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Causes of Global Warming
Causes of Global Warming
Humans create an excessive amount of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, or CO2. Every time something burns, carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere. Fossil fuels, which are used to fuel cars and airplanes, are the primary source of carbon dioxide emissions. Plants and trees store carbon dioxide, and when trees are destroyed to build houses and buildings, carbon dioxide is released back into the atmosphere, increasing global warming. Plant life in the oceans store carbon dioxide, but because of the increased temperatures, underwater plants are dying off as well, reports A Cooler Climate.com in "What Causes Global Warming? Learn The Major Human Causes Of Climate Change."
Methane
Methane gas is much more potent than carbon dioxide, and this gas is created when bacteria break down organic matter that is free of oxygen, according to "National Geographic" in "Causes of Global Warming." The process occurs during human and animal digestive processes and is released into the air. Increased farming leads to increased methane gas levels. Rice paddies, landfills and gas leaks are also primary sources of methane gas pollution. Catharses are frozen pieces of ice that lie in the ocean, and when temperatures rise, they melt and release methane into the water, reports "National Geographic."
Nitrogen Oxide
The growing need to produce more food has led to increased use of modern technology, and to drastically speed growth and production of their crops, farmers typically use nitrogen fertilizers. Nitrogen oxides trap more than 300 times the amount of heat than carbon dioxide does in a process that happens every time soil is fertilized. In fact, studies have proven that modern farming practices have affected global warming more than modern transportation, reports A Cooler Climate.com.
Other Causes
Other causes of global warming that are less significant include CFCs HCFCs (chlorofluorocarbons and hydro chlorofluorocarbons), organic compounds caused by refrigeration and aerosols, which contribute to the hole in the ozone layer. While the concentrations of these gases are smaller, they are much more toxic to the environment than carbon dioxide
Effects of Global Warming:Assuming that global warming patterns will continue along their current trend lines, what types of global warming effects will people experience in their ever day lives?
The answer depends on the specific area in question, and this brief review addresses the general types of global warming effects on human, plant and wildlife populations.
One of the most obvious visible effects of global warming will be changes to plant and wildlife habitat. In any given area, many of the native plant and wildlife species have evolved to live in that specific habitat because it contain their basic survival needs such as food, water and shelter. A changing climate will cause changes to the traditional wildlife and plant habitat. In many instances, wildlife are adaptable and able to migrate to cope with changing temperatures. Consequently, global warming will mean that people will begin seeing more of some species and less of others in their areas. The Baltimore Oriole, for example, is the state bird of Maryland, and it is adapted to breeding in a temperate climate. A changing climate, with warmer temperatures in Maryland, suggests that the Oriole might stop migrating to Maryland, instead choosing to nest further to the north in New Jersey or Pennsylvania. Considerable research about the global warming effects on plants and wildlife has already been undertaken. The Climate Change Atlas, for example, examines global warming effects on eastern tree and bird species. Wildlife with below average adaptive capabilities are at considerable risk if their current habitat changes. The International Union for Nature Conservation (IUNC) recently released a report suggesting that around the world, 35% of bird species, 52% of amphibian species and 71% of warm-water reef-building coral species are at risk because of a changing climate. Change in physical landscapes also pose problems for populations around the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) follows recent climate change and health reports saying, "Climate variability and change cause death and disease through natural disasters, such as heat waves, floods and droughts. In addition, many important diseases are highly sensitive to changing temperatures and precipitation.". In the United States, natural disaster issues associated with climate change such as the formation of more, or more intense, hurricanes in the Eastern United States, and the melting of glaciers in the Western United States, have received considerable attention.
The planet is warming, from North Pole to South Pole, and everywhere in between. Globally, the mercury is already up more than 1 degree Fahrenheit (0.8 degree Celsius), and even more in sensitive polar regions. And the effects of rising temperatures arent waiting for some far-flung future. Theyre happening right now. Signs are appearing all over, and some of them are
surprising. The heat is not only melting glaciers and sea ice, its also shifting precipitation patterns and setting animals on the move. Some impacts from increasing temperatures are already happening. Ice is melting worldwide, especially at the Earths poles. This includes mountain glaciers, ice sheets covering West Antarctica and Greenland, and Arctic sea ice. Researcher Bill Fraser has tracked the decline of the Adlie penguins on Antarctica, where their numbers have fallen from 32,000 breeding pairs to 11,000 in 30 years. Sea level rise became faster over the last century. Some butterflies, foxes, and alpine plants have moved farther north or to higher, cooler areas. Precipitation (rain and snowfall) has increased across the globe, on average. Spruce bark beetles have boomed in Alaska thanks to 20 years of warm summers. The insects have chewed up 4 million acres of spruce trees. Sea levels are expected to rise between 7 and 23 inches (18 and 59 centimeters) by the end of the century, and continued melting at the poles could add between 4 and 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters). Hurricanes and other storms are likely to become stronger. Species that depend on one another may become out of sync. For example, plants could bloom earlier than their pollinating insects become active. Floods and droughts will become more common. Rainfall in Ethiopia, where droughts are already common, could decline by 10 percent over the next 50 years. Less fresh water will be available. If the Quelccaya ice cap in Peru continues to melt at its current rate, it will be gone by 2100, leaving thousands of people who rely on it for drinking water and electricity without a source of either. Some diseases will spread, such as malaria carried by mosquitoes. Ecosystems will changesome species will move farther north or become more successful; others wont be able to move and could become extinct. Wildlife research scientist Martyn Obbard has found that since the mid-1980s, with less ice on which to live and fish for food, polar bears have gotten considerably skinnier. Polar bear biologist Ian Stirling has found a similar pattern in Hudson Bay. He fears that if sea ice disappears, the polar bears will as well.
Green House Effect:The greenhouse effect is a process by which thermal radiation from a planetary surface is absorbed by atmospheric greenhouse gases, and is re-radiated in all directions. Since part of this re-radiation is back towards the surface, energy is transferred to the surface and the lower atmosphere. As a result, the temperature there is higher than it would be if direct heating by solar radiation were the only warming mechanism. Solar radiation at the high frequencies of visible light passes through the atmosphere to warm the planetary surface, which then emits this energy at the lower frequencies of infrared thermal radiation. Infrared radiation is absorbed by greenhouse gases, which in turn re-radiate much of the energy to the surface and lower atmosphere. The mechanism is named after the effect of solar radiation passing through glass and warming a greenhouse, but the way it retains heat is fundamentally different as a greenhouse works by reducing airflow, isolating the warm air inside the structure so that heat is not lost by convection. The greenhouse effect was discovered by Joseph Fourier in 1824, first reliably experimented on by John Tyndall in 1858, and first reported quantitatively by Svante Arrhenius in 1896.
If an ideal thermally conductive blackbody was the same distance from the Sun as the Earth is, it would have a temperature of about 5.3 C. However, since the Earth reflects about 30% (or 28%) of the incoming sunlight, the planet's effective temperature (the temperature of a blackbody that would emit the same amount of radiation) is about 18 or 19 C, about 33C below the actual surface temperature of about 14 C or 15 C. The mechanism that produces this difference between the actual surface temperature and the effective temperature is due to the atmosphere and is known as the greenhouse effect. Global warming, a recent warming of the Earth's surface and lower atmosphere, is believed to be the result of a strengthening of the greenhouse effect mostly due to human-produced increases in atmospheric greenhouse gases.
Basic mechanism
The Earth receives energy from the Sun in the form UV, visible, and near IR radiation, most of which passes through the atmosphere without being absorbed. Of the total amount of energy available at the top of the atmosphere (TOA), about 50% is absorbed at the Earth's surface. Because it is warm, the surface radiates far IR thermal radiation that consists of wavelengths that are predominantly much longer than the wavelengths that were absorbed. Most of this thermal radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere and re-radiated both upwards and downwards; that radiated downwards is absorbed by the Earth's surface. This trapping of long-wavelength thermal radiation leads to a higher equilibrium temperature than if the atmosphere were absent. This highly simplified picture of the basic mechanism needs to be qualified in a number of ways, none of which affect the fundamental process.
The solar radiation spectrum for direct light at both the top of the Earth's atmosphere and at sea level The incoming radiation from the Sun is mostly in the form of visible light and nearby wavelengths, largely in the range 0.24 m, corresponding to the Sun's radiative temperature of 6,000 K. Almost half the radiation is in the form of "visible" light, which our eyes are adapted to use. About 50% of the Sun's energy is absorbed at the Earth's surface and the rest is reflected or absorbed by the atmosphere. The reflection of light back into spacelargely by cloudsdoes not much affect the basic mechanism; this light, effectively, is lost to the system. The absorbed energy warms the surface. Simple presentations of the greenhouse effect, such as the idealized greenhouse model, show this heat being lost as thermal radiation. The reality is more complex: the atmosphere near the surface is largely opaque to thermal radiation (with important exceptions for "window" bands), and most heat loss from the surface is by sensible heat and latent heat transport. Radiative energy losses become increasingly important higher in the atmosphere largely because of the decreasing concentration of water vapor, an important greenhouse gas. It is more realistic to think of the greenhouse effect as applying to a "surface" in the mid-troposphere, which is effectively coupled to the surface by a lapse rate. Within the region where radiative effects are important the description given by the idealized greenhouse model becomes realistic: The surface of the Earth, warmed to a temperature around 255 K, radiates longwavelength, infrared heat in the range 4100 m. At these wavelengths, greenhouse gases that were largely transparent to incoming solar radiation are more absorbent. Each layer of atmosphere with greenhouses gases absorbs some of the heat being radiated upwards from lower layers. To maintain its own equilibrium, it re-radiates the absorbed heat in all directions, both upwards and downwards. This results in more warmth below, while still radiating enough heat back out into deep space from the upper layers to maintain overall thermal equilibrium. Increasing the concentration of the gases increases the amount of absorption and re-radiation, and thereby further warms the layers and ultimately the surface below. Greenhouse gasesincluding most diatomic gases with two different atoms (such as carbon monoxide, CO) and all gases with three or more atomsare able to absorb and emit infrared radiation. Though more than 99% of the dry atmosphere is IR transparent (because the main constituentsN2, O2, and Arare not able to directly absorb or emit infrared radiation), intermolecular collisions cause the energy absorbed and emitted by the greenhouse gases to be shared with the other, non-IR-active, gases. The simple picture assumes equilibrium. In the real world there is the diurnal cycle as well as seasonal cycles and weather. Solar heating only applies during daytime. During the night, the atmosphere cools somewhat, but not greatly, because its emissivity is low, and during the day the atmosphere warms. Diurnal temperature changes decrease with height in the atmosphere.
Global Warming Can Be Stopped:Humans have the means to drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions and avoid the catastrophic consequences of global warming, a major climate report released today concludes.
But in order to stabilize the climate, the transition from fossil fuels like coal and oil needs to occur within decades, according to the final report this year from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Delegates representing a network of 2,500 scientists, economists, and policymakers from more than 120 nations hammered out details of the report at a week-long, closed-door meeting in Bangkok, Thailand.
Many people dont realize that we are committed right now to a significant amount of global warming and sea level risethe longer we wait to do something about it, the more change we will have.
Gerald Meehl, The National Center for Atmospheric Research
Improve the efficiency of home appliances Home appliances vary greatly in terms of energy-efficiency and operating costs. The more energy-efficient an appliance is, the less it costs to run. You can lower your utility bill and help protect the environment.
Buy energy-efficient appliances when shopping for a new appliance Do this especially when shopping for a major appliance such as a refrigerator, dishwasher, or air-conditioner select the one with the highest energy efficiency rating. By opting for a refrigerator with the Energy Star label indicating it uses at least 15 percent less energy than the federal requirement you can reduce carbon dioxide pollution by nearly a ton in total.
Reduce energy needed for heating According to the U.S. Department of Energy, heating and cooling systems in the U.S. emit over a half billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year. Much of the energy used for heating our homes is wasted, and yet the prevention is, in many cases, simple and inexpensive.
Reduce energy needed for cooling Air conditioners alone use up to 1/6th of the electricity in the U.S. and, on hot summer days, consume 43% of the U.S. peak power load. You can reduce much of the need for air conditioning, and enjoy a cost savings benefit, by using passive techniques to help cool your home.
Recycle air conditioner coolant If your car has an air conditioner, make sure you recycle its coolant whenever you have it serviced. You can save thousands of pounds of carbon dioxide each year by doing this.
Drive less Youll save energy by taking the bus, riding a bike, or walking. Try consolidating trips to the mall or longer routine drives. Encourage car-pooling.
Buy clean energy certificates and carbon offsets Help spur the renewable energy market and cut global warming pollution with wind certificates or green tags, which represent clean power you can add to the nations energy grid in place of electricity from fossil fuels. A carbon offset is an emission reduction credit which can be purchased by individuals, businesses and governments to reduce their net greenhouse gas emissions.
While it may be difficult to adopt some of these suggestions, any amount of energy saved is significant. Even small changes are worthwhile, as they spark our awareness. As we become more aware of the importance of saving energy, we find ways of saving where possible.
Making energy conservation a part of our daily awareness is essential to the goal of reducing global warming.
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