Thursday, March 11, 2010

Rough Draft

Climate Change

To have a stabilized greenhouse gas concentration in the earth’s atmosphere, there needs to be a reduction in the amount of CO2 usage. With the increasing amounts of CO2 being released into our air and a constantly decreasing number of trees so suck it up, earth’s atmosphere is starting to stay extra warm. This scenario, also known as climate change, is causing glaciers to melt and sea levels to rise.

Carbon Dioxide, a heavy odorless gas formed during respiration and by the decomposition of organic substances, is absorbed from the air by plants and trees during a process called photosynthesis. Having too much CO2 in our atmosphere is causing climate change. America currently emits 19% of the worlds CO2 gases. The more CO2 that’s emitted into the atmosphere the warmer earth gets.

Increased downpours are said to be an early sign of climate change. A recent study done by MIT and Caltech conclude that global climate change is affecting precipitation patterns. “Precipitation in extreme events will go up by about 6 percent for every one degree Celsius increase in temperature.” With these increased downpours it creates more flood warnings through out city’s and towns.

Another affect of climate change that we have seen is an increase in diseases. Warmer lands breed incredible amounts of insects, which then causes an increase in mosquito-borne diseases, such as malaria, dengue fever, and West Nile virus. Also an increase in summer’s temperature can cause more extreme heat waves.

Many animals are at danger now due to the affects of climate change. Polar Bears are finding it harder to survive, with ice melting fast and nowhere to rest, they are drowning. “A 2007 report from the U.S. Geological Service estimated that as a result of sea-ice decline, today’s population of about 22,000 polar bears would decrease by two-thirds by the year 2050.”

The keeling curve is a graph that measured the rise of CO2 levels in our atmosphere from the years1958-2000. Dr. Charles David Keeling, a professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, completed this study. Once a year that graph would seem to fluctuate. This was because during summer trees and plants would bloom, so this allowed them to intake more CO2, causing the CO2 levels in the atmosphere to decrease. He kept track of the measures by ppmv, Part Per Million Volume, which is the concentration of CO2 molecules mixed with the air molecules. During 1958 the levels were at 315 ppmv when the study ended in 2000 it was 367ppmv, showing a 52 increase in just 50 years.

Although CO2 is a necessity on earth, action needs to be taken to help balance it out. If we keep increasing our amount of carbon emissions we release we will soon destroy our earth. Many scientist say that if the earths temperature keeps rising it will soon make it warm enough to melt glaciers, causing the sea levels to rise and parts of earths land to be submerged underwater.

Sources


• House, Jo, and Victor Brovkin. "Climate & Air Quality ." *Millennium
Assessment*. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Mar. 2010. <
www.millenniumassessment.org/documents/document.282.aspx.pdf
• "Freedom Socialist Newspaper --- Too much carbon dioxide and too few trees." Freedom Socialist Party - socialism.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Mar. 2010. http://www.socialism.com/fsarticles/vol26no6/carbondioxide.html
• "Keeling Curve." Earthguide: Educational Resources in Earth, Marine, Environmental and Planetary Sciences. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Mar. 2010.
Footnotes
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090817190638.htm
http://www.neaq.org/conservation_and_research/climate_change/effects_on_ocean_animals.php

Outline

Outline

CO2 Increasing while Temperature rises.

Thesis/Intro: To have a stabilized greenhouse gas concentration in the earth’s atmosphere, there needs to be a reduction in the amount of CO2 usage. With the increasing amounts of CO2 being released into our air, earth’s atmosphere is starting to stay extra warm. This scenario, also known as climate change, is causing glaciers to melt and sea levels to rise.


Paragraph 1: About CO2. Where & who is it coming from?
Topic Sentence: While we continue to emit more amounts of CO2 into our atmosphere, we are slowly destroying earth.
Main Points:
• Carbon dioxide is a heavy odorless colorless gas formed during respiration and by the decomposition of organic substances; absorbed from the air by plants in photosynthesis
• The more Co2 in the air, the more heat we have.
• 3/4ths of the worlds CO2 emissions come from Industrial and automobile consumption of oil and coal.



Paragraph 2: What happens if temperature increases? What are the affects on earth?
Topic Sentence: By increasing CO2 emissions and causing temperatures to rise…
Main Points:
• Oceans, land masses, and ice caps temperature rises
• Since the oceans are warmer it evaporates more water in to the air causing more powerful sever storms.
• Warmer lands breed mass amounts of insects, that leads to an increase in mosquito-borne diseases, such as malaria, dengue fever, and West Nile virus.
• Warmer ice caps break apart, destroying and threatening the survival of polar life.






Paragraph 3: Keeling Curve
Topic Sentence: I don’t know?
Main Points:
• PPMV (Part Per Million Volume) Number of CO2 molecules per every one million molecules in the air.
• During 1800’s between 275 & 280
• During 2000 it rose to approximately 367 ppmv
• The squiggles on the graph. When it rises it mean it is probably winter time when barely any plants are blooming so therefore they cannot intake much CO2. It lowers during Summer time because a majority of flowers and trees bloom so they intake more CO2.



Paragraph 4: Our Future, if we take no action
Topic Sentence: Although CO2 is a necessity in our earth, action needs to be taken to help balance.
Main Points:
• If carbon emissions continue to raise so will earth’s temperature.
• Do I analyze data for this part?



Paragraph 5: Acid Rain? An affect.