Look up a fellow by the name of Will Happer, Princeton University physicist, former Director of Energy Research at the Department of Energy: “I had the privilege of being fired by Al Gore, since I refused to go along with his alarmism....I have spent a long research career studying physics that is closely related to the greenhouse effect....Fears about man-made global warming are unwarranted and are not based on good science. The earth's climate is changing now, as it always has. There is no evidence that the changes differ in any qualitative way from those of the past.”
He will fill you in on the real facts.
For your research, define climate change, in a legal or scientific method. The IPCC defines it this way, "Climate Change is a change in the climate." Wow! Does that advance your knowledge of Climate Change? That is not even up to grade school science let alone a definition for the adults and especially scientists of the world.
So if you really want to do research on Climate Change, define it in a clear way that someone could go to an honest court and say, "This is X, Y and Z. Therefore it is climate change or it is not." Or one can go into laying it out scientifically. That has not been done yet. If you are going to do research on the topic the first thing is to define it in an non-ambiguous method. To do less is meaningless. You would be just as well off to write a research paper on the bogeyman or Santa Claus.
I know that if you persisted in doing that you would fall out of favor with those same ones that bestowed the 'Honors' title on you and you wouldn't retain it to graduation. But which is more important to you, living with a meaningless title, or knowing the truth. Maybe you can have both but you will never get there without defining Climate Change.
Climatology is heavy on dynamics and thermodynamics. If you want to do research on climate change for your final year research you may want to switch you major to mechanical engineering or physics. And get the prerequisite courses on thermodynamics and fluid mechanics. A course than includes infrared analysis would also be useful.
There's going to be a lot of civil infrastructure changes needed because of climate change. You could do research on hardening against storm surges, modification of harbors to accommodate changing sea level, changing wind load requirements, building of reservoirs to compensate for snowpack loss, or improved water handling. You could evaluate new concrete formulations that decrease CO2 output from cement manufacturing. A study on pumped-water energy storage also comes to mind. Check with your adviser about any of these ideas appeal to you.
Talk to your adviser If it is civil engineering degree probably not
BSc Honors Civil Engineering Final Year
