Posts tagged : "Global warming"

Kourosh Ziabari - Asia Times: Unprecedented water shortages in Iran have sparked protests across southwestern Khuzestan that have quickly spread to other regions, a popular uprising that threatens wider stability as authorities violently crack down. Residents of Khuzestan provincial cities have taken to the streets for the past 12 days to demand a swift solution to the water crisis and resignation of local authorities who they believe are corrupt and incompetent. In a show of solidarity, people across Iran in Aligudarz, Karaj, Isfahan, Mashhad, Tabriz, Tehran, Saqqez, Zanjan and various other cities have also taken to the streets, chanting slogans decrying authorities for their perceived endemic mismanagement of Khuzestan. On...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: Climate change is a complex threat to life on Earth, driving countless shifts worldwide, and it is only through collective action on the individual, national, regional and international levels that it can be addressed meaningfully. The provision of food, fiber, fuel and freshwater, without which human society and its economy cannot survive, is jeopardized by the rising global temperature and record levels of land and freshwater exploitation. The UN Secretary General António Guterres has termed climate change the “defining challenge of our time.” Some experts talk of climate change as a “threat multiplier” that even has the potential to increase the risk of political instability and terrorism. Climate...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: The world is reeling from an unprecedented, lethal pandemic and governments are scrambling to come up with a remedy in the form of a vaccine that can tamp down the torrent of deaths and infection it is causing. It is intrinsic that the scourge of COVID-19 and the global economic recession associated with it represent the leitmotif of daily conversations, soaking up the attention of media and the public. At this critical time, it might be that such pressing global challenges as global warming are overlooked. But let’s face it: our summers and winters are getting warmer; with the rise of sea levels at rates not chronicled in some 3,000 years, cities as colossal as Jakarta might be submerged altogether; the...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: Facts about climate change are frightening enough to prod conscientious citizens of the 21st century into taking swift action to avert the tragedy which now looms large over their lives and survival. According to NASA data, the average global temperatures in 2019 were warmer than the entire 20th century average. Eleven percent of the world’s population, namely 800 million people, is highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. Global warming and extreme weather conditions are responsible for as many as 150,000 deaths annually. And despite the abundance of figures and studies pointing to the acuteness of the situation, there are leaders who irresponsibly call climate change a hoax and deny climate science...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: It was in 1965 when scientists on the US President’s Science Advisory Committee broached the idea of a “greenhouse effect” that was sparking concerns about the rising temperature of the Earth, and no more than a decade later, the distinguished geoscientist Wallace Broecker coined the term “global warming”, which took a while to enter the mainstream debate but carved a fundamentally new path for research and excavation into how anthropogenic activities accelerate the heating of the planet and endanger the lives of humans and other species. The international community’s fight to tackle climate change as a concern of universal proportions started more than three decades ago, when the...

Kourosh Ziabari: Climate change is a complex threat to life on Earth, driving countless shifts worldwide, and it is only through collective action on the individual, national, regional and international levels that it can be addressed meaningfully. The provision of food, fibre, fuel and freshwater, without which human society and its economy cannot survive, is jeopardized by the rising global temperature and record levels of land and freshwater exploitation. The UN Secretary General António Guterres has termed climate change the “defining challenge of our time.” Some experts talk of climate change as a “threat multiplier” that even has the potential to increase the risk of political instability and terrorism. Climate change...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: There is unanimity among scientists that the Earth’s climate is presently changing faster at any point in the history of modern civilization, and this inauspicious change, unleashing a variety of negative impacts on human life, is chiefly triggered by anthropogenic activities. As evidenced by a plethora of academic and scholarly research, the worrying growth of the emissions of heat-tapping greenhouse gases, deforestation, land-use change and solid waste and waste water generation are only some of the drivers of a phenomenon some experts have warned is the most conspicuous threat to human rights in our time. Climate change affects human communities in a number of ways. Human health, infrastructure and...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: Our world is getting warmer, and it is almost entirely triggered by human activity. It is not a hoax, myth or a conspiracy theory, as some politicians tend to suggest. The atmospheric gases known as “greenhouse gases” are largely responsible for the greenhouse effect, which is one of the chief drivers of global warming. Global greenhouse gas emissions have soared at a rate of roughly 2 percent annually since 1970. In 2015, 195 countries and the European Union subscribed to a comprehensive agreement aiming to keep the global warming levels at well below 2°C, and ideally above 1.5°C. The agreement is believed to be the first genuine global commitment to address the climate dilemma. Climate change disrupts...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: Finland is a country of fascinating and stark contrasts — long and glittery summer nights and short, snowy winter days, the midnight sun and the winter darkness. The country earned its nickname, the Land of the Midnight Sun, because of the sun doesn’t set at all in its northernmost parts during summer months. Finland is a land of islands, boasting some 187,888 lakes, and is believed to be one of the most extensive and unspoiled natural environments in Europe. However, Finland has been affected by global warming and climate change in its own ways. The Finnish Meteorological Institute has projected that in the near future, temperatures will rise, precipitation will surge, snow cover and soil...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: Today, climate change is being talked of as the most defining issue of our time and the biggest threat the human race faces going into the future. The rise of global temperatures, warming oceans, shrinking ice sheets, decreased snow cover, glacial retreats, rise of sea levels, ocean acidification and extreme weather events ensure that scientists have compelling evidence of rapid climate change. This man-made catastrophe needs to be addressed through concerted supranational efforts aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and making global energy consumption more sustainable. According to NASA, the current global warming trend is particularly significant because most of it is reported to be the...