What Is Climate Variability?

Environmental variation (Environmental variation) refers to a change in the physical and chemical properties or environmental structure of one or more environmental elements of the natural environment, which disrupts the relative balance of natural ecology and threatens or extinct people or biological populations.

Environmental variation is also called environmental anomaly, which refers to the phenomenon that natural or man-made factors cause the environmental system to deviate from the normal state, causing the structure and function of the environment to mutate, thereby causing harm to the survival of humans and other living things. The environment is a relatively stable system, and the damage caused by external interference has a certain ability to recover. An environmental anomaly is only called when the extent of such damage exceeds a certain threshold and environmental systems undergo irreversible changes that harm the ecosystem. ^[1]

Environmental variations include the following types:

Abnormal natural environment: caused by natural processes or natural disasters beyond human control. For example, due to the geochemical structure in some areas, soil and water are rich in certain elements or compounds that are harmful to the human body, which causes the incidence of certain local diseases to be much higher than in other areas, forming endemic diseases; volcanic eruption, a large number of eruption Volcanic gases containing harmful components such as sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, carbon monoxide, hydrogen fluoride, etc., significantly change the composition of the local atmosphere, which in turn affects the environmental chemical characteristics of local areas; strong earthquakes have completely changed the natural environment of local areas, and caused huge ecological system damage Destruction.

Man-made environmental anomalies: In the activities of development, utilization, and transformation of nature, humans transport a large amount of harmful substances to the surrounding environment. Such as the mining and smelting of metal minerals, causing heavy metal pollution in the environment; the large amount of toxic pesticides and chemical fertilizers used in farmland, causing pesticide residues in soil, water bodies, and grains, and causing eutrophication of water bodies. ^[1]

Global warming has mutated the Antarctic climate. The sudden increase in heavy rain has seriously threatened penguin breeding. Tens of thousands of newborn Adelie penguins have not grown their wings and their feathers are not waterproof. As a result of rain, they will be soaked. Frozen to death soon. Scientists believe that if the rainstorm climate continues, the number of Adelie penguins may drop by 80%, or even become extinct within 10 years.

According to the Hong Kong Ming Pao, the temperature of the Antarctic Peninsula has risen by 3 ° C to an average of -14.7 ° C over the past 50 years. Rain has become more common than snow. The newborn Adelie penguin only had thin fluff, and it did not grow waterproof feathers until it was 40 days old. When heavy rain strikes, penguin parents generally protect their children from getting wet. However, once the older penguins go out for food or are killed, the little penguins will be soaked throughout the body without parental protection, and eventually die of hypothermia. . Fluff is not waterproof and susceptible to hypothermia. New York explorer JonBowermaster, who has just returned from Antarctica, said, "Everyone says Antarctic glaciers are melting, but day after day heavy rain is a completely new phenomenon here. In 5 years, the Antarctic heavy rains increased, and we saw the baby Adelie penguins trembling during the 6 days of rain. If it snows, their fluff can completely resist, but the heavy rain can't, it's like you are wearing a feather coat, The whole body was soaked. At night, when the temperature dropped, we saw the baby penguins frozen to death the next morning. Other marine creatures, such as seals, were born with fur for protection, but newborn penguins did not. It was said that 50 days ago, the meteorological station in the area recorded two days of snow and only one day of rain, but the situation has been reversed in the past few years. ^[1]