Every time you open a newspaper there is another article on climate change with facts such as a one metre sea level rise would require new flood defences for New York, London, Mumbai and Shanghai. There are new advances happening all the time hence this volume which is an updated edition of an earlier work by the same editors (Goudie and Cuff, 2002). The 250 plus entries, more than one third written for this edition, include technologies for dealing with carbon dioxide emissions, carbon taxes (three and a half page article), Antarctica (five pages) and other areas undergoing the greatest environmental change (such as China, India and the Arctic), the ongoing controversy surrounding the date of peak oil production (three and one half pages) and developments in geo‐engineering (five and a half pages).
Cuff and Goodie are from Temple University and Oxford University respectively and have edited a book with an impressive array of over 150 contributors from the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and a host of other countries. It covers all the major issues facing humankind at a time of sustained climatic change – the rapid advances are hard to keep up with but this one volume tries to achieve this. There is much interest in global warming after the awareness raising inconvenient truth and, of course, huge uncertainties about the future of global environments. There is even an article entitled “Uncertainty in this book”.
The introduction puts global change into context with a discussion on the developing terms of “global change” and “global environmental change” and goes on to look at the differences between natural and anthropogenic changes in the Earth's physical, chemical and biological systems. It includes six pages of abbreviations, acronyms and symbols followed by a comprehensive section listing contributors. A very useful section is the four‐page listing of entries by subject so that with a quick glance users can find a subject of interest. The bulk of the book is organized in articles alphabetically – these range from Acid Rain to Younger Dryas (the cold climatic interval between 12,900 and 11,600 BP (before the present)). There are many embedded references – both see also and see article. Each article is enriched by references to both books and journals but in the days of the internet the editors point out that none provide current/up to date information and readers are referred to government and private organizations via the web. Articles do contain a limited number of diagrams/maps/tables along with a few black and white photographs.
At the end of the book are four pages of web addresses (called Resources for Citizens) which are taken from Speth (2004). These are grouped by Speth's “eight transitions to sustainability”. A number of interesting tables follow such as Nations Ranked by Environmental Performance Index 2008 (Switzerland is top, UK 14th and USA 39th) along with tables on greenhouse gases by nation, energy resources, etc. A 24‐page extensive index ends the book.
Essential for anyone in this field, this is a good source of climate change information being very comprehensive so that anyone interested in the topic can delve deeper.
