Rising CO2 Affecting our Planet

While the world continues to emit huge amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) earth’s temperature is rising. Many of the environmental issues are related to large amounts of CO2 released into our atmosphere. “In the last 100 years the Earth has warmed by 0.74°C, meaning that global sea levels have gone up, glaciers and sea ice has melted, floods and droughts are on the increase.” Climate change can be controlled but in the world we live in now it has become harder for us to adapt to change. If we continue to live on this path we are slowly killing future generations by not providing a stable & clean earth for them to live on. Weather patterns have not been normal, more storms and floods are occurring due to higher sea levels, and the reason sea levels are rising is because glaciers are melting. Certain species and habitats are finding it harder to survive. After Polar Bears swim for a long time they will usually rest on a piece of ice. But ice is melting faster and there is no more resting spots for these Polar Bears, so they drown. Deforestation has a major impact on carbon that is being stored in our atmosphere. The more trees that are being cut down the more carbon left in our atmosphere. Trees will go through a process, known as photosynthesis; this process is earth’s natural way of removing CO2. Trees also store tons of carbon so by cutting down trees we are keeping more CO2 in our air. Earths resources are slowly dissolving, we need change our future is on the line.

Pull Quote:"Due to rising sea levels,weather patterns have not been normal, more storms and floods have been occurring".

Abstract with visual

Abstract

While the world continues to emit huge amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) earth’s temperature is rising. Many of the environmental issues are related to large amounts of CO2 released into our atmosphere. “In the last 100 years the Earth has warmed by 0.74°C, meaning that global sea levels have gone up, glaciers and sea ice has melted, floods and droughts are on the increase.” Climate change can be controlled but in the world we live in now it has become harder for us to adapt to change. If we continue to live on this path we are slowly killing future generations by not providing a stable & clean earth for them to live on. Weather patterns have not been normal, more storms and floods are occurring due to higher sea levels, and the reason sea levels are rising is because glaciers are melting. Certain species and habitats are finding it harder to survive. After Polar Bears swim for a long amount of time they will usually rest on a piece of ice. But ice is melting faster and there is no more resting spots for these Polar Bears, so they drown. Deforestation has a major impact on carbon that is being stored in our atmosphere. The more trees that are being cut down the more carbon left in our atmosphere. Trees will go through a process, known as photosynthesis; this process is earth’s natural way of removing CO2. Trees also store tons of carbon so by cutting down trees we are keeping more CO2 in our air. Earths resources are slowly dissolving, we need change our future is on the line.

Pull Quote: “In the last 100 years the Earth has warmed by 0.74°C, meaning that global sea levels have gone up, and floods and droughts have increased.”

Smoothie Recipe

Tropical Fruit Smoothie

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Tropical Fruit Smoothie  Dr. Susan Smith Jones - 7/30/2009 2 ripe bananas, peeled 1 mango, peeled, seeded and cubed 1 papaya, peeled, seeded, and cubed 1 cup fresh pineapple chunks Ice cubes to taste Place fruit into the blender jar first, then add the ice last. Secure lid and press Smoothie on the Total Blender touchpad or button #3 on older Blendtec blenders. If necessary, press the Pulse 'P' button until desired consistency is reached. Notes Serves 2 to 3

http://www.blendtec.com/recipecard.aspx?id=107

Food, ink.

Reflection

Food ink. definitely left me with curiosity as to how the meat I eat gets on my plate. While I was watching this I felt guilty and kept asking myself do I have to eat meat? Can I live without it? And if I choose to stop eating it, will I actually make a difference. It left me wondering what if everyone who consumes meat were to watch this and see how there food is prepared, would anything change.

What struck me the most is how the animals are slaughtered. Although watching it was disturbing, I am glad I did. I feel like now I can make smarter decisions on what I eat. Another thing that struck me was how much America consumes I had no idea. 32,000 hogs are slaughtered a day, that is one thing that stood out to me. This left me wondering about the Hog species and how that is going to look like in the future. Chickens that usually take 3 months to grow are now growing at a ridiculous rate. Now it only takes them 49 days to be grown. Not only have we changed the way we eat, but also what we eat. What is supposed to be natural/healthy chicken doesn’t seem to be so natural/healthy these days. The chicken’s body has even been changed the way it grows.

I’ve never heard of the company Smithfield but after learning about them I feel like they should change their company. Although they are providing jobs for immigrants I don’t think it is right, to me it seemed like they didn’t treat their employers right.

I was also shocked to hear that the FDA didn’t want companies to label where the food came from. It left me wondering, why, are they hiding something? They just don’t want society to know about where, or how the food they buy is prepared. I disagree and think if people want to know they should have that right. I read on an article that they have even made laws making it illegal for view how companies slaughter their animals.

The food industry does need change, only for a better healthier America. But people will still continue to live their lives and not care about their food. I think a lot of people purposely avoid or block them selves from knowing how their food is processed. These choices that are made have to do with money, and people not being able to afford the healthier organic meal, and a lot of people tend to think that way. But what if we did eat healthier would it really be more expensive; I personally think yes for a while it will be expensive. But in the long run it’s a smarter decision because you won’t need to be paying for 3 types of medication.

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.

Peer reviewed annotated sources

Biodiversity

"Climate change, species–area curves and the extinction crisis — Philosophical Transactions B ." The Royal Society. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2010. .

"By 2050, doom 15–37% of the earth's species to extinction".

That's scary, up to 37% of earth's species can be extinct by 2050. This peer reviewed source focuses on an article written in January 2004 that focuses on Earth species becoming extinct, Extinction crisis. It's said that habitat change and modification are what's causing extinction. This source includes information about the SAR (Species–Area Relationship) Method and how it relates to climate change, causes of extinction, and suggestions he has about ecologist. Mostly includes a lot of information about the SAR method and it's application, if it's reliable.

"University of California Press - Error." University of California Press - Error. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2010. .

"(1) models that consider species individually, (2) niche-theory models that group species by habitat (more specifically, by environmental conditions under which a species can persist or does persist), (3) general circulation models and coupled ocean–atmosphere–biosphere models, and (4) species–area curve models that consider all species or large aggregates of species."

These four forecasting methods are discussed in the article. In this article they mainly focus on the forecast and how it is affecting different kinds of species. Since the forecast is considered one of the effects of Global Warming. It is said that although we had an ice age very few species actually became extinct, so this article claims to clarify that and give more accurate and reliable forecasting.

A great map that describes where and what kinds of species are being affected.





















Source
"Animals Under Siege - TIME." Breaking News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews - TIME.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2010. ."

Some major environmental issues that are included in this map are, climate change, overpopulation, and deforestation.

"From 1990 to 2005, the world lost 172 million acres of forest"

By participating in deforestation and cutting down thousands of trees effects the species and habitats living around it. So by cutting down trees we are slowly killing species and many habitats.

"The warming of the planet could put as much as 70% of species at a greater risk of extincction-with Artic animals like the polar bear potentially among the first to go".

We wonder what will happen if the polar bear does go extinct? How bad can it possibly be?But all animals have a role in the ecosystem, all are important. I believe it would not have a sudden affect but it would eventually disrupt the food chain, which would eventually lead to greater issues.