Lab 11: Climate Change

 

Part One

 

On the second page is graph of Antarctic ice core data taken up until 1999.  The x-axis shows the years before present (BP), based on depth of ice, and the y-axis shows the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in parts per million by volume (ppmv) and the temperature fluctuation in degrees Celsius.  Use this graph, information discussed in class, and relative outside sources to answer the questions below.

 

  1. For hundreds of thousands of years in the past, how do scientists determine the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere at that time?

 

 

  1. How do they determine the temperature?

 

 

  1. How are the CO2 and temperature trends different and how are they alike?

 

 

  1. How would you expect the amount of methane (CH4) to fluctuate in relation to the temperature and the amount of CO2?  Draw what you expect on the graph of the ice core data and explain why methane would fluctuate in that way.

 

 

  1. Ice ages are identified by their colder temperatures.

a)      When was the last ice age?

 

 

b)      What was the temperature difference in Antarctica at that time with respect to the present temperature?

 

 

c)      What was the atmospheric CO2 concentration during the last ice age?

 

 

  1. Are there any other ice ages recorded in this data?  How many? And when?

 

 

  1. When Earth enters an ice age does the climate cool relatively quickly or relatively         

slowly? When it warms is it fast or slow?

 

 

  1. Calculate the rate at which atmospheric CO2 increased (in ppm/year) during the    

warming period that followed the last ice age. (Show your work)

 


 

Part Two

 

Refer to Figure 12.1 and the text, chapter 19, for the following questions regarding the obliquity of the ecliptic.

 

1.  Within a 41,000-year cycle, what is the range of the earth’s axial tilt?

 

 

2.  Describe the climatic conditions in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres if the axial tilt were 0 degrees.

 

 

 

 

3.  Describe the climatic conditions in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres if the axial tilt were 54 degrees.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Part Three

List three human activities that have contributed to climate change and describe how they affect the climate (use the back of page if necessary).