The Climate Crisis

by David Archer, Stefan Rahmstorf

An incredible wealth of scientific data on global warming has been collected in the last few decades. The history of the Earth’s climate has been probed by drilling into polar ice sheets and sediment layers of the oceans’ vast depths, and great advances have been made in computer modeling of our climate. This book provides a concise and accessible overview of what we know about ongoing climate change and its impacts, and what we can do to confront the climate crisis. Using clear and simple graphics in full color, it lucidly highlights information contained in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports, and brings the subject completely up-to-date with current science and policy. The book makes essential scientific information on this critical topic accessible to a broad audience. Obtaining sound information is the first step in preventing a serious, long-lasting degradation of our planet’s climate, helping to ensure our future survival.

Genres: Science, Climate Change, Planetary Science, Nonfiction

260 pages, Paperback

First published December 24, 2009

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

David Edward Archer is a computational ocean chemist, and has been a professor at the Geophysical Sciences department at the University of Chicago since 1993

Reviews

[Robin · Rating 3 out of 5]

If I had rated this book immediately after reading it, I would likely have rated it higher. I read this book first as part of a two-book point/counter-point argument about Global Warming. It is well-written and well-illustrated, and it seemed at the time of reading like a good summary of the argument for Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).

However, the counter-point book that I read was an argument for Milankovitch cycles and insolation being the cause of the earth's climate change rather than CO2 levels. After reading that book, I started to think that much of the argument in The Climate Crisis is beside the point. Most of the chapters of the book outline different ways in which the earth is currently changing. But, if we ignore the talk-radio screeds and just focus on the scientific arguments, the fact that the earth is changing, and even the fact that the earth has been warming of late, is not denied by either side. The real questions are around what is causing the change, and where we expect to go in the future. The counter-point book provided a compelling argument against CO2 as a cause of GW, and I would love to have heard a stronger argument for CO2. Unfortunately, The Climate Crisis takes CO2 as such an obvious cause of GW that it barely defends that point. Worse yet, late in the book, the authors basically state that any scientific argument against AGW is essentially junk science and leave it at that.

In truth, the other book provided a more compelling scientific explanation of climate change. I would love to read an AGW-based response to that argument, but unfortunately, it's not to be found in this book. Hopefully a future edition will incorporate that discussion.

Update: after reading both books, a friend directed me to the website www.skepticalscience.com, which gives extensive discussion to the claims made in the other (anti-AGW) book. So, there are answers out there. This book, therefore, is probably a good introduction to the topic, but if you're already familiar with the issues and want to see the finer points (where the dispute really lies) debated, you won't find that here.

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is primarily a readable summary of the 2007 4th Assessment report of the International Panel on Climate Change. It is important for anyone who wants to know the actual facts of what is and isn't known. Although no specific scientific knowledge is required, it is assumed that the reader is familiar with scientific thinking. If you are put off by graphs, charts and tables of scientific data you may have some difficulty with this book. The last two chapters especially impress on the reader the crucial place society is right now towards this problem. The penultimate chapter "Avoiding Climate Change" shows how technologically and economically it is quite feasible to deal with the problem. The final chapter "Climate Policy" shows the sorry state of mankind's will to face up to this problem to date.

[Sarah Porter · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's not much fun to read, frankly, both because of the grim material it covers and because it's written like a textbook. That said, it totally deserves five stars for being accessible, meticulous, elegant, persuasive, thorough, and terrifically informative. It spends more time countering the arguments of climate change deniers than you might feel the need for if you don't have major doubts yourself, but it does make very clear how indefensible that denial is, not to mention unconscionable. An excellent overview.

[Frederick Bingham · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a more readable summary of the main findings of the IPCC's 4th assessment report. It includes the authors' interpretation of the report and some history behind it. The authors do a fine job of presenting the findings in a way that is both technically correct and accessible to a reasonably intelligent and educated person.

[Buddy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good book for a scientifically literate layperson or a scientist looking for more background on the topic. Nobody could read all of the volumes of the last IPCC report, but this summarizes the results nicely.