Global Warming

Global warming is an undisputed fact. The scientific debate centers on how much of the rise in global temperatures is the result of a natural cycle of climate change; how much is due to the accumulation in the atmosphere of such greenhouse gases as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide; and how much is due to other factors.

The melting tropical glaciers of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania present a typically complicated example. According to an online article from National Geographic, loss of glacier coverage is not restricted to the latter half of the 20th century, when greenhouse gases become a problem. Evidence of a local climate change dates back to 1850; however, a climatologist at the University of Massachusetts offers recent overgrazing and forest reduction as plausible explanations for the region’s rising temperatures, loss of cloud cover, and the rapid disappearance of Mount Kilimanjaro’s spectacular fields of white ice, which scientists predict will be gone entirely within fifteen years.

It is generally agreed that worldwide air pollution is accelerating global warming. The 10 warmest years in the 20th century occurred between 1985 and 2000, with precipitation increasing by 1 percent. In the US, frequency of extreme rainfall has increased and sea levels have risen, perhaps as a result of more extreme rainfall or as a result of a decrease in snowfall and melting glaciers in the Northern Hemisphere, or a combination of both.

The key question concerning global warming is how developed countries will manage to reduce carbon in the air. As oil and gas prices continue to rise, coal becomes more competitive in the US as a source of energy. Burning coal, however, is one of the dirtiest ways of obtaining electricity. The two largest challenges facing Houston are reduction of industrial emissions of carbon-based volatile organic compounds, including emissions from coal-fired power plants, and traffic management that reduces vehicle emissions.

According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, NASA studies indicate that aircraft account for about 4 percent of the emissions implicated in global warming. This figure is expected to go to 17 percent by 2050. Jet “contrails alone are expected to increase temperature in the lower atmosphere over the United States by at least one degree every 20 years.”

Kyoto

The Kyoto Protocol, a string of commitments to combat global warming, was adopted in 1997 by many industrialized countries. The main focus of the protocol was reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Although the agreement outlined a basic compliance system, it did not lay out specific rules for how it would operate. In the end, 84 countries signed on, but many were reluctant to ratify it. The Marrakesh Accords, which came later, finally detailed rules for implementation. By November 2004, 128 countries had signed, putting enough weight behind the Kyoto Protocol for some of its initiatives to be effective. Russia has recently signed, but a question of importance is whether the United States, a major polluter, will now sign as well.

What you can do

Balance your driving and flying by planting trees, which sequester carbon.

www.americanforests.org/resources/ccc

www.betterworldclub.com/environment/carbon_offsets.htm

www.futureforests.com

Sources