The Nature of Quaternary Climate Change

Dynamic interactions between atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, and biosphere, driven by solar energy and modulated by atmospheric greenhouse gasses, volcanism, and plate tectonics produce substantial variations in Earth's climate over geologic time. Major Quaternary drivers of climate change include variations in Earth's orbital cycles, global temperature, natural atmospheric greenhouse gasses, and continental ice mass. Multiple abrupt climate perturbations with onsets of a century to decades have also occurred. Since the 1970s, geologically unprecedented rising levels of anthropogenic greenhouse gasses from fossil fuel combustion, industry, and agriculture have become the dominant contributors to rising global temperature, glacier and ice sheet losses, and sea level rise.