GLOBAL WARMING
Introduction
Have you ever imagined what will happen if Greenland’s ice sheet, the second largest ice body in
the world after Antarctica’s ice sheet would be completely gone? According to the James Hansen,
an American Adjunct Professor and Director of the “Program on Climate Science, Awareness and
Solutions”, by 2100 Greenland’s ice sheet will have completely melted and raising the worldwide
sea level by 23 feet. The rising could badly affect millions of people and animals all over the world
especially those who live on islands or coasts. On the other parts of the planet, there were cold
spell in Texas, USA and Spain, unusually warm winter in Russia and unprecedented rainfall and
flooding in Western Europe which killed at least 189 people and hundreds more missing. All of
these extraordinary and never-expected phenomena are the evidence that the world that we live in
today is in high risk and leading to a catastrophic disaster. But what is causing the earth to behave
that way? Scientist believe this is due to a process known as global warming. By definition, global
warming is a gradual increase of an earth’s atmosphere overall temperature leading to the
greenhouse effect.
In the last century, the planet temperature has risen unusually fast about 1.2 to 1.4 degrees
Fahrenheit. Evidence for global warming is based on data recorded by America’s National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) who conducted the monitoring since 1850 till now
which also assisted by The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Based on
the data, year of 2020 is regarded as the hottest year ever recorded in the history of human mankind
surpasses previous record in 2016. Artic sea ice is also shrinking as per NASA studies whereby
the extent of Artic Sea ice has declined about 10 percent in the last 30 years. Researchers predict
that temperatures will increase another two to 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century if
we do not stop what cause the problem.
The Atmosphere
The earth and the moon basically have the same distance from the sun, yet the temperature on the
moon is unlivable and even deadlier as it could reach 100 degrees Celsius at day time and -170
degrees Celsius during night. Even though the earth rotates 14 times faster than the moon, that is
not what spare us from the moon’s loony temperature. What protect us is our atmosphere. The
atmosphere is a mixture of gases that surround the planet. Earth atmosphere is made up of gases
which are 78 percent of Nitrogen (N2), 21 percent of Oxygen (O2) and the remaining 1 percent
consist of gases known as the greenhouse gases (GHGs) such as Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Water
Vapor (H2O), Methane (CH4), Nitrous Oxide (N2O), Ozone (O3) and other atmospheric gases.
These GHGs play an important role in our ecosystem and will be explained in next paragraph.
Natural and Anthropogenic Greenhouse Effect
In the day time, the sun shines through the atmosphere and warms the earth surface. After the sun
goes down, earth surface cools and releases back the heat into the air. Some of the heat loss through
the atmosphere and some is trapped by GHGs. The function of these GHGs is like a glass in a
greenhouse which allowing visible sunlight to enter and trapping heat to keep plants warm, even
at night and during winter. This phenomenon is called the greenhouse effect. The natural
greenhouse effect helps an earth to be naturally heated and provide a perfect temperature in order
for living things to thrive and sustain their life. Without the greenhouse effect, world would be
about 30-degrees Celsius cooler than it is today. Scientist believe that the greenhouse effect is
being intensified by the extra GHGs that human activities have released. The increase of the
amount of the GHGs in the atmosphere will create so-called unbreakable-gases-shield resulting
more and more heat to be trapped and eventually rise the earth temperature. This is known as
anthropogenic greenhouse effect. According to data from America’s Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), CO2 contributes 76 percent of total GHGs released, CH4 contributes 16 percent,
N2O contributes six percent and Fluorinated gases contribute the rest two percent.
Overall, we can conclude that there are two major activities that contribute to the anthropogenic
greenhouse effect, fossil fuel combustion and agricultural practices. Ever since the industrial
evolution began in 17th century, factories, power plants and eventually cars have burned fossil
fuels resulting emission of huge amounts of CO2 and N2O to the atmosphere. 65 percent of CO2 is
released by this category. Transportation is the major contributor to the emission of CO2 followed
by power generation and industry. In 2020, it is estimated that there are approximately 1.4 billion
cars on the road. As for power generation, to-date the usage of coal in power plants are still widely
used despite the potential of pollution it brings and the amount of CO2 emission higher than another
fossil fuel due to it is readily available, cheaper and stable. The last source is industrial activities
which are using fossil fuel in their processes such as production of mineral (cement), production
of metal (iron and steel) and production of chemical. The second source of the CO2 emissions is
from agricultural practices. CO2 is emitted through various activities such as by utilizing
machineries and equipment, massive deforestation, soil tillage and land degradation which
releasing carbon from the land and reduce its capacity to absorb and store carbon. CH4 is naturally
released from the digestive system of livestock, from the wastewater treatment ponds and also
from composting activities for organic fertilizer. Even though CH4 emission is much lesser and
the lifetime also shorter compare to the CO2, CH4 is more efficient at trapping radiation than CO2.
Furthermore, CH4’s comparative impact is 25 times greater than CO2 over a 100-year period. The
agriculture sector is the largest source of CH4 emissions in the USA. Last but not lease, the
utilization of synthetic fertilizer in agricultural activities increase the amount of nitrogen available
for microbes in soil which turn it into N2O. The composting of manure and excretion from
livestock also contribute to the N2O production. Even though the amount of release by percentage
is less than 10 percent, N2O’s comparative impact is 300 times more powerful than CO2 and
remains in atmosphere for over 100 years before it is degradable by chemical processes.
Impact of Global Warming
As mentioned in the introduction, the impact of global warming is unimaginable and inevitable
disaster if it is not put into pause. There is list of effects of global warming but we will be focusing
on few major impacts. The first impact is rising of sea level. Since the early of the 20th century,
the average global sea level has been steadily rising. According to the Climate Science Special
Report issued by U.S. Global Change Research Program, between year 1900 and 2016 sea level
has risen by 6.3 to 8.3 inches. According to studies by the Proceedings of the National Academy
of Sciences of the U.S, this rising is due to the melting ice in the Artic. Ice cover on the Artic
Ocean has declined annually by 17,000 square miles. To worsen it, at the exact same time as the
ice is melting, the ocean water undergoing physical changes known as thermal expansion which is
the tendency of matter to change in shape, area and volume in response to a change of temperature.
The global warming is causing the oceans to expand which is adding a deeply worrying amount
of extra water to the world ocean. If we sum up the total extra water due to thermal expansion with
the 17,000 square mile extra water due to the ice melting, all at once is causing a truly intimidating
rise of sea level.
Another major impact of global warming is the climate change. Climate change is a long-term
change in the Earth’s overall temperature with massive and permanent ramifications. Some people
might use the fact that it still snows as evidence that something called global warming is impossible
because it does not make sense when world is heating up and at the same time still producing
snow. The actual fact is higher temperature can actually cause more rain and snow. For example,
sometime when it is really hot in the evening, what happen next is thunderstorm with a sudden
downpour of rain. Sahara Desert had been experiencing snowfall more than once in less than 50
years which was in 1979, 2016 followed by the most recent was on 2018 which saw 15 inches of
snow cover. Sahara was not alone. The rainfall, snowfall and all other types of precipitation will
be heavier than ever and that means an increase in flood risks are inevitable. This looks to be a
pretty serious problem for Europe in particular which will be at an increased risk of inland flash
flood, more frequent coastal flooding and increase erosion from sea level rise. The crash of
thunder, a ripple lightning that is all triggered by a hot climate. The planet getting hotter does not
mean we are about to get non-stop sunshine. The weather is going to be more mercurial than ever.
There will be an intense and frequent heat waves that you expect, but there will also be an increase
of heavy rain, thunderstorms and intense snowy blizzards unexpectedly. Back in 2005, an intense
heat waves caused one of the worst droughts in human history. Rivers are all dried up and remote
communities became isolated and thousands of square miles of land burned for months releasing
100 million metric tons of carbon in atmosphere.
The future impact of global warming is species extinction. When earth continues to warm up,
crucial habitats will become inhospitable for many plants and animals. They are going to suffer
and struggle to survive in circumstances that they are not accustomed to. As a result, a variety of
species will be at risk of permanent extinction. Sure, some may adapt and move but there is no
way to know for sure but many will be struggling to adapt quickly enough and will go extinct in
the blink of an eye. The planet has gotten hotter before and animal and plants have often survived
by evolving but what is different about this time is that it is happening too fast for animal and
plants that they are at risk to adapt.
Solution for Global Warming
Scientific community has come up with many proven solutions in order to put the end to the global
warming so that the earth’s life span would prolong for living things’ survival, however there are
quite challenging for those proposal to be implemented immediately as it is a global issue meaning
that everyone on earth has to work together to archive it or else it would not work. Hence, the
global conferences were set up to bring the issues up to the global leaders so that the mutual consent
and agreement could be achieved.
The first historic moment before any action taken on the higher level is the testimony by Dr. James
Hansen, one of the leading NASA scientists in the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural
Resources on Jun 23rd, 1988 whereby he confirmed that according to NASA computer simulations,
global warming is happening and highlighted the effect of the climate change at that time was large
enough to cause extreme weather events. He also emphasized that 99 percent certainty the climate
change was caused by human activities. His statement has made a topic headlines around the world
and for the first time there were real discussions happened between public, scientist and politicians.
At the same year, the United Nation had established The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC). This panel was participated by 195 countries with the objective was to have the
most up-to-date information on the problem on global warming and climate change. All scientific
information that was published globally were reviewed and based on those; a comprehensive
picture about global warming and climate change was established. IPCC became a high level in
pushing problem of climate change and global warming further because now at least the
governments have a single source of truth to rely on.
The next important milestone happened in June 1992 at the Rio Earth Summit. It was a major
united nations conference that brought together the representatives from 179 countries to discuss
a plan of actions to be taken globally to minimize negative human impact on the environment. For
the first time is history the climate change became one of major agenda and as a result a document
called the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) was established.
The UNFCC later was ratified on March 1994 by 197 countries. The main agenda of the document
was to make all countries have to consider actions to minimize their GHGs emissions and make
sure that the reduction of emissions will be at safe level for human being. Five years later on
December 1997, countries signed the first extension of the agreement and it was named as Kyoto
Protocol. It looked like the standard of the agreement was much higher that previous version that
it took almost seven years to be ratified by the participated countries. The first commitment period
that the countries had to deliver was from 2008 to 2012. This time the protocol was signed by 193
countries. The first condition of the protocol was, developed countries under the protocol had to
reduce their GHGs emissions by five percent versus the level in 1990. The Kyoto Protocol was a
huge step forward in the international level to combat climate change. In December 2015, a new
upgraded and improved agreement was established. Occurred in Paris, it was called Paris
Agreement and was ratified a year later in 2016. The first commitment period started in 2020 and
a review of the results expected to be done every five years. This agreement was ratified by 190
countries which later the U.S withdrew from the agreement in 2017. The objective this time is to
make sure that the earth temperature will not be increased by more than 2 degrees Celsius and
better below 1.5. Next is to achieve a point of net zero emissions by 2050 meaning that the amount
of GHGs emitted is the same amount of GHGs is taken out from atmosphere by natural means like
trees or oceans or by human introduced technologies.
As for the specific method on reducing the global warming, there many possible ways to
implement. One of many solutions to stop global warming is put a stop on mass using of coal in
power generation and replace it with power plant that utilize the renewable energy. One of the
renewable energies that has already success is wind energy like what is being done in Denmark.
Wind turbines provide a huge opportunity for low cost and low emissions energy creation. Indeed,
in 2019 Denmark sourced 47 percent of its electricity from wind turbines. Turbines has remarkably
small land footprint, allowing for farming, recreation and conservation to continue on under their
shadows. According to researchers, if we can scale wind capacity to 26 percent of our global
energy consumption, we could avoid roughly 147 gigatons of GHGs emissions. As for now, the
world only derives four percent of its energy from wind power. A future of wind turbines could
have substantial positive effects on our changing climate.
Another solution is to reduce emission from car. This could be archive by using public
transportation, replacing car fuel from fossil fuel to biodiesel fuel and maximizing the use of
electric vehicle. Indeed, most of the developing countries are heading to the direction whereby the
mass transformation of the public transportation in each countries become one of the top priorities.
Many developed countries already practiced using public transportation like Japan, Sweden and
many more. People if those countries also tend to walk or cycle to go to work rather than driving.
As the demand of electric car around the globe, car producer like Tesla has to work 24-7 in order
to fulfill the order. This shows that the awareness of the environmental protection has become
higher compare to those day in last 10 years. If this solution can be achieved, more than 50 percent
of GHGs can be reduced in a long term.
We can not rely entirely to the government for stopping the global warming. As an individual,
everybody could play their role in reducing a GHGs emission from our home. Firstly, stop
unnecessary open burning especially during hot and dry season. An open burning is an act of
burning unwanted material such as paper, trees, leaves, grass and other debris where smoke and
other emissions such as GHGs into the air. By refraining ourselves to do so, we could help to
reduce global warming without us knowing. Secondly, save electricity consumption at home. As
we know that most of power plants are still utilizing coal and electricity is generated based on
supply and demand mechanism. Hence, by reducing demand we could reduce the generation and
supply. Thirdly, walk, cycle or using public transportation to go to work or school. As explained,
CO2 is major contributor to the global warming and the largest producer of CO2 is transportation
using fossil fuel. Therefore, if we could minimize in using vehicle that utilize fossil fuel, we
indirectly reducing global warming.
Conclusion
From the whole writing, we could summarize that world that we live in today is in high risk due
to the global warming that is caused by us, human being. The impact is happening and it is real
either we realize or not. Should the activities that contributes to the global warming are not being
reduced or put on stop, what wait us is unimaginable disaster. To stop the global warming,
everybody plays different roles either an individual, public, scientist or politician. Together we can
save our world for the future generation.
