Climate Variability and Extremes During the Past 100 Years

Abstract

Although the Anthropocene is usually defined as the period since the late eighteenth century when humans started to influence global climate, the past 100 years is the period when the impact of humans on climate has led to a discernible signal above the noise of natural climate variability. Since 1988, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has regularly documented the continuing increase of our knowledge of policy‐relevant scientific and technical issues associated with climate change, and the number of journal articles and books on the topic has grown rapidly. It is therefore difficult to write a book that brings new light to the science issues. The eclectic nature of the areas covered by Climate Variability and Extremes During the Past 100 Years does produce an interesting set of snapshots on the state of our understanding of climate variability. The book, with 55 contributors and 24 chapters, is based on a workshop of the same name. The workshop was held in Switzerland in July 2006 and brought together climatologists, modelers, and chemists. Discussions at the workshop would have been extremely interesting, as modelers commented on the state of the observed climate record and those more focused on observation commented on the ability of models to simulate the climate system. However, the book only records formal papers prepared for the workshop.