Climate change is now a hot topic discussed worldwide on an almost daily basis. So it is easy to think of it as something new. In fact, the research that has helped us understand climate change dates back to the 18th century.
Following are some of the key moments in the development of people's understanding of climate change.
1753: Joseph Black discovers carbon dioxide by treating limestone (calcium carbonate) and 'magnesia alba' (magnesium carbonate) with acids.
1827: French polymath Jean-Baptiste Fourier predicts an atmospheric effect keeping the Earth warmer than it would otherwise be. He is the first to use a greenhouse analogy.
1863: Irish scientist John Tyndall publishes a paper describing how water vapor can be a greenhouse gas.
1896: Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius realizes that the burning of fossil fuels could lead to global warming.
1924: Based on 1920 coal use, Lotka, a U.S. physicist, speculates that industrial activity will double atmospheric carbondioxide in 500 years.
1979: First World Climate Conference adopts climate change as major issue and calls on governments "to foresee and prevent potential man-made changes in climate."
1985: First major international conference on the greenhouse effect at Villach, Austria, warns that greenhouse gases will "in the first half of the next century, cause a rise of global mean temperature which is greater than any in man's history."
1988: The United Nations sets up the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to analyze and report on scientific findings.
1990: The first report of the IPCC finds that the planet has warmed by 0.5C in the past century. The IPCC warns that only strong measures to halt rising greenhouse gas emissions will prevent serious global warming. This provides scientific clout forU.N. negotiations for a climate convention.
1992: Climate Change Convention (creation of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change), signed by 154 nations in Rio Summit, agrees to prevent "dangerous" warming from greenhouse gases and sets initial target of reducing emissions from industrialized countries to 1990 levels by the year 2000.
1994: On March 21, 1994, the UNFCCC, which was signed at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, comes into force.
1997: Kyoto Protocol, which was adopted at the U.N. climate change conference in Kyoto, Japan, on Dec. 11, 1997, agrees legally binding emissions cuts for industrialized nations, averaging 5.4 percent, to be met by 2010.
2000: IPCC scientists re-assess likely future emissions and warn that, if things go badly, the world could warm by 6C within a century.
2001: On July 27, 178 countries signed the Kyoto Protocol. U.S. President George W. Bush renounces the Kyoto Protocol because he believes it will damage the U.S. economy.
2005: The Kyoto Protocol comes into force on Feb. 16. In December, Kyoto signatories agree to discuss emissions targets for the second compliance period beyond 2012.
2006: Report by former World Bank economist Sir Nicholas Stern says global warming will cost up to 20 percent of worldwide gross domestic product if nothing is done.
2007: IPCC's 4th assessment says glacial shrinkage, ice loss and permafrost retreat are signs that climate change is already underway. It predicts higher risk of drought, floods and more powerful storms this century.
Source: Xinhua
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