What should we do about Global warming and the Greenhouse effect ?

Question

what should we do ?

Answer 1

Global warming is in theory reversable,but it will mean global co operation between all countries ,and taking into account human nature and the world politics ,it is unlikely that this will happen,

At least not untill we are all in the middle of planetary disastres and it becomes a battle for the survival of humanity every where.

SOLUTIONS
if you want to help the planet ,plant a tree every week ,if everyone on the planet did we we would be able to reverse the destructive processes

reduce carbon emisions,and they are already working on that by alternative forms of energy and regulations on carbon producing materials,aerosol cans,burning rubbish,industrial chimneys,powerplants etc.

the capture of carbon and the production of water and assist the aquiferous manta.

the world bank pays large subsidies for reforrestation to capture carbon and the best tree for this is the Pawlonia

Waterharvesting projects ,such as millions of small dams.to redirect over ground waterflows from the rains into the ground to supply subteranian water supplies.

the protection of existing forrests.

stop building more highways,urban planning to include vegetation stop building cities encourage people to return to the land to conduct their business from there which now has become possible thanks to the internet.

education to motivate people to auto sufficiency by building more home food gardens.

education on environmental awareness
education on family planning to curb over´populaion

Agricultural education and improvements to follow the principals or sustainability and soil management.

more environmental or land ,design to prevent bush fires,such as--fire breaks

,more dams.regulations and control for public behaviour

alternative effeciant public transport to discourage the use of the internal conbustion engine

recicling wastes,limit water use

i am a Permaculture Consultant for the department of Ecology for the regional government in Guerrero Mexico
http://spaces.msn.com/byderule

Source(s) Lester E Brown is the director and founder of the global institute of Environment in the United states .he has compiled a report based on all the satalite information available from NASA,and all the information that has
come from Universities and American embassies WORLD WIDE ,
his little book--a planet under stress , Plan B has been trans lated into 50 languages and won the best book award in 2003.

Answer 2

Study and become informed of the science behind it. The US is a particularly fertile place for critics of global warming but most are not informed of what it is and what effects it will have.

Scientists have predicted the erratic and changing weather patterns that others have referred to. Global warming is definitely occurring...the real question is whether humans have significantly contributed to the effect.

Global warming will contribute to an increase in the intensity of storms, both during the winter and the summer. It will also lead to drought, shifting rainfall patterns and intensities, and other weather related issues.

Once people understand the issue better, they can effectively counter the arguments of the ignorant ones who say things like, "there's a huge snow storm outside, how can anyone believe in global warming!" This is exactly the type of effects scientists have predicted.

Answer 3

First off, it has yet to be proven that global warming is due to human activity (the Milankovitch Cycle may yet be the culprit). That said, cutting down our carbon emissions really can't hurt. Using more (safer) nuclear power until we develop better technology for wind and solar will help.

Answer 4

Global craziness
By Nathan Tabor
Saturday, February 24, 2007

This week—perhaps emboldened by the groundhog predicting an early spring—Old Man Winter came roaring back, blanketing much of the nation with a sheet of ice. In fact, a number of residents of the Midwest and Northeast felt as if they were living in a new Ice Age, thanks to a thick coat of ice that brought vehicular traffic to a standstill.

As they shivered amid wind-chill levels well below zero, it must have come as a comfort that Al “Global Warming” Gore is once again at work, trying to free the world from the tyranny of temperatures above the freezing mark.

Rapper Pharrell Williams, left, and actress Cameron Diaz attend a news conference for the "Live Earth" concerts Thursday, Feb. 15, 2007, in Los Angeles. The concert series hopes to trigger a broad movement to address what the former Vice President Al Gore calls a global climate crisis. (AP Photo/Nick Ut) Gore announced plans this week for a series of musical concerts designed to, in Gore’s words, “solve the climate crisis.” His accomplices in this mission of misguided mercy include musical artists ranging from the rapper Snoop Dogg to American Idol star Kelly Clarkson.

Venues for the “Live Earth” concerts include Shanghai, Sydney, Johannesburg, London, and yet-to-be-determined cities in Japan, Brazil, and the U.S. The campaign behind this effort is ironically titled, “Save Our Selves.”

Gore was quoted as saying, “We are launching SOS and Live Earth to begin a process of communication that will mobilize people all over the world to take action. The climate crisis will only be stopped by an unprecedented and sustained global movement. We hope to jump-start that movement right here, right now, and take it to a new level on July 7, 2007.”

Earth to Gore: It’s 12 degrees outside. Are we really suffering from global warming—or just a liberal propaganda campaign that’s now gone musical?

It’s heart-warming to see musical artists come together for a good cause—after all, what would Labor Day be without the Jerry Lewis Telethon? But fighting muscular dystrophy is one thing—fighting Mother Nature is quite another.

By trying to cast Mother Nature as an extremist, environmentalists such as Gore are trying to hide their own extremism. Their solution to the earth’s problems is to regulate businesses out of existence. They’d sacrifice American jobs to save a single tree, and they often put animals on a pedestal above human beings. It’s a world view that’s positively frightening but, unfortunately, there are no rock concert promoters around who are willing to stage a musical extravaganza to combat environmental extremism.

Since when does a failed Presidential candidate have such pull with the music industry? I don’t hear of Ross Perot getting the Black Eyed Peas to sing for his pet projects.

When the worlds of music and politics embrace, it is often a scary proposition for us all. Look at how many folk groups credited themselves with ending the Vietnam War. Forget military strategy and political acumen, to their way of thinking, it’s four-part harmonies that determine victory or defeat on the battlefield.

I can only hope that, when the SOS concerts roll around, this week’s deep freeze will be fresh in the memories of Americans who might otherwise be hoodwinked by the global warming crowd.

Answer 5

As individuals, the best thing we can do is reduce our energy use: Use compact florescent bulbs and turn them off when you leave the room. Buy more efficient appliances, especially your fridge. Buy a more efficient vehicle, and drive less. Better yet, move closer to work so you don't need to commute by car at all. Get a programmable thermostat so you won't be heating or cooling your house when you're gone. Make sure your house can be sectioned off so that you don't need to waste energy heating and cooling the unused areas. But as individuals, we can't do it all. Talk to your representatives at the local, state, and national level, and tell them that you expect something to be done about global warming. Ask them to create policies that encourage investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy. And ask them to support market-based policies to limit CO2 emissions, like "cap and trade" programs, or carbon taxes (if you're concerned about high taxes, ask them to make sure the revenue is used to reduce existing income or sales taxes)

To get an idea of the scale of the actions required, I recommend you look at the "stabilization wedge" materials put together by Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala at Princeton. They came up with a list of 15 strategies that could be adopted using known technologies. The important point is that these strategies provide results at a large enough scale, so that if we can do just 7 of them, we will avoid the projected increases in annual CO2 emissions over the next 50 years, and therefore prevent the atmospheric CO2 levels from rising above 570ppm (double the pre-industrial level.)

It might seem a little discouraging as individuals, because a lot of these ideas can't be done alone. But I guess that's the point. There's no simple solution, and it needs to be addressed at all levels -- individual, industry, and government. We must make big changes like these in order to prevent the really catastrophic effects of climate change. But unfortunately, even if we can hold CO2 levels to double the pre-industrial level, we will STILL see effects like loss of coral reefs, changing precipitation patterns, and droughts in some regions.

The 15 strategies are:
1. Efficiency –Transport
Increase automobile fuel efficiency (2 billion cars projected in 2050) … 1 wedge = doubling the efficiency of the all world’s cars from 30 to 60 mpg

2. Conservation- Transport
Reduce miles traveled by passenger and/or freight vehicles … 1 wedge = cutting miles traveled by all passenger vehicles in half

3. Efficiency - Buildings
Increase insulation, furnace and lighting efficiency… 1 wedge = using best available technology in all new and existing buildings

4. Efficiency – Electricity
Increase efficiency of power generation … 1 wedge = raising plant efficiency from 40% to 60%

5. Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) Electricity
CO2 from fossil fuel power plants captured, then stored underground (700 large coal plants or 1400 natural gas plants) … 1 wedge = injecting a volume of CO2 every year equal to the volume of oil extracted

6. CCS Hydrogen
Hydrogen fuel from fossil sources with CCS displaces hydrocarbon fuels … 1 wedge = producing hydrogen at 10 times the current rate

7. CCS Synfuels
Hydrogen fuel from fossil sources with CCS displaces hydrocarbon fuels … 1 wedge = producing hydrogen at 10 times the current rate

8. Fuel Switching – Electricity
Replacing coal-burning electric plants with natural gas plants (1400 1 GW coal plants) … 1 wedge = using an amount of natural gas equal to that used for all purposes today

9. Nuclear Electricity
Displace coal-burning electric plants with nuclear plants (2 x current capacity) … 1 wedge = ~3 times the effort France put into expanding nuclear power in the 1980’s, sustained for 50 years

10. Wind Electricity
Wind displaces coal-based electricity (30 x current capacity) … 1 wedge = using area equal to ~3% of U.S. land area for wind farms

11. Solar Electricity
Solar PV displaces coal-based electricity (700 x current capacity) ... 1 wedge = using the equivalent of a 100 x 200 km PV array

12. Wind Hydrogen
Produce hydrogen with wind electricity … 1 wedge = powering half the world’s cars predicted for 2050 with hydrogen

13. Biofuels
Biomass fuels from plantations replace petroleum fuels … 1 wedge = scaling up world ethanol production by a factor of 30

14. Forest Storage
Carbon stored in new forests … 1 wedge = halting deforestation in 50
years

15. Soil Storage
Farming techiques increase carbon retention or storage in soils … 1 wedge = using conservation tillage on all the world’s agricultural soils