What is Global Warming? Explained
So, we've all heard of global warming and climate change and that carbon dioxide is causing our planet to heat up. But what exactly is the science behind it?
To get there, we first have to understand the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is a process that maintains our planet's temperatures at liveable levels and is pretty much the reason life on Earth is even remotely possible. You see, the sun is constantly shooting energy towards the Earth mostly in the form of visible light which is then absorbed by our planet heating it up. This heat is then released from our planet's surface in the form of infrared light. Here's where greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide come in. Completely surrounding our planet these greenhouse gases create a blanket that allows visible light to freely pass through to the surface of the Earth but traps infrared light as it tries to leave therefore, slowing the release of the planet's heat back into space.
Keeping it just warm enough for us to sustain life. However, the more greenhouse gases there are in our atmosphere the harder it becomes for the planet's heat to escape and thus causing a global warming. and that's exactly what has been happening since 1750 or the industrial revolution. You see, before the industrial revolution the amount of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere lingered around 270 parts per million. But since then, it has increased at an exponential rate reaching over 400 parts per million this past October. The last time there was this much CO2 in our atmopshere human beings didn't exist. And there's no doubt that this unprecedented increase in CO2 is caused by human activity. Every living thing on Earth is made of carbon and this very element is continuously cycling to maintain an equilbirum through a process called the carbon cycle. While things such as the death of plants and animals, the eruption of volcanoes, and wildfires release carbon into the atmosphere things like photosynthesis from plant life can help remove and sequester it.
However, when the industrial revolution began humans started digging up and burning fossil fuels which are really just the decomposed remains of ancient plants and animals, to use as energy. In other words, we found stockpiles of carbon which has been kept deep beneath the Earth's surface and burned it for energy and in the process, added extreme amounts of carbon dioxide right into our atmosphere On top of this, we carried out deforestation on a massive scale and sabotaged what carbon filtration system the planet had provided us with. completely toppling the equilibirum between carbon emission and removal. With over 200 years of throwing this life sustaining equilibirum off balance, action must be taken immediately to mitigate the impact of our changing climate. The first major step we can take is shifting to clean energy sources as soon as possible so as to prevent a further increase of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. And when we look at the rapid growth of clean energy, this is a shift that we can make. All we need is a unified push towards a more environmentally conscious global society.
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