PAPER ON THE EFFECT OF GREEN HOUSE GASES ON THE ENVIRONMENT

BY ARIERE ARODOVWE MARVELOUS (1101/2012)EARTH SCIENCE DEPARTMENT (GEOLOGY OPTION) JUNE, 2016

AbstractThe amount of solar energy absorbed or radiated by Earth is modulated by the atmosphere and depends on its composition. Greenhouse gases - such as water vapor, carbon dioxide, and methane - occur naturally in small amounts and absorb and release heat energy more efficiently than abundant atmospheric gases like nitrogen and oxygen. Small increases in carbon dioxide concentration have a large effect on the climate system. The existence of a heavier layer of greenhouse effect gases at the level of the entire planet triggers significant climate changes. This paper intends to present the main environmental indicators elaborated by various specialized international bodies, and the models used by different governmental or non-governmental bodies for studying the impact/effects of greenhouse effect gas emissions on the environment, climatic changes or economic development.

TABLE OF CONTENT

Executive Summary........................................................................................................................1

Introduction.....................................................................................................................................1

Understanding Green House Effect.................................................................................................1

Looking Forward.............................................................................................................................1

Table of Content ………………………………………………………………………………….1

ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………….

INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………...3

What are Greenhouse Gases……………………………………………………………..3

Sources of Greenhouse Gases…………………………………………………………...5

Types of Greenhouse Gases…...………………………………………………………...6

What is the Greenhouse Effect………………………………………………………….7

UNDERSTANDING THE GREEN HOUSE EFFECT……………………………....9

What causes the Greenhouse Effect………..………………………………………….....9

How do humans contribute to the Greenhouse Effect……..…………………………….10

Scientific issues surrounding the Greenhouse Effect……….………………………..….11

Consequences of enhanced Greenhouse effect…..……………………………….....…..16

LOOKING FORWARD (MITIGATION TO THE GREEN HOUSE EFFECT)…22

The Industrial Sector……………………………………………………………………23

The Transportation Sector………………………………………………………………23

Renewables…………………………………………………………………………….24

Forestry and Agriculture………………………………………………………………25

Information……………………………………………………………………………25

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CONCLUSION…………………………………………………..……………………….27

REFERENCES……………………………………………………………………………28

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INTRODUCTION

The Sun powers Earth’s climate, radiating energy at very short wavelengths, predominately in

the visible or near-visible (e.g., ultraviolet) part of the spectrum. Roughly one-third of the solar

energy that reaches the top of Earth’s atmosphere is reflected directly back to space. The

remaining two-thirds is absorbed by the surface and, to a lesser extent, by the atmosphere. To

balance the absorbed incoming energy, the Earth must, on average, radiate the same amount of

energy back to space. Because the Earth is much colder than the Sun, it radiates at much longer

wavelengths, primarily in the infrared part of the spectrum. Much of this thermal radiation

emitted by the land and ocean is absorbed by the atmosphere, including clouds, and reradiated

back to Earth. This is called the greenhouse effect. The glass walls in a greenhouse reduce

airflow and increase the temperature of the air inside. Analogously, but through a different

physical process, the Earth’s greenhouse effect warms the surface of the planet. Without the

natural greenhouse effect, the average temperature at Earth’s surface would be below the

freezing point of water. Thus, Earth’s natural greenhouse effect makes life as we know it pos-

sible. However, human activities, primarily the burning of fossil fuels and clearing of forests,

have greatly intensified the natural greenhouse effect, causing global warming.

What are greenhouse gases?

Greenhouse gases include methane, chlorofluorocarbons and carbon dioxide. These gases act as

a shield that traps heat in the earth’s atmosphere. A greenhouse gas is any gaseous compound in the atmosphere that is capable of absorbing infrared radiation, thereby trapping and holding heat in the atmosphere. By increasing the heat in the atmosphere, greenhouse gases are responsible for the greenhouse effect, which ultimately leads to global warming.

The two most abundant gases in the atmosphere, nitrogen (comprising 78% of the dry

atmosphere) and oxygen (comprising 21%), exert almost no greenhouse effect. Instead, the

greenhouse effect comes from molecules that are more complex and much less common. Water

vapour is the most important greenhouse gas, and carbon dioxide (CO2) is the second-most

important one. Methane, nitrous oxide, ozone and several other gases present in the atmosphere

in small amounts also contribute to the greenhouse effect. In the humid equatorial regions, where

there is so much water vapour in the air that the greenhouse effect is very large, adding a small

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additional amount of CO2 or water vapour has only a small direct impact on downward infrared

radiation. However, in the cold, dry polar regions, the effect of a small increase in CO2 or water

vapour is much greater. The same is true for the cold, dry upper atmosphere where a small

increase in water vapour has a greater influence on the greenhouse effect than the same change in

water vapour would have near the surface.

Several components of the climate system, notably the oceans and living things, affect

atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases. A prime example of this is plants taking CO2

out of the atmosphere and converting it (and water) into carbohydrates via photosynthesis. In the

industrial era, human activities have added greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, primarily

through the burning of fossil fuels and clearing of forests. Adding more of a greenhouse gas,

such as CO2, to the atmosphere intensifies the greenhouse effect, thus warming Earth’s climate.

The amount of warming depends on various feedback mechanisms. For example, as the

atmosphere warms due to rising levels of greenhouse gases, its concentration of water vapour

increases, further intensifying the greenhouse effect. This in turn causes more warming, which

causes an additional increase in water vapour, in a self-reinforcing cycle. This water vapour feed-

back may be strong enough to approximately double the increase in the greenhouse effect due to

the added CO2 alone.

Additional important feedback mechanisms involve clouds. Clouds are effective at absorbing

infrared radiation and therefore exert a large greenhouse effect, thus warming the Earth. Clouds

are also effective at reflecting away incoming solar radiation, thus cooling the Earth. A change in

almost any aspect of clouds, such as their type, location, water content, cloud altitude, particle

size and shape, or lifetimes, affects the degree to which clouds warm or cool the Earth. Some

changes amplify warming while others diminish it. Much research is in progress to better

understand how clouds change in response to climate warming, and how these changes affect

climate through various feedback mechanisms.

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Sources of greenhouse gases

Some greenhouse gases, like methane, are produced through agricultural practices including

livestock manure management. Others, like CO2, largely result from natural processes like

respiration and from the burning of fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas. The production of

electricity is the source of 70 percent of the United States' sulfur dioxide emissions, 13 percent of

nitrogen oxide emissions, and 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions, according to the EPA.

The second cause of CO2 release is deforestation, according to research published by Duke

University. When trees are killed to produce goods or heat, they release the carbon that is

normally stored for photosynthesis. This process releases nearly a billion tons of carbon into the

atmosphere per year, according to the 2010 Global Forest Resources Assessment.

It's worth noting that forestry and other land-use practices offset some of these greenhouse gas

emissions, according to the EPA. "Replanting helps to reduce the buildup of carbon dioxide in

the atmosphere as growing trees sequester carbon dioxide through photosynthesis. Atmospheric

carbon dioxide is converted and stored in the vegetation and soils of the forest. However, forests

cannot sequester all of the carbon dioxide we are emitting to the atmosphere through the burning

of fossil fuels and a reduction in fossil fuel emissions is still necessary to avoid build up in the

atmosphere," said Daley.

Worldwide, the output of greenhouse gases is a source of grave concern: From the time the

Industrial Revolution began to the year 2009, atmospheric CO2 levels have increased almost 38

percent and methane levels have increased a whopping 148 percent, according to NASA, and

most of that increase has been in the past 50 years. Because of global warming, 2014 was the

warmest year on record and 10 of the hottest years have all come after 1998.

"The warming we observe affects atmospheric circulation, which impacts rainfall patterns

globally. This will lead to big environmental changes, and challenges, for people all across the

globe," Josef Werne, an associate professor in the department of geology and planetary science

at the University of Pittsburgh, told Live Science.

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If these trends continue, scientists, government officials and a growing number of citizens fear

that the worst effects of global warming — extreme weather, rising sea levels, plant and animal

extinctions, ocean acidification, major shifts in climate and unprecedented social upheaval —

will be inevitable. In answer to the problems caused by global warming by greenhouse gasses,

the government created a climate action plan in 2013.

Types of Greenhouse gases

Greenhouse gases comprise less than 1% of the atmosphere. Their levels are determined by a

balance between “sources” and “sinks”. Sources and sinks are processes that generate and

destroy greenhouse gases respectively. Human affect greenhouse gas levels by introducing new

sources or by interfering with natural sinks. The major greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are

carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and

ozone (O3). Atmospheric water vapour (H2O) also makes a large contribution to the natural

greenhouse effect but it is thought that its presence is not directly affected by human activity.

Characteristics of some of the greenhouse gases are shown in Table 1 below

Plate 1: Major Green House Gases and Their Percentages

Source: Encarta Encyclopedia

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Table 1: Characteristics of some major greenhouse gases

What is the Greenhouse Effect?

The “Greenhouse Effect” is a term that refers to a physical property of the Earth's atmosphere. If

the Earth had no atmosphere, its average surface temperature would be very low of about 18℃ rather than the comfortable 15℃ found today. The difference in temperature is due to a suite of

gases called greenhouse gases which affect the overall energy balance of the Earth's system by

absorbing infrared radiation. In its existing state, the Earth atmosphere system balances

absorption of solar radiation by emission of infrared radiation to space. Due to greenhouse gases,

the atmosphere absorbs more infrared energy than it reradiates to space, resulting in a net

warming of the Earth atmosphere system and of surface temperature. This is the “Natural

Greenhouse Effect”. With more greenhouse gases released to the atmosphere due to human

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activity, more infrared radiation will be trapped in the Earth's surface which contributes to the

“Enhanced Greenhouse Effect”.

The greenhouse effect increases the temperature of the Earth by trapping heat in our atmosphere.

This keeps the temperature of the Earth higher than it would be if direct heating by the Sun was

the only source of warming. When sunlight reaches the surface of the Earth, some of it is

absorbed which warms the ground and some bounces back to space as heat. Greenhouse

gases that are in the atmosphere absorb and then redirect some of this heat back towards the

Earth.

The greenhouse effect is a major factor in keeping the Earth warm because it keeps some of the

planet's heat that would otherwise escape from the atmosphere out to space. In fact, without the

greenhouse effect the Earth's average global temperature would be much colder and life on Earth

as we know it would not be possible. The difference between the Earth's actual average

temperature 14° C (57.2° F) and the expected effective temperature just with the Sun's radiation -

19° C (-2.2° F) gives us the strength of the greenhouse effect, which is 33° C

The greenhouse effect is a natural process that is millions of years old. It plays a critical role in

regulating the overall temperature of the Earth. The greenhouse effect was first discovered by

Joseph Fourier in 1827, experimentally verified by John Tyndall in 1861, and quantified by

Svante Arrhenius in 1896.

Plate 2 A simplified diagram illustrating the global long term radiative balance of the atmosphere.

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Source: Encarta Encyclopedia

* Carbon dioxide’s lifetime is poorly defined because the gas is not destroyed over time, but instead moves among different parts of the ocean–atmosphere–land system. Some of the excess carbon dioxide will be absorbed quickly (for example, by the ocean surface), but some will remain in the atmosphere for thousands of years, due in part to the very slow process by which carbon is transferred to ocean sediments.

Table 2: Major Long-Lived Greenhouse Gases and Their Characteristics

UNDERSTANDING THE GREEN HOUSE EFFECT

What Causes the Greenhouse Effect?

Life on earth depends on energy from the sun. About 30 percent of the sunlight that beams

toward Earth is deflected by the outer atmosphere and scattered back into space. The rest reaches

the planet's surface and is reflected upward again as a type of slow-moving energy called

infrared radiation.

The heat caused by infrared radiation is absorbed by greenhouse gases such as water vapor,

carbon dioxide, ozone and methane, which slows its escape from the atmosphere.

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Although greenhouse gases make up only about 1 percent of the Earth's atmosphere, they

regulate our climate by trapping heat and holding it in a kind of warm-air blanket that surrounds

the planet.

This phenomenon is what scientists call the greenhouse effect. Without it, scientists estimate that

the average temperature on Earth would be colder by approximately 30 degrees Celsius (54

degrees Fahrenheit), far too cold to sustain most of our current ecosystems.

How Do Humans Contribute to the Greenhouse Effect?

While the greenhouse effect is an essential environmental prerequisite for life on Earth, there

really can be too much of a good thing.

The problems begin when human activities distort and accelerate the natural process by

creating more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere than are necessary to warm the planet to an

ideal temperature.

Burning natural gas, coal and oil, including gasoline for automobile engines, raises the level of

carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Some farming practices and other land uses increase the levels of methane and nitrous oxide.

Many factories produce long-lasting industrial gases that do not occur naturally, yet

contribute significantly to the enhanced greenhouse effect and global warming that is currently

under way.

Deforestation also contributes to global warming. Trees use carbon dioxide and give off oxygen

in its place, which helps to create the optimal balance of gases in the atmosphere. As more

forests are logged for timber or cut down to make way for farming, however, there are fewer

trees to perform this critical function. At least some of the damage can be offset when young

forests aggressively regrow, capturing tons of carbon.

Population growth is another factor in global warming, because as more people use fossil fuels

for heat, transportation and manufacturing the level of greenhouse gases continues to increase.

As more farming occurs to feed millions of new people, more greenhouse gases enter the

atmosphere.

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Ultimately, more greenhouse gases means more infrared radiation trapped and held, which

gradually increases the temperature of the Earth's surface, the air in the lower atmosphere,and

ocean waters.

Scientific Issues Surrounding the Greenhouse Effect

It is helpful to break down the set of issues known as the greenhouse effect into a series of

stages, each feeding into another, and then to consider how policy questions might be addressed

in the context of these more technical stages.

Projecting emissions. Behavioral assumptions must be made in order to project future use of

fossil fuels (or deforestation, because this too can impact the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere--

it accounts for about 20% of the recent total CO2 injection of about 5.5 x 10 9 metric tons). The

essence of this aspect then is social science. Projections must be made of human population, the

per capita consumption of fossil fuel, deforestation rates, reforestation activities, and perhaps

even countermeasures to deal with the extra CO2 in the air. These projections depend on issues

such as the likelihood that alternative energy systems or conservation measures will be available,

their price, and their social acceptability. Furthermore, trade in fuel carbon (for example, a large-

scale transfer from coal-rich to coal-poor nations) will depend not only on the energy

requirements and the available alternatives but also on the economic health of the potential

importing nations. This trade in turn will depend upon whether those nations have adequate

capital resources to spend on energy rather than other precious strategic commodities--such as

food or fertilizer as well as some other strategic materials such as weaponry. Total CO2

emissions from energy systems, for example, can be expressed by a formula termed "the

population multiplier" by Ehrlich and Holdren

The first term represents engineering effects, the second standard of living, and the third

demography in this version, which is expanded from the original.

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In order to quantify future changes, we can make scenarios that show alternative CO 2 futures

based on assumed rates of growth in the use of fossil fuels. Most typical projections are in the 0.5

to 2% annual growth range for fossil fuel use and imply that CO2 concentrations will double (to

600 ppm) in the 21st century. There is virtually no dispute among scientists that the CO2

concentration in the atmosphere has already increased by @25% since @1850. The record at

Mauna Loa observatory shows that concentrations have increased from about 310 to more than

350 ppm since 1958. Superimposed on this trend is a large annual cycle in which CO2 reaches a

maximum in the spring of each year in the Northern Hemisphere and a minimum in the fall. The

fall minimum is generally thought to result from growth of the seasonal biosphere in the

Northern Hemisphere summer whereby photosynthesis increases faster than respiration and

atmospheric CO2 levels are reduced. After September, the reverse occurs and respiration

proceeds at a faster rate than photosynthesis and CO2 levels increase. Analyses of trapped air in

several ice cores suggest that during the past several thousand years of the present interglacial,

CO2 levels have been reasonably close to the pre-industrial value of 280 ppm. However, since

about 1850, CO2 has risen @25%. At the maximum of the last Ice Age 18,000 years ago, CO2

levels were roughly 25% lower than pre industrial values. The data also reveal a close

correspondence between the inferred temperature at Antarctica and the measured CO2

concentration from gas bubbles trapped in ancient ice. However, whether the CO2 level was a

response to or caused the temperature changes is debated: CO2 may have simply served as an

amplifier or positive feedback mechanism for climate change--that is, less CO2, colder

temperatures. This uncertainty arises because the specific bio geophysical mechanisms that cause

CO2 to change in step with the climate are not yet elucidated. Methane concentrations in bubbles

in ice cores also show a similar close relation with climate during the past 150,000 years.

Other greenhouse gases like chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), CH4, nitrogen oxides, tropospheric

ozone, and others could, together, be as important as CO2 in augmenting the greenhouse effect,

but some of these depend on human behavior and have complicated biogeochemical interactions.

These complications account for the large error bars. Space does not permit a proper treatment of

individual aspects of each non-CO2 trace greenhouse gas; therefore, I reluctantly will consider all

greenhouse gases taken together as "equivalent CO2. However, this assumption implies that

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projections for "CO2" alone will be an underestimate of the total greenhouse gas buildup by

roughly a factor of 2. Furthermore, this assumption forces us to ignore possible relations between

CH4 and water vapor in the stratosphere, for example, which might affect polar stratospheric

clouds, which are believed to enhance photochemical destruction of ozone by chlorine atoms.

Projecting greenhouse gas concentrations. Once a plausible set of scenarios for how much CO2

will be injected into the atmosphere is obtained the interacting biogeochemical processes that

control the global distribution and stocks of the carbon need to be determined. Such processes

involve the uptake of CO2 by green plants (because CO2 is the basis of photosynthesis, more CO2

in the air means faster rates of photosynthesis), changes in the amount of forested area and

vegetation type, and how CO2 fertilization or climate change affects natural ecosystems on land

and in the oceans. The transition from ice age to interglacial climates provides a concrete

example of how large natural climatic change affected natural ecosystems in North America.

This transition represented some 5deg.C global warming, with as much as 10deg. to 20deg.C

warming locally near ice sheets. The boreal species now in Canada were hugging the rim of the

great Lauren tide glacier in the U.S. Northeast some 10,000 years ago, while now abundant

hardwood species were restricted to small refuges largely in the South. The natural rate of forest

movement that can be inferred is, to order of magnitude, some @1 km per year, in response to

temperature changes averaging @1deg. to 2deg.C per thousand years. If climate were to change

much more rapidly than this, then the forests would likely not be in equilibrium with the climate;

that is, they could not keep up with the fast change and would go through a period of transient

adjustment in which many hard-to-predict changes in species distribution, productivity, and CO2

absorptive capacity would likely occur.

Furthermore, because the slow removal of CO2 from the atmosphere is largely accomplished

through biological and chemical processes in the oceans and decades to centuries are needed for

equilibration after a large perturbation, the rates at which climate change modifies mixing

processes in the ocean (and thus the CO2 residence time) also needs to be taken into account.

There is considerable uncertainty about how much newly injected CO2 will remain in the air

during the next century, but typical estimates put this so-called "airborne fraction" at about 50%.

Reducing CO2 emissions could initially provide a bonus by allowing the reduction of the

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airborne fraction, whereas increasing CO2 emissions could increase the airborne fraction and

exacerbate the greenhouse effect. However, this bonus might last only a decade or so, which is

the time it takes for the upper mixed layer of the oceans to mix with deep ocean water.

Biological feedbacks can also influence the amount of CO2 in the air. For example, enhanced

photosynthesis could reduce the buildup rate of CO2 relative to that projected with carbon cycle

models that do not include such an effect. On the other hand, although there is about as much

carbon stored in the forests as there is in the atmosphere, there is about twice as much carbon

stored in the soils in the form of dead organic matter. This carbon is slowly decomposed by soil

microbes back to CO2 and other gases. Because the rate of this decomposition depends on

temperature, global warming from increased greenhouse gases could cause enhanced rates of

microbial decomposition of neuromas (dead organic matter), thereby causing a positive feedback

that would enhance CO2 buildup. Furthermore, considerable methane is trapped below frozen

sediments as clathrates in tundra and off continental shelves. These clathrates could release vast

quantities of methane into the atmosphere if substantial Arctic warming were to take place.

Already the ice core data have shown that not only has CO2 tracked temperature closely for the

past 150,000 years, but so has methane, and methane is a significant trace greenhouse gas which

is some 20 to 30 times more effective per molecule at absorbing infrared radiation than CO2.

Despite these uncertainties, many workers have projected that CO2 concentrations will reach 600

ppm sometime between 2030 and 2080 and that some of the other trace greenhouse gases will

continue to rise at even faster rates.

Estimating global climatic response. Once we have projected how much CO2 (and other trace

greenhouse gases) may be in the air during the next century or so, we have to estimate its

climatic effect. Complications arise because of interactive processes; that is, feedback

mechanisms. For example, if added CO2 were to cause a temperature increase on earth, the

warming would likely decrease the regions of Earth covered by snow and ice and decrease the

global albedo. The initial warming would thus create a darker planet that would absorb more

energy, thereby creating a larger final warming. This scenario is only one of a number of

possible feedback mechanisms. Clouds can change in amount, height, or brightness, for example,

substantially altering the climatic response to CO2. And because feedback processes interact in

the climatic system, estimating global temperature increases accurately is difficult; projections of

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the global equilibrium temperature response to an increase of CO2 from 300 to 600 ppm have

ranged from @1.5deg. to 5.5deg.C. (In the next section the much larger uncertainties

surrounding regional responses will be discussed.) Despite these uncertainties, there is virtually

no debate that continued increases of CO2 will cause global warming.

We cannot directly verify our quantitative predictions of greenhouse warming on the basis of

purely historical events; therefore, we must base our estimates on natural analogs of large

climatic changes and numerical climatic models because the complexity of the real world cannot

be reproduced in laboratory models. In the mathematical models, the known basic physical laws

are applied to the atmosphere, oceans, and ice sheets, and the equations that represent these laws

are solved with the best computers available. Then, we simply change in the computer program

the effective amount of greenhouse gases, repeat our calculation, and compare it to the "control"

calculation for the present Earth. Many such global climatic models (GCMs) have been built

during the past few decades, and the results are in rough agreement that if CO2 were to double

from 300 to 600 ppm, then Earth's surface temperature would eventually warm up somewhere

between 1deg. and 5deg.C; the most recent GCM estimates are from 3.5deg. to 5. 0deg.C. For

comparison, the global average surface temperature (land and ocean) during the Ice Age extreme

18,000 years ago was only about 5deg.C colder than that today. Thus, a global temperature

changes of 1deg. to 2deg.C can have considerable effects. A sustained global increase of more

than 2deg.C above present would be unprecedented in the era of human civilization.

The largest uncertainty in estimating the sensitivity of Earth's surface temperature to a given

increase in radiative forcing arises from the problem of parameterization. Because the equations

that are believed to represent the flows of mass, momentum, and energy in the atmosphere,

oceans, ice fields, and biosphere cannot be solved analytically with any known techniques,

approximation techniques are used in which the equations are discretized with a finite grid that

divides the region of interest into cells that are several hundred kilometers or more on a side.

Clearly, critically important variables, such as clouds, which control the radiation budget of

Earth, do not occur on scales as large as the grid of a general circulation model. Therefore, we

seek to find a parametric representation or parameterization that relates implicitly the effects of

important processes that operate at sub grid-scale but still have effects at the resolution of a

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typical general circulation model. For example, a parameter or proportionality coefficient might

be used that describes the average cloudiness in grid cell in terms of the mean relative humidity

in that cell and some other measures of atmospheric stability. Then, the important task becomes

validating these semi empirical parameterizations because at some scale, all models, no matter

how high resolution, must treat sub grid-scale processes through parameterization.

Projecting regional climatic response. In order to make useful estimates of the effects of

climatic changes, we need to determine the regional distribution of climatic change. Will it be

drier in Iowa in 2010, too hot in India, wetter in Africa, or more humid in New York; will

California be prone to more forest fires or will Venice flood? Unfortunately, reliable prediction

of the time sequence of local and regional responses of variables such as temperature and rainfall

requires climatic models of greater complexity and expense than are currently available. Even

though the models have been used to estimate the responses of these variables, the regional

predictions from state-of-the-art models are not yet reliable.

Although there is considerable experience in examining regional changes, considerable

uncertainty remains over the probability that these predicted regional features will occur. The

principal reasons for the uncertainty are twofold: the crude treatment in climatic models of

biological and hydrological processes and the usual neglect of the effects of the deep oceans. The

deep oceans would respond slowly--on time scales of many decades to centuries--to climatic

warming at the surface, and also act differentially (that is, non-uniformly in space and through

time). Therefore, the oceans, like the forests, would be out of equilibrium with the atmosphere if

greenhouse gases increase as rapidly as typically is projected and if climatic warming were to

occur as fast as 2deg. to 6deg.C during the next century. This typical projection, recall, is 10 to

60 times as fast as the natural average rate of temperature change that occurred from the end of

the last Ice Age to the present warm period (that is, 2deg. to 6deg.C warming in a century from

human activities compared to an average natural warming of 1deg. to 2deg.C per millennium

from the waning of the Ice Age to the establishment of the present interglacial epoch). If the

oceans are out of equilibrium with the atmosphere, then specific regional forecasts will not have

much credibility until fully coupled atmosphere-ocean models are tested and applied. The

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development of such models is a formidable scientific and computational task and is still not

very advanced.

Consequences of Enhanced Greenhouse Effect

i) Global Warming

Increase of greenhouse gases concentration causes a reduction in outgoing infrared radiation,

thus the Earth's climate must change somehow to restore the balance between incoming and

outgoing radiation. This “climatic change” will include a “global warming” of the Earth's surface

and the lower atmosphere as warming up is the simplest way for the climate to get rid of the

extra energy.

However, a small rise in temperature will induce many other changes, for example, cloud cover

and wind patterns. Some of these changes may act to enhance the warming (positive feedbacks),

others to counteract it (negative feedbacks). Using complex climate models, the

"Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change" in their third assessment report has forecast that

global mean surface temperature will rise by 1.4℃ to 5.8℃ by the end of 2100. This projection

takes into account the effects of aerosols which tend to cool the climate as well as the delaying

effects of the oceans which have a large thermal capacity. However, there are many uncertainties

associated with this projection such as future emission rates of greenhouse gases, climate

feedbacks, and the size of the ocean delay etc.

ii) Sea Level Rise

If global warming takes place, sea level will rise due to two different processes. Firstly, warmer

temperature cause sea level to rise due to the thermal expansion of seawater. Secondly, water

from melting glaciers and the ice sheets of Greenland and the Antarctica would also add water to

the ocean. It is predicted that the Earth's average sea level will rise by 0.09 to 0.88 m between

1990 and 2100.

Potential Impact on the Environment / human life

a) Economic Impact

Over half of the human population lives within 100 kilometers of the sea. Most of this population

lives in urban areas that serve as seaports. Rising temperatures would raise sea levels as well,

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reducing supplies of fresh water as flooding occurs along coastlines worldwide and salt water

reaches inland. A measurable rise in sea level will have a severe economic impact on low lying

coastal areas and islands, for examples, increasing the beach erosion rates along coastlines, rising

sea level displacing fresh groundwater for a substantial distance inland.

b) Agricultural Impact

An increase in atmospheric CO2 enhances the agricultural productivity of land resources because

of its direct beneficial effects on crop growth. Over the long run, however, increasing

concentrations of greenhouse gases warm Earth’s climate and thereby modify the potential extent

and productivity of agriculture. The direct effects of CO2 on plant growth and the indirect effects

of climate change also will modify the potential extent and productivity of Earth’s ecosystems.

Human responses to changing agricultural opportunities will interact with ecosystems, as well.

Experiments have shown that with higher concentrations of CO2, plants can grow bigger and

faster. However, the effect of global warming may affect the atmospheric general circulation and

thus altering the global precipitation pattern as well as changing the soil moisture contents over

various continents. Millions of people also would be affected, especially poor people who live in

precarious locations or depend on the land for a subsistence living. Food production, processing,

and distribution can be affected, as well as national security.

c) Effects on Aquatic systems

The loss of coastal wetlands could certainly reduce fish populations, especially shellfish.

Increased salinity in estuaries could reduce the abundance of freshwater species but could

increase the presence of marine species. However, the full impact on marine species is not

known.

d) Effects on Hydrological Cycle

Global precipitation is likely to increase. However, it is not known how regional rainfall patterns

will change. Some regions may have more rainfall, while others may have less. Furthermore,

higher temperatures would probably increase evaporation. These changes would probably create

new stresses for many water management systems.

e) More mobile species

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Many of the world’s endangered species would become extinct as rising temperatures changed their habitat, and affected the timing of seasonal events. Species are straying from their native habitats at an unprecedented rate: 11 miles (17.6 km) toward the poles per decade. Areas where temperature is increasing the most show the most straying by native organisms. The Cetti's warbler, for example, has moved north over the last two decades by more than 90 miles (150 km).

Plate 3: Credit: Kenneth Lohmann, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Plate 4: A Cetti’s warbler

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

f) Hurting polar bearsPolar bear cubs are struggling to swim increasingly long distances in search of stable sea ice,

according to a 2011 study. The rapid loss of sea ice in the Arctic is forcing bears to sometimes

swim up to more than 12 days at a time, the research found. Cubs of adult bears that had to

swim more than 30 miles (48 kilometers) had a 45 percent mortality rate, compared with 18

percent for cubs that had to swim shorter distances.

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Plate 5: Credit: USFWS

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

g) Changing genetics

Even fruit flies are feeling the heat. According to a 2006 study, fruit fly genetic patterns normally

seen at hot latitudes are showing up more frequently at higher latitudes. According to the

research, the gene patterns of Drosophila subobscura, a common fruit fly, are changing so that

populations look about one degree closer in latitude to the equator than they actually are. In other

words, genotypes are shifting so that a fly in the Northern Hemisphere has a genome that looks

more like a fly 75 to 100 miles (120 to 161 kilometers) south.

Plate 6: Credit: Giovanni Cancemi | Shutterstock Plate 7: Fruit flies

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

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h) Changed high season at national parks

When's the busiest time to see the Grand Canyon? The answer has changed over the decades as

spring has started earlier. Peak national park attendance has shifted forward more than four days,

on average, since 1979. Today, the highest number of visitors now swarm the Grand Canyon on

June 24, compared with July 4 in 1979.

Plate 8: Credit: Andrea El-Wailly

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

i) Altered Thoreau's stomping grounds

The writer Henry David Thoreau once lovingly documented nature in and around Concord,

Mass. Reading those diaries today has shown researchers just how much spring has changed in

the last century or so. Compared to the late 1800s, the first flowering dates for 43 of the most

common plant species in the area have moved forward an average of 10 days. Other plants have

simply disappeared, including 15 species of orchids.

Plate 9: Credit: © Houghton Library, President and Fellows of Harvard College

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

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j) High-country changes

Decreased winter snowfall on mountaintops is allowing elk in northern Arizona to forage at higher elevations all winter, contributing to a decline in seasonal plants. Elk have ravaged trees such as maples and aspens, which in turn has led to a decline in songbirds that rely on these trees for habitat.

Plate 10: Credit: Don Becker, USGS

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

k) Altering breeding seasons

As temperatures shift, penguins are shifting their breeding seasons, too. A March 2012 study

found that Gentoo penguins are adapting more quickly to warmer weather, because they aren't as

dependent on sea ice for breeding as other species. It's not just penguins that seem to be

responding to climate change. Animal shelters in the U.S. have reported increasing numbers

of stray cats and kittens attributed to a longer breeding season for the felines.

Plate 11: Credit: Wally Walker, National Science Foundation

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

l) Moving the military northward

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As the Arctic ice opens up, the world turns its attention to the resources below. According to the

U.S. Geological Survey, 30 percent of the world's undiscovered natural gas and 13 percent of its

undiscovered oil are under this region. As a result, military action in the Arctic is heating up,

with the United States, Russia, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Sweden and Canada holding

talks about regional security and border issues. Several nations, including the U.S., are also

drilling troops in the far north, preparing for increased border patrol and disaster response efforts

in a busier Arctic.

Plate 12: Credit: Romain Schläppy, Paris, distributed by the EGU under a Creative Commons License.

Source: Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012

m) Effects on Diseases

Certain vector-borne diseases carried by animals or insects, such as malaria and Lyme disease,

would become more widespread as warmer conditions expanded their range

n) Effect on Rocks: Carbon dioxide is mostly bounded chemically in rocks made from

compounds that chemists call carbonates. High temperature as result of the Greenhouse effect

triggers a chemical reaction which drives carbon dioxide from rock into the atmosphere, this in

turn bakes the rock, decays any organic matter within the rock and leaves it vulnerable to

weathering

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LOOKING FORWARD (MITIGATION OF GREEN HOUSE EFFECT)

This involves intervention or policies to reduce the emissions or enhance the sink of greenhouse

gases. the following policy options suggested below are a combination mitigation models gotten

from various countries like Australia, Philippines, Japan and organizations like the United

Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC) through its current International

legal mechanism for countries to reduce their emissions:

1. The industrial sector: The first policy area should focus on the industrial sector which

is the main energy and carbon dioxide generator. The reduction of industrial carbon

dioxide can be achieved through these options:

Structural changes affecting material utilization and recycling.

Efficiency improvements

Industrial process change

Fuel-mix changes

Implementation of energy efficiency measures

Promotion of energy conservation

Use of alternative non-CO2 emitting industrial processes

2. The transportation sector: The second policy should focus on the transportation

sector. Reduction in carbon monoxide emission in the transportation sector can be

achieved through the following option

Energy efficiency

Good road network

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Behavioral modification.

Use/promotion of non-motorized transport modes which promotes healthy living

habit e.g. cycling and walking

Development and use of efficient mass transport systems which help to reduce the

number of vehicles on the road and also reduce carbon monoxide emission too

Emission control schemes focusing on improved fuel and vehicle efficiency

Traffic volume reduction measure such as the Unified Vehicular Volume

Reduction Program (UVVRP)

Fuel and vehicle tax policy

3. Renewable source of Energy: The third policy is on renewable. Renewables sources

of energy is extremely important in the mitigation of greenhouse gases. The following

policy options:

Implementation of policies stimulating increased utilization of renewable.

Invitation of international organization to support this policy in developing

countries.

Eliminating fossil fuels, which currently provide 85% of all energy supplies

Research and technology cost trends of renewables (solar, wind, biomass, hydro)

Supply-side efficiency improvements; power plants efficiency improvement;

transmissions loss reduction; replacement of coal plants with natural gas

combined cycle plants

Demand-side efficiency improvements; energy conservation, use of energy

efficient technologies

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Energy-efficient designs for new buildings

4. Forestry and agriculture: The fourth policy is on forestry and agriculture, since they

function as sinks for carbon dioxide emission. The necessary policy options to be taken

are:

Implementation of policies to reverse deforestation

Implementation of policies to cover sustainable forest management of existing

forest resources

Implementation of soil conservation.

Use of tubular polyethylene bio-digesters and urea-molasses mineral block as

nutrient supplement in animal production

Use of sulfate fertilizers to reduce methane emissions

Use of rice straw, water management and low-emitting cultivars

Upgrading of food storage and distribution systems

Promotion and implementation of judicious land –use planning

5. Information: Another policy area is on information. There is a desperate need for

simplified guides, easily accessible information to the public on Greenhouse effect. The

necessary policy option are:

Involvement of environment non-governmental organization to give mass

campaign

Implementation of Agenda 21 (the Rio Declaration on environment and

development, and the statement of principles for sustainable Management of

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forests adopted by more than 178 governments Rio de Janerio, Brazil, 3 to 14

June 1992) in collaboration with relevant organization. Agenda 21 is a

comprehensive plan of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by

organizations of the united Nations system, Governments and major groups in

every area in which human impact on the environment.

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Conclusion

Despite the series of evidences above some persons still believe and can prove that the

Greenhouse effect is the least our problems. They believe that in our efforts to conserve the

beautiful planet that is our home, we should not fixate on CO2. We should instead focus on

issues like damage to local landscapes and waterways by strip mining, inadequate cleanup,

hazards to underground miners, the excessive release of real pollutants such as mercury, other

heavy metals, organic carcinogens, etc.

No matter which side of the debate we stand, we should realize that reducing greenhouse gases

and moving to a low carbon economy will be associated with substantial health benefits. These

health benefits have a substantial economic impact everywhere, including developing countries.

It only takes a little change in lifestyle and behavior to make some big changes in greenhouse gas

reductions. For other types of actions, the changes are more significant. When that action is

multiplied by the approximately 160 million people in Nigeria or the 6 billion people worldwide,

the savings are significant.

“Individuals Can Make a Difference" identifies actions that many households and individuals

can take that reduce greenhouse gas emissions in addition to other benefits, including saving

your money and improving our health. The actions range from changes in the house, in the yard,

in the car, and in the store. Everyone's contribution counts so why don't you do your share?

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Cain Polidano, The impact of climate change policies on employment in the coalmining industry,

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Church, J. A. and N.J. White (2006), A 20th century acceleration in global sea level rise,

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Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012, Credit: Kenneth Lohmann, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012, Credit: USFWS

Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012, Credit: Giovanni Cancemi | Shutterstock

Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor, September 07, 2012, Credit: Andrea El-Wailly

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