“It’s Getting Hot in Here”: Communicating the San Diego County Ecosystems Report with Buttons
- Climate Science Alliance
- Jun 8, 2018
- 2 min read
Communicating science can be difficult, especially if your audience members aren’t scientists by training. The San Diego County Ecosystems Assessment, a part of California's Fourth Climate Change Assessment to be released in late Summer of 2018, is 150+ pages long. To make the findings more accessible to practitioners, the Alliance developed a 34 page summary magazine, which can be downloaded here. To add a little fun, we created buttons featuring short slogans to communicate key points of the report.
“It’s Getting Hot in Here”
The assessment considers historical climate and environmental observations as well as plausible future climate in the San Diego region, using Relative Concentration Pathways (RCPs). RCP 4.5 reflects intermediate emissions, consistent with future intensive efforts to reduce emissions. RCP 8.5, reflects high emissions scenarios consistent with no future policy and behavioral changes. The graph featured in the background represents the increase of yearly average temperatures under the two paths described. Rap/R&B musician Nelly said it best — “It’s getting hot in here” — under RCP 8.5, the path with no action taken.
The button image is based on a figure from the Third National Climate Assessment: "The lowest emissions pathway shown here, RCP 2.6, assumes immediate and rapid reductions in emissions and would result in about 2.5°F of warming in this century. The highest pathway, RCP 8.5, roughly similar to a continuation of the current path of global emissions increases, is projected to lead to more than 8°F warming by 2100, with a high-end possibility of more than 11°F."
Want more details? Refer to the “Temperature and Temperature Extremes in the San Diego Region” chapter in the summary magazine, viewable here.
Want this button? Enter in our social media contest!
To win this week’s button, follow these simple rules:
Follow the Climate Science Alliance on at least one of our social media channels:
Tag one friend in a comment on this week’s post
That’s it! Each comment counts as one entry, you can comment as many times as you want for more entries. We will randomly select one winner to receive 2 buttons — one for you and one for your friend! Winners will be announced one week from original posting. Good luck!