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Anthropogenic Climate Change: Observed Facts, Projected Vulnerabilities and Knowledge Gaps

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Earth System Processes and Disaster Management

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Abstract

Rising temperatures on earth especially during the later half of the twentieth century have been largely attributed to increasing greenhouse gases (GHG) levels in atmosphere, due to worldwide growth in fossil fuel consumptions by the industrialized nations. Though there are several other offspring of industrial revolution other than GHGs, e.g., increased atmospheric water vapor, aerosols, which also may affect terrestrial climate in either way on shorter timescales, understanding their net role in terms of climate change on regional to global scale remains limited (IPCC 2007). In aggregate, though anticipated anthropogenic climate changes have generated immense curiosity, concerns and lucid debates among intellectuals, scientific experts as reported by Rockstörm et al. (Nature 461:472–475, 2009) broadly agree that deeper understanding is required on how these anthropogenic drivers mutually interact among themselves and most importantly with natural drivers in terms of their net climatic impact. In this communication, we intend to put forward some of the established facts of anthropogenic climate change, projected vulnerabilities of immediate concern and important knowledge gaps that are yet to be explored and understood.

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Acknowledgements

RA thanks Director, NPL New Delhi for facilities and Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) for financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Physical Laboratory (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research), New Delhi, 110012, India

    Rajesh Agnihotri

  2. Large Lakes Observatory, University of Minnesota-Duluth, 2205 East 5th Street, Duluth, MN, 55812, USA

    Koushik Dutta

Authors
  1. Rajesh Agnihotri
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  2. Koushik Dutta
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rajesh Agnihotri .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Dept. OF Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Lucknow, 226016, India

    Rajiv Sinha

  2. The Society of Earth Sciences, Indira Nagar, National Center for Antarctic and Ocean, C-207, Lucknow, 226016, India

    Rasik Ravindra

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Agnihotri, R., Dutta, K. (2013). Anthropogenic Climate Change: Observed Facts, Projected Vulnerabilities and Knowledge Gaps. In: Sinha, R., Ravindra, R. (eds) Earth System Processes and Disaster Management. Society of Earth Scientists Series. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-28845-6_10

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