positive and negative impacts
- The marine food chain – from plankton to bear
- Impacts on polar bears, seals, walruses, and other marine animals.
- Melting permafrost – impacts on infrastructure such as airports, roads and buildings
- Impacts galore – heating costs; shipping routes; outdoor safety; agriculture, etc.
- Living on a quickly changing land – problems for traditional cultures, safety
- Adapting to climate change impacts
- Worldwide impacts – rising sea levels, drought, storms, insects and changing snowfields
- Social impacts – starvation, disease, population migrations, water conflicts, etc.
- Poorer countries – paying the price for rich-country industrialization
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Solutions |
- Renewable and non-renewable energy
- Power in the north – hydropower or diesel generators: what are the problems?
- Renewable energy – what are the sources? What’s happening in the north?
- Barriers and opportunities
- How are Canadians doing on GHG emissions?
- Ideas to lower the emissions we produce: at home, with our cars and when we buy things
- The idling problem – one way to reduce
- Organizing for change
- Ideas to help students and schools reduce electricity and heating costs, and educate others
- Energy savings - how to reinvesting
- International climate change discussions from 1988 to Kyoto
- The Kyoto Protocol - what it contains
- Four key debates on climate change
- What governments in Canada are doing to reduce emissions
- Developing a climate change action plan – what is it? How can we get one?
- What businesses are doing to reduce their emissions
- Transportation innovation – an international effort to reduce GHG emissions
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