As atmospheric carbon dioxide levels climb higher than they have been in the last two million years, we face the challenge of adapting to and mitigating the effects of climate change. How do we know that humans are responsible for climate change? What effects of climate change can we see already? How can geology help understand what a future warm world might look like? In this talk, Dr. Tierney will take us through the past, present, and future trajectory of Earth’s climate and discuss how paleoclimatologists query the ancient record of climate change to improve our understanding of the future.

Chapters (navigate to in progress bar or lower-right corner of the video):
1. Beginning (00:18)
2. Carbon dioxide measurements and its sources (01:42)
3. Fourier, carbon dioxide, and electromagnetic spectrum (05:58)
4. Greenhouse effect (09:36)
5. Global temperature record (11:42)
6. Receding glaciers, Miami sea level rise, California 1000-year drought, climate extremes (12:32)
7. Paleoclimate as a window to future (14:50)
8. Ice cores and 800,000 years of carbon dioxide and methane (16:30)
9. Sediment cores and proxies for climate (17:30)
10. Foraminifera, a paleo geologist’s friend (19:32)
11. 2.5Ma (million years ago), last time the for an atmosphere with over 400ppm CO2—until today (20:38)
12. Humans are an ice-age species (21:44)
13. Model of Pliocene temperature (23:20)
14. Temperature of past 65Ma, CO2 and greenhouse climate of 56-34 Ma Eocene. Giant snakes and crocodiles in Arctic! (23:41)
15. Palms in Antarctica! (27:30)
16. Eocene ocean temperature/warm poles (28:06)
17. Eocene not a stable climate, PETM (Paleo Eocene Thermal Maximum) 55Ma (29:17)
18. PETM and loss of shell carbonates 100,000-year recovery (30:34)
19. Present warming rate is faster than PETM (33:50)
20. Summary: climate change is real and bad, but there is hope for us (34:52)
21. IPCC projections/Pliocene vs Eocene as our possible future (35:42)
22. Nobel scientist Sherwood Rowland quote (37:58)
23. End (38:40)

A new energy system is emerging. The Paris Agreement has sent a signal around the world: climate change is a serious issue that governments are determined to address. By 2070 there is the potential for a very different energy system to emerge. The Sky Scenario, developed by Shell, outlines what they believe to be a technologically, industrially, and economically possible route forward, consistent with limiting the global average temperature rise to well below 2°C from pre-industrial levels. It reveals the potential for an energy system to emerge that brings modern energy to all in the world, without delivering a climate legacy that society cannot readily adapt to. But while encouraging news, success towards the Paris Agreement aim is not guaranteed. The Sky Scenario relies on a complex combination of mutually reinforcing actions by society, markets and governments. It recognises that the necessary changes will unfold at different paces in different places, and must ultimately transform all sectors of economic activity. The changes are economy-wide, sector-specific, and amount to re-wiring the global economy in just 50 years.

Chapters (found at the lower-right corner of the video):
1. Beginning (00:19)
2. Early 20th century perspective (01:33)
3. 1912 newspaper article about coal combustion and climate change, 1896 Arrhenius' paper on doubling CO2 and global temperature increase (02:09)
4. Visualizing a metric ton of carbon dioxide, visualizing a daily amount (107 million tons per day) of emissions (03:50)
5. Mauna Loa CO2 record since 1958, now over 410 ppm with an increasing rate of rise (04:50)
6. Resulting rising surface temperature trend since 1950 of about 0.2°C per decade (05:31)
7. Image of 5 minutes of global coal production as represented in equivalent freight train cars (07:00)
8. Figure of global energy system in 2020 as 80% fossil fuels (07:30)
9. False starts such as the electric car in the early 20th century (09:30)
10. Paris Agreement of 2015 and its goals, 25 years in the making, sea level rise with 1.5°C vs 2.0°C goal (10:40)
11. Figure of negative emissions needed to meet Paris Agreement in second half of century (12:48)
12. National Determined Contributions (NDCs) of the Paris Agreement and improvement process every 5 years (14:39)
13. Attributes of existing energy system, persistence of coal, stalled technologies, demand growth (16:24)
14. Scenarios as a tool to explore possible futures (not a forecast) (19:52)
15. The Sky Scenario within a family of scenarios, concept of mechanisms to share common interest (e.g. the UN at grand scale or AGCI at smaller scale), nation state inconsistencies (21:03)
16. 5-year increments of review for NDCs (23:20)
17. Six components of Sky Scenario (carbon pricing, energy efficiency, electrification, new energy deployment, carbon capture/storage, and ending deforestation) all with new societal engagement (26:27)
18. Carbon pricing in Sky, $65/ton CO2 by 2030 (27:08)
19. Energy efficiency, doubling sequence needed (28:01)
20. Electrification, e.g. electric cars (29:51)
21. New energy systems (wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, etc.), peaking of fossil fuels but persistent uses, emerging role of hydrogen/fuel cells/aviation (32:42)
22. Carbon capture and storage (CCS), Bioenergy with CCS (BECCS) (38:03)
23. Figure of Sky in 2020 (41:17)
24. Figure of Sky in 2050 (42:50)
25. Figure of Sky in 2070 with no net emissions to atmosphere (44:05)
26. Figure of Sky in 2100 with negative emissions (draw-down from the atmosphere) (44:43)
27. End of deforestation (45:16)
28. Decline in non-CO2 greenhouse gases, e.g. nitrous oxide, methane, non-fossil CO2, etc. (45:50)
29. Plugging Sky assumptions into a climate model with results below 2°C by 2100 and results for less aggressive scenarios, role for massive reforestation to achieve 1.5°C (46:55)
30. Summary of present system today compared to the Sky Scenario (50:00)
31. How to download the report on the Sky Scenario: www.shell.com/skyscenario (51:50)
32. End (52:27)

NOAA senior science advisor Roger Pulwarty reflects on how science and learning can help us adapt to an uncertain future in the semi-arid Intermountain West and beyond. In a humorous and entertaining manner, the lecture highlights innovative lessons from communities with which Dr. Pulwarty has worked and addresses barriers and opportunities for applying research to support communities in managing risk and developing new networks for sharing knowledge.

Chapters (navigate to in progress bar or lower-right corner of the video):
1. Beginning (00:19)
2. Water crisis ranked among top global issues (02:57)
3. AGCI’s role in exploring drought and AGCI’s cohort of researchers/collaborations (03:50)
4. Gilbert White and living with risk (05:20)
5. Changing climate conditions, disasters, and societal costs (06:55)
6. Damages from droughts are hard to quantify (09:10)
7. Importance of the rate of change, e.g. the Southwest has states with fastest population growth rates (10:52)
8. Settlement patterns and fire hazard in California, wildfire in the west, trends, extent, severity, and response (14:10)
9. Risk lessons learned, California drought case (18:20)
10. Spillway failure of Oroville Dam in 2017, compound risk of drought and flood (20:00)
11. Lake Powell input deficit (24:20)
12. Drought in the Four Corners region (25:45)
13. Four Corners sand dune movement, drought and vegetation loss/response (27:08)
14. San Francisco water infrastructure & non-potable water, role of leadership to counter political resistance to change, and how to accomplish that (28:49)
15. Assessing costs, U.S. GDP and water withdrawals, role of regulation, efficiency and innovation (32:14)
16. How mitigation reduces damages from natural hazards and saves lives and dollars (34:20)
17. Value of land use planning and design, communicating the value (35:04)
18. Drought, conflict, and fragile states (37:09)
19. Famine Early Warning system, role of Band-Aid for Ethiopia, avoiding conflict (37:52)
20. Tipping points, re-droughts, and other environmental issues (41:20)
21. Proactive strategies, 5 Paradoxes in reducing risk (43:10)
22. Planning to implementation, drivers of disaster risk, co-production, and sustainability framing (46:10)
23. Overconfidence in context of uncertainty, adaptation, and elements of what works (50:56)
24. Proximity in time to 450ppm carbon dioxide (53:50)
25. Roger's mentors, needs moving forward, and working with practitioners (54:14)
26. End (55:42)

The global food system is vast and complex, but how secure is it? Dr. Rosamond Naylor, Senior Fellow and Founding Director, Center on Food Security and the Environment, explores the food system starting with civilization’s domestication of grains from hybrid crossing to modern genetic modification techniques, considering the trade-offs inherent in feeding the world’s growing population. Dr. Naylor explores possible solutions to the vexing problems of climate change, resource depletion, population growth, changing diets, poverty, and conflict.

Chapters (navigate to in the progress bar or at the lower-right corner of the video):
1. Beginning (00:19)
2. Overview of the global food system (01:15)
3. Four food system pillars (availability, access, utilization, stability) (02:10)
4. Seeds and the Green Revolution (03:47)
5. Malnutrition & micronutrients (05:45)
6. Nutrition security, empty calories (07:45)
7. Resources, environment, and climate change (08:12)
8. Change in growing season, prevalence of pests & pathogens; (09:50)
9. Genetic modification (12:11)
10. Crop loss to pests, control of pests, pest crop resistance (14:22)
11. Bacillus thuringiensis, no till framing, and farm management (19:35)
12. Mark Lynas's book on GMO science (22:55)
13. CRISPR (25:25)
14. Food systems in West Africa, PV water pumping for irrigation, improved yields and variety of crops (26:55)
15. Terrestrial and aquatic animal protein innovation (33:50)
16. Solution pathways, systems integration, technology transfer, diversity and cultural preference (38:20)
17. Human populations, rural communities, reproductive health (42:50)
18. End (46:59)

What is coral bleaching? Why does the acidity and temperature of the ocean matter to corals? What is driving the stressors to coral reef systems and how are they projected to fair in the coming decades? Dr. Joanie Kleypas gives an engaging and colorful presentation of life below the ocean's surface and how human activity is damaging coral ecosystems. Dr. Kleypas utilizes the latest in ocean modeling to project future ocean conditions juxtaposed with the global distribution of coral reefs, concluding with stories about promising attempts at reef restoration and strategies for reducing climate impacts on our oceans.

Chapters (navigate to in the progress bar or at the lower-right corner of the video):
1. Beginning (00:19)
2. Global map of coral reefs, area of coral reefs in comparison to Texas (01:38)
3. Coral reefs defined (02:45)
4. Threats to coral reefs such as climate change, pollution, exploitation (03:45)
5. Carbon cycle-sources and sinks, gas law, acidification; (04:14)
6. Global temperature projections, corresponding ocean pH changes (06:16)
7. Coral bleaching, the biology of coral, coral secretions form reefs as an abiotic structure of calcium carbonate (07:34)
8. Coral symbiosis with algae that photosynthesize, coral bleaching and ocean temperature, significant coral loss by mid-century (08:28)
9. Heat stress impacts on coral and NOAA global simulation of heat stress (11:14)
10. Map of severe coral reef bleaching (12:45)
11. Ocean acidification due to carbon dioxide into ocean, acidification chemistry, damage to shell formation (13:14)
12. Overview of the pH scale and ocean chemistry, impact on plant and animal life (15:22)
13. Acidification and corals, marine ecosystems and biodiversity loss (18:05)
14. Coral life cycle, implications for restoration, species interactions-bioerosion (20:40)
15. Media reporting (25:39)
16. Restoration strategies: reduce stressors, improved modeling to guide restoration (27:00)
17. Coral spawning event video, sources and sinks of larvae and relation to ocean currents (30:43)
18. Reef restoration techniques (33:30)
19. Summary: identify adaptation ability of different species, reduce stressors (33:48)
20. End (35:04)