Extracts from this document...

Introduction

Is human activity responsible for increased global warming? In this report the question that I will try to be answering is: 'Is human activity responsible for increased global warming? Firstly, there are two sides to the above question; either humans are responsible for the increased global warming or rather it is nature. It is a certain fact that the Earth's temperature is increasing; however not all people agree that humans are the causers of global warming; some people agree that it is nature who is the actual perpetrator. On the one hand some people may say that humans are the result for the increased global warming. Global warming is caused by the rising amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gases are gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2), Methane (CO) and nitrogen oxide, there are other gases which are included, but these are the major ones. Numerous human activities, such as burning of fossil fuels are factors which increase the amount of greenhouse gases and thus result in global warming. The graph below shows the fossil fuel combustion between different countries from the year 1900 to the year 2000 The trend in the graph is apparent; the fact that countries/continents around the world have increased their usage of fossil fuels has been a major contribution to global warming; fossil fuels contribute to global warming through the release of carbon into the atmosphere; carbon consequently reacts with oxygen in the air, thus creating carbon dioxide. ...read more.

Middle

The USA is accountable for 23% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions and therefore the country is responsible for major change to the atmosphere and the increased global warming; additionally we can see the millions of carbon dioxide that is pumped yearly, into the Earth's atmosphere. As I explained before how carbon dioxide affects global warming, we can comprehend, just how effective that human activity is on destroying the environment and atmosphere. Cars have similar effects as that of burning fossil fuels; the fact that humans are emitting millions of tons of carbon dioxide through the use of cars further depicts just how exponentially the Earth's atmosphere is getting destroyed. Nitrogen oxide is another well known gas that affects the atmosphere; it is said that oxides of nitrogen have three hundred times more heat-trapping capacity per unit of volume than carbon dioxide. Nitrogen oxides are released every time we apply fertilizer to soil. Even though the use of CFCs, such as in refrigerators, was banned long ago, the ramifications are still seen today; the reason for this is because once CFCs are released into the atmosphere, they begin a chain reaction and therefore the CFCs within the atmosphere and ozone layer take a long time to be removed. CFCs are many times more potent than carbon dioxide and even though (as I said before) they were banned long time ago, they still continue to contribute to global warming because they destroy the ozone layer; the ...read more.

Conclusion

Furthermore, methane is a byproduct of natural biological processes in mammals. * What's more natural solar activity is a contribution to global warming. The emissions of heat from the sun fluctuate over short and long term periods. Moreover, sunspots (Changes in the Earth's solar radiation levels) and solar flares have the ability to increase the amount of energy reaching the Earth over a wide spectrum, including UV light. * Evaporation of ocean water has shown to release numerous chemicals that either directly or indirectly contributes to global warming. It is a fact that the oceans contain more carbon dioxide than the atmosphere and release of carbon dioxide is common, especially in warmer waters. * Volcanic activity is probably the largest producer of naturally occurring greenhouse gas emissions. There is proof that volcanic eruption has released terrific amounts of carbon dioxide. Methane tends to be also released from volcanoes, but more intensely during warmer seasons. Recently scientists have found that the Earth goes through a temperature cycle and usually his climate change usually lasts about 40,000 years. The graph shows how global temperatures have changed over the past 160,000 years: This is evidence that naturally there have been changes in Earth's temperature and we just happen to be in the age where nature has warmed up the Earth. The graph shows some inconsistences and anomalies such as the data on temperature about 130,000 years ago and about 15,000 years ago ...read more.

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE The Earth and Beyond section.