Global Warming.

Our President once again has factitiously stated that scientific knowledge is inadequate in reference to global warming and the accompanying greenhouse effect. Not only is the greenhouse effect and an accepted scientific fact, but it is in science textbooks around the nation. He chooses to fault the lack of similar estimates across the board. The reasons for discrepancy is al the factor that must be included which are not limited to demography, economy, technology, policy, and institutional developments. In 2100 one of the most accepted projections from the EPA states, in the absence of emissions controls, carbon dioxide, the most rampant green house gas, concentrations are expected to increase 30-150%.

His charge that there is a lack of technology is completely neglagent. When you consider that many European countries were willing to reduce emissions by 10% in the same ten years with the same technology, the President is simply unwilling to ignore the oil and coal lobbyists who represent the corporations that release the majority of U.S. emissions. The president refuses to realize the dangers of global warning. When the president has the United States Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) coordinates the world most extensive research and technologically advanced group in the world the president lacks truth in his accusations. One must also relise his background as Texas governor. As Governor Texas was the state with the most citations of clean air violations in the Unites States. The greenhouse effect is as much a fact as the dinosaur's extinction and the President's unwillingness to betray the lobbyists has no foundation beyond falsehood.

There are many causes of the greenhouse effect. The most prevalent greenhouse gas is Carbon dioxide or CO2. Carbon dioxide and it's fellow greenhouse gases are released in agricultural practices world wide. They are released by the burning of fossil fuels. There are many invaluable methods in each of these areas to produce Carbon dioxide.

In agriculture there are dozens of ways that greenhouse gases are produced world wide. The clearing of land and the subsequent burning of the vegetation releases a green house gas. Add to that the vegetation they removed is also what removes Carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and a lethal cycle can be scene. Methane another greeenhouse gas is released by the decomposing of manure for fertilization. Methane is also released by cattle in high amounts. These are the most prevalent ways agriculture creates greenhouse gases.

The burning of fossil fuels is another leading cause of greenhouse gases. These emissions can be seen when you start your car on a cold early morning and the muffler smokes the pavement behind it. It can be seen in the form of smog in the heavily populated cities throughout the world. The gases are also released by the industries that require furnaces to burn the toxin that they create. In addition the landfills releases other greenhouse gases and increase the total emission that are produced.

The Green house effect poses many dangers. First the melting of the polar ice caps would increase sea level and flood coastal areas. Second it poses a threat to agriculture. Third it threatens the environments and ecosystems of the world. These are the true dangers that the next generation will be forced to bare the brunt of if we do not decrease world wide emissions of green house gases.

Increased tempertures are believed to be the cause of rising tide waters around the world. By increasing the average temperature we melt the ice caps more rapidly then it has even been done before. We also permanently change the make up of the ocean. We are endangering the largest ecosystem the oceanic system by altering the waters and releasing ice that has been in a frozen state for eons. With the ice melted we are also losing one to the best measurements to study climate changes since the ice rarely melts enough to change its make up drastically.

Agriculture is also at risk in these changes. Higher temperatures could effect he growth and yields of plants. Increased carbon dioxide has already proven to create higher yields, but we don't know if it also depletes the soil while in the process. Add to this the last drastic change in climate sparked the dust bowl agriculturalists world wide must be prepared to adapt t new rules. Even as biotechnology creates heat resistant strains of crops there is always a natural limit to tampering with the original.

The final and most deadly danger comes in the environmental changes. As temperatures go up evaporation is increased. So now face the prospect of increased rain fall, but we will also see drier soils. In many areas this would destroy the agrarian way of life. The temperatures would also lead to stronger and more prevalent rain storms, the violence of which cannot be estimated. These changes world wide could create vast deserts in ecosystems already teetering on the brink of collapse and turn strong ecosystems into death traps.

The threat of Global Warming is very real. Even if our government refuses to help the world wide coalition to stop it before we do irreconcilable damage to the earth. Add to this the fact that temperature are already increasing and the early stages have already begun. In this time of large corporation and strong lobbyist forces we most all unite to fight for our children future. This earth is our legacy and it is our decision whether we will leave a legacy of beauty or one of destruction/Found in all latitude positions between 15 and 35 degrees north and south of the equator, deserts are the driest of all biomes. Simply because the amount of precipitation is exceeded by the evaporation.

The transition from the hot Sonoran desert to the cooler and higher Great Basin is called the Mojave desert. Hot deserts such as the Mojave, experience hot days and very cool nights.

These regions of Southeastern California and some areas of Nevada, Arizona and Utah occupy more than 25,000 square miles. The Mojave's climate is characterized by extreme variation in daily temperature and an average annual precipitation of less than 5 inches. Almost all of the desert's precipitation arrives in the winter while summers are dry, hot and windy.

The Mojave has a typical mountain and basin topography with little vegitation. Sand and gravel basins drain to centeral salt flats where borax, potash, and salt are extracted. Silver, gold and iron deposits are mined.

While some do not consider the Mojave its own, it hosts over 200 endemic plant species found no where in its adjacent deserts. Cacti are usually restricted to the coarse soils of bajades. Mojave Yucca and Spanish Bayonets are prominent. Creosote bush, Shandscale, Big Sagebrush, Bladder-sage, Bursage and Blackbush are common shrubs in Mojave.

The classification of North American deserts is by no means universally accepted by all geologists, biologists, and other scientists. For instance, some maintain that the mojave is not a distinct desert at all, but simply a transition between the Great Basin and the Sonoran desert.