mandag 25. juni 2018

Is overpopulation the root cause of global warming?

Population growth is not the direct cause of global warming, burning fossil fuels is. It’s not overpopulation that causes climate change, it’s overconsumption:

“It is the ravenous demands of the rich world that is enlarging the human footprint on our planet – pumping greenhouse gases into the air, polluting the oceans, trashing forests and the rest. Any further rise in numbers of poor people will barely figure in that.”

Befolkningsvekst er ikke den direkte årsaken til global oppvarming, det er det bruken av fossilt brensel som er. Det er ikke overbefolkning som forårsaker klimaendringer, det er overforbruk:

Det er den rike verdens enorme hunger etter mer som forstørrer det menneskelige fotavtrykket på planeten vår - som pumper drivhusgasser i luften, som forurenser havene, ødelegger skogene og miljøet. Enhver økning i antall fattige mennesker i verden vil knapt bidra til dette. 



“Of course, you might argue the world is already overpopulated. Given the way we plunder its resources, that seems so. But why do we blame the poor in Africa for having babies when the real issue is overconsumption closer to home?

That is not to say there aren’t local environmental crises caused in part by soaring population numbers, such as falling levels in water reservoirs. Nor that rising African numbers won’t complicate their efforts at economic development. But let’s not blame them for the state of the planet. That is down to us – the overconsumers, whose numbers are largely stable but whose appetites seem infinite.”

It’s not overpopulation that causes climate change, it’s overconsumption | Fred Pearce

Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe explains:





Where some of the confusion comes from is that CO2 emissions are reasonably well correlated to population.There’s every indication that the relationship between population and global warming and GDP and global warming has been broken. And that continued penetration of wind and solar generation and electrification of transportation will fundamentally destroy the historical relationship.

That’s really good news.

What Does Overpopulation Have To Do With Global Warming?


As the video explains, the concern about overpopulation started back in the 1960s when a population boom – spurred on by the end of World War II – caused a bunch of doomsday hypotheses to emerge about what would happen if the Earth were covered head to toe in humanity. Eventually cities would be overrun and we'd all run out of resources, right? Kurzgesagt argues that this is a misconception, because population growth is not a runaway problem. It’s controlled by a four-stage process that intricately connected to economics, and much of the world has already been through most of the steps.


Hans Rosling was a Swedish medical doctor, academic, statistician and public speaker. He was Professor of International Health at Karolinska Institute and co-founder and chairman of the Gapminder Foundation, which developed the Trendalyzer software system. In this talk 'Don't Panic - The Truth About Population' he comprehensively dispels the Human overpopulation myth which has been introduced into the subconscious mind of viewers of mainstream broadcasted media communications over the past thirty years.


From about 1880 our C02 emissions STARTED TO DOMINATE CC , and after 1950, according to scientists, humans are the dominant cause of CC. 

Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4), Volume I peer reviewed by the National Academy of Sciences, the world’s most prestigious academy, founded by Abraham Lincoln, with over 200 Nobel Price winners among their members.

This report is an authoritative assessment of the science of climate change, with a focus on the United States. It represents the first of two volumes of the Fourth National Climate Assessment, mandated by the Global Change Research Act of 1990.

The 600 page report was created from input by scientists working at 13 different federal government agencies. “Based on extensive evidence … it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century,”

For the warming over the last century, there is no convincing alternative explanation supported by the extent of the observational evidence.

Climate Science Special Report: Executive Summary



 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

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