Notice at the end, I'm going to leave my references for all to review.
I don't know about those who will read this, but I'm getting tired of only one side of the whole global warming issue getting out to the public.
I ask everyone to please read this in its entirety. There are going to be spots that look as though I'm into the man-made global warming lie, but I'm not. I'm only answering the question pointedly.
I would like to say that my professor never replied to my posting. I'm not sure if it's because this is long or if it was because I don't buy into man-made global warming. Actually.... I only had one person out of a total of 20 who responded to my posting. I would have taken criticism, but to get NOTHING????? It made me feel as though my opinion counted for even less than the responses I got from the following.
1. Define "global warming."
Global warming can be defined as, “an increase in the earth's average atmospheric temperature that causes corresponding changes in climate and that may result from the greenhouse effect” (Global warming, 2011). That is, global warming is the increase in the earth’s average air temperature, which causes environmental changes.
2. Describe briefly the theory behind man-caused global warming. Include a list of some of the gases that are believed to contribute to global warming.
The theory behind man-caused global warming states that through man’s actions, the average temperature of the earth is rising causing changes in the environment such as the melting of the polar ice caps, the rising of the seas, and a threat to the wild life that depend on the polar ice. Although the process of greenhouse gases is totally natural, man’s actions are being blamed for an increase in these gases, which act to trap heat.
There are two basic types of greenhouse gases: those that occur naturally and those that are manmade. Naturally occurring greenhouse gases include, “water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone” (West, 2011). Manmade greenhouse gases include, “hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6)” (West, 2011). Of these, carbon dioxide is blamed the most for global warming.
3. What are the causes of increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere?
According to Larry West, a writer on environmental issues, man is the direct cause of an increase in naturally occurring greenhouse gases.
Burning fossil fuels (gas, coal, oil), wood and solid wastes are being blamed for an increase in carbon dioxide.
Burning fossil fuels and solid wastes along with certain practices associated with emissions in industry and agriculture are being blamed for an increase in nitrous oxide levels.
The production and transport of fossil fuels along with the gases released by decaying organic waste (feces) and animal flatulence are being blamed for an increase in methane.
4. What country do you think is the largest contributor to global warming?
Believe it or not, I know that we are not the largest contributor to global warming, but we are up there.
While looking up this answer, I noticed a lot of web sites that claim that the United States is the largest contributor to global warming, but each one of those were blogs and, as a personal rule of thumb, I do not trust blogs.
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, a non-profit science group that gathers research to promote a better environment, as of 2008, China is the largest contributor to global warming with the United States coming in second and Russia in third. This is based on the total amount of each country’s carbon dioxide emissions.
5. What types of industries emit the most greenhouse gases?
The burning of fossil fuels has been shown to increase the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and has been labeled as the number one man-made component to greenhouse gas increases. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), energy plants that use fossil fuels to create energy, the transportation industry, and other industries are the top three industries that emit carbon dioxide. The EPA lists the following as other industries (US EPA, 2011):
- Production and consumption of mineral products such as cement, lime and soda ash
- Production of metals such as iron and steel, aluminum, zinc and lead
- Chemical production (e.g., ammonia, petrochemicals and titanium dioxide)
- Consumption of petroleum products in feedstocks and other end-uses
The EPA also states that industry processes are also to blame for increases in nitrous oxide and methane.
6. What is the evidence that global warming is a real process caused by humans and occurring right now?
Through my research, I cannot find any real evidence that man-made global warming is currently happening outside of web sites that are owned by ecologists and environmentalists.
Being a meteorologist with 20 years of experience, I can tell you that there are weather records that can attest to an average decrease in the earth’s temperature.
Once an hour (at a minimum), human weather observers go outside all over the world (including those on ship at sea) to record what is currently going on with the weather. There are also sites all over the world (including over water sides) that are totally automated. These weather observers (both computer and human) are recording the following (this is my current job):
- current wind speed and direction
- current atmospheric pressure
- current cloud cover (both amount and heights of the base of the clouds)
- current visibility and anything that is restricting visibility (such as fog, rain, snow, smoke, etc)
- current air temperature
- current dew point temperature
- current sea surface temperature (observers at sea)
- current sea and swell heights (observers at sea)
- current sea and swell periods (observers at sea)
- current swell directions (observers at sea)
These records are transmitted between 10-5 minutes before each hour to the world. There are web sites where anyone can view these records, which are coded. Some of these web sites include a translator for those who don’t know how to read the codes. These records are also archived in computerized data bases. These archives are used to create better computerized atmospheric weather forecasting models. Believe it or not, literally half the process of forecasting weather is knowing what has happened in the past. These archived weather observations are also used in climatological studies. It’s these climatological studies that have shown that the earth’s average temperature has decreased slightly since 2007.
There were studies by climatologists and other scientists that suggested that man was in fact causing global warming. Their collaborative effort attempted to prove that as man went about his business, he was causing a dangerous increase in greenhouse gases (mostly carbon dioxide), which has in turn created an increase in the earth’s average temperature. There were also computer models that were created in an attempt to show what future average earth temperatures would be like if things didn’t change.
Since some time in 2007, several scientists and other people have begun to speak out against claims that man has impacted the environment enough to cause global warming. The fact is, some of those climatologists and other scientists that conducted the studies have since admitted that they lied in order to make global warming seem like a manmade disaster.
7. What is the evidence that global warming is either not occurring or is not caused by humans?
As stated above, there are weather records that show a decrease in the earth’s average temperature. There is a report provided by the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that also shows evidence that man has little to nothing to do with global climate change of any kind.
A report provided by the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee entitled More Than 700 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims Scientists Continue to Debunk “Consensus” in 2008 & 2009 discusses the fact that, at time of the last update on 16 March 2009, over 700 scientists internationally have been refuting “the facts” provided that support manmade global warming. Some of these scientists include those who used to work for the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is an agency under the United Nations that was formed to examine global climate change to include global warming. It was charged to understand how man was affecting climate change. Of significant importance is that these 700 scientists far outnumber the 52 scientists the United Nations had employed to try to prove that man was creating global climate change in 2007.
According to this report, “The chorus of skeptical scientific voices grow louder in 2008 and 2009 as a steady stream of peer-reviewed studies, analyses, real world data and inconvenient developments challenged the UN’s and former Vice President Al Gore's claims that the ‘science is settled’ and there is a ‘consensus’” (Morano, 2008). Of the peer-reviewed studies, the following has been submitted in the report as evidence that manmade global warming is in fact not happening (Morano, 2008):
- Global temperatures failing to warm (since 2007)
- Peer-reviewed studies predicting a continued lack of warming (very important in the scientific community to weed out biases)
- a failed attempt to revive the discredited “Hockey Stick,” in which Michael Mann, a physicist and climatologist, attempted to show a drastic increase in the earth’s average temperature
- inconvenient developments and studies regarding rising carbon dioxide (while carbon dioxide has increased since 1986, temperatures have not significantly increase, but have decreased)
- the Spotless Sun (increases in sunspots have also been blamed for global warming, which has since been debunked)
- Clouds (they have a much larger effect on temperatures than carbon dioxide does)
- Antarctica (global warming was supposed to melt Antarctica and thus shrink it, but studies have shown that the continent is in fact increasing in size)
- the Arctic (what was said about Antarctica was also said about the Arctic: seems the realities between the two are the same)
- Greenland’s ice (if anyone has been keeping track, that’s a melting Antarctica, Arctic, and Greenland that never melted)
- Mount Kilimanjaro (global warming was supposed to be the reason for a decrease in ice on the mountain, but later studies have shown it’s due to a lack of precipitation)
- Global sea ice (global warming was supposed to melt sea ice, but sea ice coverage as increased)
- Causes of Hurricanes (global warming has been blamed for an increase in stronger hurricane, but there is no scientific proof that this is true)
- Extreme Storms (as with hurricanes, global warming has been blamed for an increase in extreme storms [tornadoes/thunderstorms] and like hurricanes, there is no scientific proof that this is true)
- Extinctions (ecologists cannot agree that global warming will cause future extinctions)
- Floods (global warming is supposed to increase the likely hood of floods, but this is not true because events that cause flooding respond to weather conditions, not climate conditions)
- Droughts (global warming is also supposed to increase the likely hood of droughts, but research in China shows that global cooling causes more droughts, not global warming)
- Ocean Acidification (global warming is supposed to cause higher concentrations on acid in the world’s oceans thanks to increased carbon dioxide, but research has shown that there is no correlation between carbon dioxide and ocean acidification)
- Polar Bears (global warming is supposed to decrease the population of polar bears due to the warming of the North Pole, but research has shown that polar bear populations are in the increase due to hunting restrictions)
- Extreme weather deaths (global warming is supposed to increase the numbers of dead due to extreme weather, but research has shown a decrease in the numbers of extreme weather related deaths)
- Frogs (global warming has been blamed for the decline and extinction of certain species of frogs, but research has shown that disease was most likely the culprit, but global warming)
- Lack of atmospheric dust (the belief is that since there is a decrease in atmospheric dust, more heat from the sun is allowed to reach the earth’s atmosphere causing global warming: there is no proof of this since global cooling as been happening)
- Malaria (global warming is supposed to increase cases of malaria worldwide: those who support this have not included factors that would preclude the spread of malaria such as simple immunity)
- The failure of oceans to warm and rise as predicted (this goes hand-in-hand with the shrinking of Antarctica and the Arctic, which we now know is not happening)
8. Based on your research, summarize your own beliefs regarding the issue of global warming, if it is or is not occurring, if it is or is not caused by human activity, and what if anything we should be doing about the problem.
I believe that global warming is not happening anymore thanks to simple weather observations that show that earth’s average temperature has been in the decline.
Since carbon dioxide is being blamed as the main issue with “global warming,” I think that there is more than enough scientific study that shows that increases in carbon dioxide due to man has little to do with climate change in general, let alone global warming.
I will say that we should still be better stewards of the earth, but not for reasons of global climate change, but for sustainability.
Bibliography
Each Country's Share of CO2 Emissions . (2010, August 20). Retrieved June 13, 2011, from Union of Concerned Scientists: http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/each-countrys-share-of-co2.html
Global warming. (2011). Retrieved June 12, 2011, from Dictionary.com: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/global+warming
Morano, M. (2008, December 11). U.S. Senate Minority Report Update: More Than 700 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims. Retrieved June 14, 2011, from U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works: http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=2674e64f-802a-23ad-490b-bd9faf4dcdb7
Strandberg, V. (2010). Michael Mann's hockey stick graph analysis. Retrieved June 15, 2011, from Global Warming and the Climate: http://www.global-warming-and-the-climate.com/mann's-hockey-stick-climate-graph.htm
US EPA, O. C. (2011, April 15). The Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks: 1990-2009 contains emissions data for the United States. Retrieved June 13, 2011, from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency: http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/downloads11/US-GHG-Inventory-2011-Complete_Report.pdf
West, L. (2011). What are Greenhouse Gases? Retrieved June 12, 2011, from About.com: http://environment.about.com/od/faqglobalwarming/f/greengases.htm
Wright, R. T., & Boorse, D. F. (2011). Environmental Science Toward a Sustainable Future (11th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Pearson Education, Inc.
