What is Climate Change?
This summer will see the release of An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power. The documentary is a sequel to An Inconvenient Truth (2006) on climate change.
Global warming (aka climate change) is now household term. Most people’s understanding is that the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans will become warmer. We hear that the sea level will rise as a result of such warming and the steady melting of polar icebergs. But most people don’t really know by how much. And such dreadful event seems to be some time in the distant future and doesn’t affect our present life and work.
It is noteworthy that global warming refers the rise of average temperature of the whole Earth’s atmosphere and oceans. The rise is 0.8 oC over the last 100 years and the rate of increase is getting faster. The warming is mainly due to human and industrial activities that
generate the so-called greenhouse gases.
Yet 0.8 oC does not sound like much. So what is the worry or big deal?
Climate change is a major cause of concern and nations have made various pledges to work together to reduce the amounts of greenhouse gases caused by traditional industrial activities. China is a signatory of the Paris Agreement and Hong Kong is part of China’s commitment (Links #1 and #2). Hong Kong also joined C40 --a network of megacities committed to addressing climate change (Link #3). As a modern city, the HK Government has joined other cities to “do something”.
Are there opportunities for Hong Kong businesses and entrepreneurs? While there are areas for academic research in climate change, economic opportunities have long time horizons and may deem unattractive in the normal investment sense.
I believe and hope, as citizens of this global community, HK’s young generation will learn more about the subject. Link #4 is an educational report and offers insights to this subject. Many useful reports and books are available from this site. Electronic downloads are free.
