About global warming?

Question

2% of carbon dioxide is produced by us, and the rest is produced naturally. Why are we becoming concerned?

Answer 1

I wish I knew. There are so many other environmental problems that are more important such as destruction of the rain forest, sulfur and NOx pollution, urban sprawl and the pathetic gas mileage of US vehicles, not to mention the every 1 out of 150 kids with autism in the US. I think it is fashionable to push the global warming issue. Like everything else, the issue will be dead in 10 years.

Answer 2

Being concerned is good but there's no reason to panic. Scientists don't know for sure if increased CO2 is a cause of global warming or an effect. There's evidence that the earth has been warmer in the past during periods when there was less CO2 in the atmosphere. Scientists do know that warming of the earth tends to follow increased solar energy output. If you can't control the sun you're probably not going to affect the earth's climate very much.

Answer 3

Because we think the world is warming up and we have gotten used to the world we know.

It isn't really significant to look at a sterile percentage and try to get any useful information from it. If I lose 2% of my body mass and that 2% supplies my heart, I would miss it. If it were 2% that was hair and fingernails, I probably wouldn't miss it so much.

The real question is whether that percentage has any significant effect. In some climate models it does, not just because of a one time effect, but an accumulating snowball effect over many years.

If I had saved 2% of my income over the past decade, I would be a pretty happy account holder now.

Another analogy is of an avalanche. It's not that I necessarily think the climate works this way, but you can certainly see how that last 2% of snow could mean the difference between a slide and no slide. And a great deal of the world is set up like this. The difference between jail and Scott free in my state is an alcohol level of .08%.

Answer 4

There is a natural "carbon cycle" which recycles carbon dioxide. But it's a delicate balance.

We're messing up that balance by digging up carbon the natural cycle buried over a very long time, and burning it really fast. That overwhelms the natural process.

You can see it clearly in this carefully measured data.

http://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/graphics_gallery/mauna_loa_record/mlo_record.html

The small teeth are the natural cycle in operation. CO2 goes down a little during the summer, when plants are active, and up a little in the winter. But every year nature loses a little to us burning fossil fuels. The increase in winter is greater than the decrease in summer. So the graph is going upwards. Actually the trend upwards is very fast, compared to previous natural changes in CO2.

We're fighting nature, and, unfortunately, winning.

Answer 5

It is hard to answer a question that is based on false information. The ozone depletion that has happened with the past 15 years, is stratospheric. Isn't nothing like 2% of this or that. The Earth has lost its protection provided by the Ozone layer, and continues to loose it in a very high and fast levels. The sun's rays has passed freely to the Earth, causing elevation of our temperature, that causes the melts of ices in the North Hemisphere, raising the levels of water and floods. We should not be concerned only if we were going to live in another planet, but it seems this is not to be the case yet, we won't have anywhere else to scape but become more educated about Global Warming and have a better management control of our resources.

Answer 6

Hi,about 95% of green house effect is due to water wapor occuring naturally.Of the remaining 5%, only 0.2% to 0.3% of the greenhouse effect (depending on whose numbers you use) is due to emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases from human sources.Green house effect has got benefits too because without it the average temperature of earth will be below -18 degree centigrade.Carbon Dioxide from all coal burning worldwide comprises only 0.013% of the greenhouse gases in Earth's atmosphere.AS mentioned above human are not the cause of green house effect.But human additions to atmospheric greenhouse gases cause global temperatures to rise too much

Answer 7

CO2 is actually not a 'greenhouse' gas according to the expert I heard on TV the other night. Methane is much more important. Plants flourish in higher concentrations of CO2.

Answer 8

do you mean that the thousands of people who have already died should not be concerned
and the many thousands who have lost everything also have nothing to worry about
that is a bit callous dont you think
as long as you are OK,to hell with ebverybody else

dont tell me you must be an American


how i envey the bliss of ignorence enjoyed by so many ,
but for how long can one have his head in the sand ,before noticing that your a**s is on fire

Is global warming a man-made menace?

not all there are natural cycles in the planets life
but a lot is influenced by mans existance ,and this is increasing with overpopulation,putting strains on Natural resources and increasing contaminations as well as destructions of essential componants the ensure living conditions for all life forms

some home truths

politicians and scientists who work for politicians have downplayed the facts because solutions are expensive and means change and change effects many people income,and most of the world is kept in the dark of the real things that are going on.


in North Africa,India,Mexico ,millions of people are effected by land loss and desertification


in recent times thousands of people have died because of exessive heat,usually old people.in India ,Mexico and France,
deforestation causing desertification,the desert conditions causing very cold nights and scorching hot days

in china, thousands of what used to be farmers are running for their lives from the dust storms that have burried their towns and turned their lands into dessert,the globe where they were got to hot for them .
and instead of producing food they are now needing it from some where else,and they will drastically effect the world food prices when they start buying water in the form of grains ,at any cost destabalising governments, in some countries ,could be the result
(are you seeing more Chinese around interested in agricultural lands ,we do here in Mexico)

,the Sahara is growing by 7 kilometers a year
and all of the desserts we know are a results of mans actions ,and they are increasing ,not getting less ,in the dinosaurs days ,there were no desserts.

collectively this planet is drying up because of bad farming practices like,over grazing and fertilizers,

as far as the food production is concerned, Global warming or some of its effects are serious,rising seas result in landloss

each degree rise in temperature means 10%crop loss

more landloss because of desertification every year,we have less areble land to produce food ,for an extra 70 million people ,

and there is less and less water (because of deforestation),to irrigate this production ,
and there are less and less farmers to do it..
who are overpumping deep carbon aquifiers
who are plowing more and more unstable lands because they have lost so many million hectares to desertification ,
because of bad farming practises ,such as using fertilizers and heavy machinary or over grazing

RISING SEAS
The northpole is melting ,and we will know it without ice in our life times.
this does not affect the sea level because it is ice that is already in the water.but the melting ice from Green land and the south pole ,are another matter.

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.