Running head: Global warming and climate changes.
Global warming and climate changes.
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Global warming and climate changes.
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Natural and anthropogenic climate changes.
Climate change is a sustained change in weather across the globe. However, it may not
occur in all regions of the world. Natural climate change is a result of normal atmospheric
changes. It may be caused by several factors such as ocean variations, plate tectonics, orbital
fluctuations, changes in solar output and tilt of the planet. On the other hand, anthropogenic
climate change refers to the production of greenhouse gasses emitted by human activity. Human
activities have increased the proportion of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere over years.
Both natural and anthropogenic climatic variations result in Earth’s energy balance. This
energy balance describes how the incoming energy from the sun is used and returned to space.
All the energy that fuels the earth comes from the sun. To ensure a constant global average
temperature is maintained, all of the sun’s radiation that enters Earth’s atmosphere must be sent
back to space.
Both natural and anthropogenic climate changes lead to global warming. Natural climatic
changes cause global warming through variations of carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere.
Anthropogenic environmental change causes a dangerous atmospheric deviation through people
discharging carbon dioxide transmitted by processing plants to the environment.
Natural climatic changes are caused by normal atmospheric changes such as ocean
variations, plate tectonic while anthropogenic climatic changes are caused by human activities
such as carbon emissions and land use. (Ollhoff, 2010)
Anthropogenic Climatic changes can be controlled by human beings since their activities
cause them. This is achieved through implementation of strict standards. On the other hand,
natural climatic changes cannot be controlled by human beings. Nature regulates them.
Global warming and climate changes.
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Global Warming
Global warming is a gradual increase in the average temperature of the global atmosphere
and the oceans. It already has a harmful effect on our health. Changes in temperature and
precipitation under global warming are likely to lead to other consequences that threaten human
health. Dangerous heat waves are becoming very common. These heat waves may cause skins
injuries, illness or even death. An example is a vector-borne disease. Warm air, sunlight and
pollution from power plants and cars burning coal and gasoline combine to produce smog, which
humans experience as poor air quality.
Global warming also has an adverse impact on the climate. Scientists in the past had
predicted that these effects would result from global climate changes are now occurring. They
include accelerated sea level rise, loss of sea ice, and longer, more intense heat waves. For
instance, the 2001-2010 decade is the warmest since 1880. (Black & Weisel, 2010)
Mitigation strategies for global warming
Carbon sequestration
Mitigating the damage caused by global warming is a responsibility that requires
cooperation globally. Our future carbon dioxide emissions, as well as our future mitigating
actions, will determine the degree to which human beings will suffer the consequences of our
current behavior. Let us look at mitigation strategies put in place to curb global warming.
One of these strategies is the carbon sequestration. It is the capturing of carbon dioxide
from the atmosphere or human carbon dioxide from large-scale sources before it is
released to the atmosphere. Once it is captured, it is stored in long-term storage. Carbon
sequestration has significantly reduced the level of carbon in the atmosphere and also
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carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere from human sources. There are two types of
carbon sequestration. One is terrestrial sequestration that uses plants to capture carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere and then store it as carbon in the stems and roots of the
plants and the soil. It is a set of land management practices that maximizes the amount of
carbon that remains stored in the ground and plant material for the long term. The other
one is geologic sequestration. It is putting carbon dioxide into long-term storage in
geologic zones deep underground. Geologic sequestration is the method of storage that is
considered for carbon capture and storage projects. (Black & Weisel, 2010)
The cost of carbon sequestration ranges between $30 and $90 per ton of carbon
dioxide. There is a need to develop methodologies to estimate, monitor and report
physical leakage from storage facilities. Measured responsibilities, discharge is
exchanging, or other comparative systems need clear principles and strategies for
representing outflows and evacuations.
Clean coal technology
Coal is the dirtiest of every single fossil fuel. At the point when blazed, it creates
emanations that contribute to a great extent to a worldwide temperature alteration, water
contamination and make corrosive downpour. To keep these impacts, clean coal innovation is
put into utilization. It tries to diminish unforgiving ecological impacts by utilizing various
changes to clean coal and contain its emanations. Some clean coal innovations cleanse the coal
before it blazes. One kind of fuel planning is coal washing. It evacuates undesirable minerals by
blending pulverized coal with a fluid. It then permits the pollutions to particular and settle. The
other one is wet scrubbers. It is additionally called vent gas desulfurization frameworks. It
uproots sulfur dioxide that is a noteworthy reason for a corrosive downpour. This is finished by
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showering pipe gas with limestone and water. The blend responds with the sulfur dioxide to
shape manufactured gypsum.
The cost of implementing clean coal technologies ranges between $2 billion and $4
billion. . The objectives are to encourage and promote research and development that will lead to
improved understanding of conventional combustion processes. It also aims at developing
techniques that control and reduce solid, liquid and gaseous emissions associated with
combustion processes. This is achieved by improving operating efficiency and identifying
methods for the efficient utilization of combustion by-products. (Ollhoff, 2010)
Proposed policy measures
Climate policies need to be taken into account for both short term and long term goals.
This will help stabilize the adverse climatic changes. I would propose a near-zero emissions
campaign. If each and factories avoid emitting gasses to the atmosphere, it would be easy to deal
with natural gasses in the atmosphere. Individuals should note that each increment of emission
leads to another increment of warming. If we want to avoid additional warming, we need to
prevent other emissions. If we reduce emissions to zero in the simulations, the level of carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere slowly go down as carbon sinks such as the oceans and forests
absorbed the gas. Based on this policy, the business sectors that should be given strict standards
are refineries companies, petroleum firms, and horticulture industries.
Global warming and climate changes.
References
Black, B., & Weisel, G. J. (2010). Global warming. Greenwood: Santa Barbara.
Ollhoff, J. (2010). Climatic changes. / Social solutions. Edina: ABDO Publishing Co.
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