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Former Vice President of the United States, Al Gore, has brought the issue of global warming to the forefront of people’s minds with his Oscar winning documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth.” While there are some people who have been concerned about global warming for years, but this movie helped make the phenomenon more “famous” if you will.
If you’ve never thought about global warming, consider the following facts:
Since the 1970′s, there has been a 100 percent increase in the intensity and duration of hurricanes and tropical storms.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey predictions, by the year 2030, Glacier National Park will have no glaciers left at all.
400,000 square miles of the Arctic Sea have melted in the last thirty years. That is roughly the size of Texas and is threatening polar bear habitats.
By the year 2050, 15 to 17 percent of animal and plant species will be wiped out by global warming
The United States is the number one global warming polluter in the world.
Six former United States Environmental Protection Agency leaders say that the U.S. isn’t doing enough to reduce pollution that contributes to global warming. This is supported by the fact that the United States Congress has not passed one piece of legislation related to the reduction of global warming.
Basically, global warming is an observable progressive warming of the average temperature of the Earth over a period of time. While some people might think is a great thing envisioning mild winters, but the truth is that global warming is a disturbing phenomenon.
The rising temperatures can cause changes like rising sea levels, an increase in the frequency and intensity of severe weather, decreased agricultural yields, and glacial retreats and/or disappearances. Global warming is also projected to cause the eventual extinction of many plant and animal species as they struggle to survive in warmer climates that they aren’t used to.
Global warming is caused mostly by the release of methane gas into the environment. Methane is a greenhouse gas that traps heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. Methane gas is naturally released from arctic tundra and wetlands.
However, the biggest contributing factors toward global warming are man-made. Man-made causes bring about the most damage when considering the global warming trend.
Pollution is one of the biggest man-made problems. Pollution comes in many shapes and sizes. Burning fossil fuels is one thing that causes pollution. Fossil fuels are fuels made of organic matter such as coal, or oil. When fossil fuels are burned they give off a green house gas called carbon dioxide (CO2).
Also, mining coal and oil allows methane to escape. How does it escape? Methane is naturally in the ground. When coal or oil is mined you have to dig up the earth a little. When you dig up the fossil fuels you dig up the methane as well.
Another major man-made cause of global warming is population. More people mean more food, and more methods of transportation, right? That means more methane because there will be more burning of fossil fuels, and more agriculture.
Methane also comes from animal manure. Because more food is needed we have to raise food. Animals like cows are a source of food which means more manure and methane.
Along with the increasing population comes the increasing problem of transportation. More people mean more cars and more cars means more pollution. Also, many people have more than one car. That means that with more cars on the road, more chemicals and pollutants that are released into the air that damages the ozone layer and traps heat in the Earth’s atmosphere.
Since CO2 contributes to global warming, the increase in population makes the problem worse because we breathe out CO2. Also, the trees that convert our CO2 to oxygen are being demolished because we’re using the land that we cut the trees down from as property for our homes and buildings. We are not replacing the trees (an important part of our eco system), so we are constantly taking advantage of our natural resources and giving nothing back in return.
Another contributing factor to global warming, believe it or not, is water vapor. Water is both the most potent greenhouse gas per molecule and the most abundant in the atmosphere by concentration, but it is a short-term greenhouse gas, and great quantities of water can be added to the atmosphere by evaporation or subtracted by precipitation in a period of weeks.
So how can using alternative fuel help reduce global warming? The concept is actually quite simple. We need to reduce the amount of damaging emissions that are released by the burning of fossil fuels. Automobiles are a source of considerable pollution at the global level, including a significant fraction of the total greenhouse gas emissions.
The alternative fuels that are being developed release a considerably lower amount of environmentally damaging greenhouse gases and thus can put a great halt to global warming. We will never be able to stop the natural release of methane, water vapor, and carbon dioxide, but we can do a lot to help the ways we pollute the environment ourselves.
