Researchers determined climate warming caused by a single carbon emission takes only a decade to reach its maximum effect.
The findings contradict common misconceptions that just because we don't feel the warming the effects of global warming today doesn't mean that future generations will not suffer the impacts, the Carnegie Institution reported.
"A lot of climate scientists have intuition about how long it takes to feel the warming from a particular emission of carbon dioxide," said Carnegie's Katharine Ricke. "But that intuition might be a little bit out of sync with our best estimates from today's climate and carbon cycle models."
Most of today's climate models look at the amount of warming caused by emissions sustained over a long period of time, but these analyses have rarely considered the timing of these changes. In this study the researchers combined the results of two large modeling studies: one that looked at how carbon emissions interfered with the global carbon cycle, and one about the effect of carbon's climate that Is used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The results suggest the benefits of actions taken to reduce emissions today would be felt within our lifetimes.
"CO2 emissions cause global temperatures to increase for about a decade, but then temperatures stay high for a long time," said Ken Caldeira, another researcher on the study. "This means if we avoid an emission, we avoid heating that would otherwise occur this decade. This will benefit us and not just our grandchildren. This realization could help break the political logjam over policies designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions."
The authors noted damage caused by warming can also occur over long periods of time, such as in cases of sea level rise and ecosystem degradation.
The findings were published in a recent edition of the journal Environmental Research Letters.
