Climate Change exhibit at AMNH

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  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. An exhibition display shows a polar bear crossing a mound of human refuse. What has happened to this magnificent animal? Climate change has altered the rhythms of its life. For much of the year, sea ice is the hunting ground and home of the polar bear (Ursus maritimus). When the ice breaks up, the bears retreat to the edge of the shrinking icepack or to ice-covered land. There, they enter into a nonhunting state sometimes called walking hibernation.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. TRS-80, Model I computer, introduced 1977. Modern conveniences have vastly improved our lives, but when fossil fuels provide the energy to make and power them, the planet's climate pays a price. Currently, using fossil fuels, the largest human-made source of carbon dioxide, adds nearly 30 billion metric tons of the gas to the atmosphere every year.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. A green wall display at the Climate Change exhibition. When it comes to global warming, even small actions?if millions of people do them?can make a big difference. For example, building designers might incorporate wall plantings similar to the one displayed in the photo at right along building facades. Not only do these vertical gardens command attention, they help shade buildings to reduce energy use and CO2 emissions. Green walls and roofs are becoming more widely used on buildings around the world.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. A green wall display at the Climate Change exhibition. When it comes to global warming, even small actions?if millions of people do them?can make a big difference. For example, building designers might incorporate wall plantings similar to the one displayed in the photo at right along building facades. Not only do these vertical gardens command attention, they help shade buildings to reduce energy use and CO2 emissions. Green walls and roofs are becoming more widely used on buildings around the world.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. Today, atmospheric CO2 is at a level that has not been seen on Earth for at least 800,000 years, and probably much longer. The line on this wall-sized graph tracks levels of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere over the last 400 years.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. A model of Manhattan in the Climate Change exhibition shows the effect of rising sea levels. The model you see here doesn't predict the future--but it does illustrate one possible outcome of polar ice sheet meltdown. It shows the southern end of Manhattan Island, a borough currently home to more than 1.5 million people, under 3 and 5 meters (about 10 and 16 feet) of sea-level rise. The higher amount would occur if a significant part of the ice sheets in Greenland or Antarctica melted--a scenario experts consider unlikely to happen anytime soon.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. A model of Manhattan in the Climate Change exhibition shows the effect of rising sea levels. The model you see here doesn't predict the future--but it does illustrate one possible outcome of polar ice sheet meltdown. It shows the southern end of Manhattan Island, a borough currently home to more than 1.5 million people, under 3 and 5 meters (about 10 and 16 feet) of sea-level rise. The higher amount would occur if a significant part of the ice sheets in Greenland or Antarctica melted--a scenario experts consider unlikely to happen anytime soon.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. Today, atmospheric CO2 is at a level that has not been seen on Earth for at least 800,000 years, and probably much longer. The line on this wall-sized graph tracks levels of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere over the last 400 years.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. A transparent, protective blanket envelops Earth. It is the atmosphere, which admits enough of the energy streaming from the Sun to warm our planet and retains enough of that heat to keep it livable. The heat-holding process is called the greenhouse effect. In its absence, Earth's surface temperature would be -18o C (0o F). There would be no liquid water --and no life on the surface.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. Today, atmospheric CO2 is at a level that has not been seen on Earth for at least 800,000 years, and probably much longer. The line on this wall-sized graph tracks levels of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere over the last 400 years.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. Today, atmospheric CO2 is at a level that has not been seen on Earth for at least 800,000 years, and probably much longer. The line on this wall-sized graph tracks levels of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere over the last 400 years.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. An exhibition display shows a polar bear crossing a mound of human refuse. What has happened to this magnificent animal? Climate change has altered the rhythms of its life. For much of the year, sea ice is the hunting ground and home of the polar bear (Ursus maritimus). When the ice breaks up, the bears retreat to the edge of the shrinking icepack or to ice-covered land. There, they enter into a nonhunting state sometimes called walking hibernation.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. An exhibition display shows a polar bear crossing a mound of human refuse. What has happened to this magnificent animal? Climate change has altered the rhythms of its life. For much of the year, sea ice is the hunting ground and home of the polar bear (Ursus maritimus). When the ice breaks up, the bears retreat to the edge of the shrinking icepack or to ice-covered land. There, they enter into a nonhunting state sometimes called walking hibernation.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. An exhibition display shows a polar bear crossing a mound of human refuse. What has happened to this magnificent animal? Climate change has altered the rhythms of its life. For much of the year, sea ice is the hunting ground and home of the polar bear (Ursus maritimus). When the ice breaks up, the bears retreat to the edge of the shrinking icepack or to ice-covered land. There, they enter into a nonhunting state sometimes called walking hibernation.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future.
  • New York. American Museum of Natural Histoty. Exhibiiton on Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future. Light bulbs from the late 1800s?early 1900s.Electric light was a revelation: bright, constant and safe. The first light bulbs, though small and inefficient, gave off 20 times the light of a candle. The discovery caught on quickly; American light-bulb inventor Thomas Edison opened his Lower Manhattan electricity generating station in 1882 and within 14 months had 508 subscribers.
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