What is the best solution for governments to solve global warming?

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  1. Introduction

  1.  Definition

        Ever since the Industrial Revolution started, the Earth had faced dramatic climate changes and the most significant threat of it is global warming. According to Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (2008), global warming can be defined as a gradual increase in world temperatures caused by polluting gases such as Carbon Dioxide which are collecting in the air around the Earth and preventing heat escaping into space.

  1.  History

        The debate about global warming was not strong until the 1980s, as political traction like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established by the United Nations to investigate the progression and impacts of global warming. 96% of people agree that global warming is a pressing issue and 90% of them have heard about this issue from mainly the media reports at a personal survey (2009) done recently (Refer Appendix 1).

  1.  Current Issues

        Until now, there are still debates about the existence of global warming but majority of the scientists believed that global warming is already affecting our mother Earth, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concludes that global temperature have risen 2 to 4 degree Celsius over the last century and sea level has risen an average six inches (Climate Cross Road, 2009). We have already witness many effects of global warming, from glaciers melting to sea levels rising, and wildlife struggling to survive. In 2002, the Larson B, one of the important glaciers in Antarctic Peninsula disintegrated in only 35 days (Refer Figure 1). The fourth assessment report, IPCC warns that if global temperature rises by 10 degrees by 2010, enormous worldwide extinction will likely to occur.

  1.  Aim of Research

        In order to reduce the possible impacts of global warming, we must have knowledge of the causes and effect of global warming, as well as efficient planning to reduce global temperature. Thus, this paper will be focusing on the causes and effects of global warming and aims to find out the best solution for the government sector to reduce global warming efficiently.

Figure 1: The melting of Larsen B Ice Shelf

(Source: National Snow and Ice Data Centre, University of Colorado.)

  1. Causes of Global Warming

        According to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (2009), a majority of the scientific researches shows that human activities are the main factor for the rise of global temperature to rise. This statement is further established as 96% of participants in a survey agree that human activities are the main contribution towards global warming (Refer Appendix 1). Thus, this section discusses the various causes for global warming.

  1.  Excessive Emission of Greenhouse Gases

        The Earth receives energy from the Sun, which provides warmth and making life sustainable in Earth. Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, water vapour, methane and much more acts like a blanket, trapping the warmth in within the ozone layer and preventing too much energy from escaping into space (Gaughen, 2005). In IPCC’s 2001 report, human activities are causing an increase of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, results in more heat trapped with the ozone layer, thus contributing to global warming.

  1.  Excessive Land Use and Deforestation

        The total land use had increased rapidly as the population grows and the technology is been advanced over the last few decades. In fact, the usage of land had been altered. Much deforestation had changed from traditionally for the use of agricultural plantation to mining, timber and land for urbanization. The US Global Change Research Information Office (2006) describes that the increase in land use in recent years has also increased some small particles in the atmosphere which may be absorbed by the atmosphere, resulting in the alteration of cloud properties.

  1. Impacts of Global Warming

        “Even if we could magically halt all fossil-fuel use tomorrow, human-generated carbon dioxide emission from the past 150 years would continue to warm the planet for generations” (NY Times cited in Climate Cross Roads 2009).This section discusses the interrelated impacts of global warming to the environment and also lifestyle upon us.

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  1.  Environmental Changes

  1.  Melting of Arctic Glaciers

        In the nineteenth-century, Fridtjof Nanson describes the Arctic as “nature’s great ice temple” as the Arctic plays a vital role in cooling the Earth. Yet, due to many human activities, the Arctic has been heated up twice as much as it does over the recent 50 years. Glaciers, ice sheets and permafrost and floating ice are melting fast. In 2003, the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf, the greatest ice shelf in Arctic, broke in two, causing a massive freshwater lake (Fight Global Warming, 2009).

        This vast melting ...

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