Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth a generally temperate, stable, and life-sustaining climate. In common parlance, global warming is often used interchangeably with climate change. In the present context, though, it is used in a more limited sense as a driver of global climate change.
Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth a generally temperate, stable, and life-sustaining climate. In common parlance, global warming is often used interchangeably with climate change. In the present context, though, it is used in a more limited sense as a driver of global climate change.
Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth a generally temperate, stable, and bi-lobatic climate.
Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth a generally temperate, stable, and bi-lobatic climate.
Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth a generally temperate, stable, and bi-lobatic climate.
Global WarmingEssay Preview: Global WarmingReport this essayGlobal WarmingIntroductionThe phrase global warming refers to a phenomenon in which the Earths surface temperature increases from its long-term averages generally because of an atmospheric blanket of greenhouse gases (GHGs; primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons) that serve to trap reradiated solar energy from escaping into space. This blanket of greenhouse gases is responsible for providing Earth
US And Global WarmingThe U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works is one of the 16 standing committees of the U.S. Senate. Like all other standing committees, this committee has permanent status and can create new laws and suggest changes in legislation to the Senate as a whole. The Committee on Environment and Public Works is responsible for dealing with a broad variety of matters related to the environment and infrastructure. This makes it one of several prominent Senate committees concerned with newsworthy issues related to science and technology (Alley 2007, 24).
This committee was originally created in 1837 by the Senate as the Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds to oversee the development of the Federal buildings in Washington, D.C. Throughout the 20th century, the committee jurisdiction was expanded to include more diverse issues, such as the interstate highway systems, flood control, and matters of navigation.
In 1963, the committee was granted the responsibility for creating new laws to achieve air and water pollution control, rural and community economic development, and relief from natural disasters (Bengtsson 2006, 56).
The 1970s are considered some of the most productive years for the committee, a period when it managed to advance some landmark legislation. On January 1, 1970, President Richard Nixon signed the National Environmental Protection Act, which put many air pollutants under regulation. The committees reputation became stronger after the Clean Air Act of 1970 and the Water Pollution Act of 1972 were approved. The 1970 Clean Air Act helped greatly reduce automobile pollution. This legislation enacted deadlines and penalties for automobile emission standards in new cars. Many other issues that relate to the work of this committee, such as acid rain and globalwarming, have also become public and government concerns. In the 1980s, the committee was in conflict with the Reagan administration as the White House sought to cut spending and relax regulations on industry. In the 1980s and 1990s, the committee focused on issues that related to water projects, harbors, and highways. The early 1990s brought another action concerning the Clean Air Act and more attention to federal highway programs (Bernstein 2007, 145).
The committee has several subcommittees. In 2009 to 2010, these subcommittees included Childrens Health; Clean Air and Nuclear Safety; Green Jobs and the New Economy; Oversight; Superfund, Toxics, and Environmental Health; Transportation and Infrastructure; and Water and Wildlife (Church 2006, 163).
Almost every piece of legislation that is introduced in the Senate is first sent to one of its committees for review. For instance, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works could receive a legislative proposal (bill) to enable a new Federal building to be constructed in a particular location (Forster 2007, 145).
In the process of considering a bill, the committee and its subcommittees may examine information received from outside experts, as well as request written proposals from various executive agencies and hold committee hearings. Generally, congressional hearings involve oral testimony about the issue under consideration, and members of Congress may question the witnesses. For example, the Subcommittee on Water and Wildlife might hold a hearing to review the detection of lead in drinking water and suggest both urgent actions and long-term solutions (Greer 2008, 167).
The ScienceIn all of our solar system, Earth is the only planet known to support life. This uniqueness derives in great part from an atmosphere that regulates the Earths surface temperature within a range conducive to the development of living organisms, including humankind. The explanation for this phenomenon was suspected as early as 1824, when French mathematician and physicist Jean Baptiste Fourier postulated that gases in Earths atmosphere might influence its surface temperature. In 1859, physicist John Tyndall suggested that changes in the concentrations of some atmospheric gases could result in changes to Earths climate (Petit 1999, 162). The Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius published an article in 1896 demonstrating that the amount of carbon dioxide in Earths atmosphere would significantly affect its surface temperature. Arrhenius coined the phrase greenhouse effect and predicted that a geometric (nonlinear) increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide would result in an arithmetic (linear) increase in the Earths surface temperature.
Consequences on health of Global WarmingAlthough the geophysical and atmospheric drivers of global warming have been known for many years, and the consequences suspected, they were thought to be long term in nature–on the order of thousands of years (Rahmstorf 2002, 98). However, in testimony before the U.S. Congress in 1987 and 1988, climate scientist James Hansen characterized global warming as a real and present threat to the stability of Earths climate system. He confidently stated that the Earth 20 years hence would be warmer than it had been in the past 100,000 years. Over those 20 years, four assessment reports by the IPCC have left little doubt that we are seeing undeniable evidence of that warming (Watson 2001,125).
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Climate Central, November 30, 1999.
While the climate is generally recognized as a rising threat by political and international leaders, it has also been recognized by many scholars and environmental NGOs that warming cannot be a global problem at all, and that if the present rate of global warming continues, a major disaster may be imminent. Even the recent increase in global temperatures has allowed the number of tropical cyclones to increase, even if the annual total of those is not greater that that of the pre-industrial range(11, 12). For example, in 2013 (12), the number of tropical cyclones has been nearly doubled (Goddard and Mehr 2006). There are few people in the global community who can honestly say that we are in a world that is much warmer, and thus much more dangerous, than the human race(13). The response to these statements of Hansen would, over the coming decades, have far reaching impacts on the many millions of people affected by climate change. A number of those affected may well be those who have spent untold time, and thousands of millions of dollars, struggling to reduce their exposure to human activities. Many of those affected are likely to struggle to survive, or even survive. This issue brings to mind three cases where international researchers have conducted a peer-reviewed assessment to assess the potential impact of anthropogenic warming on human health and social welfare as well as on the lives and development of the people affected by these impacts in an attempt to understand the effect of global warming on our current or future climate system and on our future environmental and economic well-being. The study was undertaken in 1997 in the United Kingdom by the International Health Service (IHS), the British government, the Department for Environment and the Environment, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the European Commission, and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In this multi-city review of the global health situation in terms of climate change in the four countries examined, in order to determine the potential and the long-run effects of climate change and the long-term impacts of environmental change on global health, the data analyzed include over 2,000 large-scale epidemiological studies, all in English (16). In addition to their current fieldwork, the IHS scientists examine national, regional and international data at different times during periods of global warming as well as their interdisciplinary data in the past few decades. The study shows the impacts of these changes on the health of populations and communities, their health-care system, public and social services, climate-related disasters, poverty and the environment, and on their health-system and the climate change debate. The findings are in
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Climate Central, November 30, 1999.
While the climate is generally recognized as a rising threat by political and international leaders, it has also been recognized by many scholars and environmental NGOs that warming cannot be a global problem at all, and that if the present rate of global warming continues, a major disaster may be imminent. Even the recent increase in global temperatures has allowed the number of tropical cyclones to increase, even if the annual total of those is not greater that that of the pre-industrial range(11, 12). For example, in 2013 (12), the number of tropical cyclones has been nearly doubled (Goddard and Mehr 2006). There are few people in the global community who can honestly say that we are in a world that is much warmer, and thus much more dangerous, than the human race(13). The response to these statements of Hansen would, over the coming decades, have far reaching impacts on the many millions of people affected by climate change. A number of those affected may well be those who have spent untold time, and thousands of millions of dollars, struggling to reduce their exposure to human activities. Many of those affected are likely to struggle to survive, or even survive. This issue brings to mind three cases where international researchers have conducted a peer-reviewed assessment to assess the potential impact of anthropogenic warming on human health and social welfare as well as on the lives and development of the people affected by these impacts in an attempt to understand the effect of global warming on our current or future climate system and on our future environmental and economic well-being. The study was undertaken in 1997 in the United Kingdom by the International Health Service (IHS), the British government, the Department for Environment and the Environment, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the European Commission, and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In this multi-city review of the global health situation in terms of climate change in the four countries examined, in order to determine the potential and the long-run effects of climate change and the long-term impacts of environmental change on global health, the data analyzed include over 2,000 large-scale epidemiological studies, all in English (16). In addition to their current fieldwork, the IHS scientists examine national, regional and international data at different times during periods of global warming as well as their interdisciplinary data in the past few decades. The study shows the impacts of these changes on the health of populations and communities, their health-care system, public and social services, climate-related disasters, poverty and the environment, and on their health-system and the climate change debate. The findings are in
In its Fourth Assessment Report the IPCC noted that the years 1995-2006 have ranked among the warmest since 1850 and that the linear temperature trend over the 100-year period 1906-2005 was greater than the corresponding trend over the 100-year period 1901-2000 (given in the Third Assessment Report). Overall, the number of hot days (measured by the heat index) has increased, while the number of cold days (on which frost was measured) has decreased.
At the same time we have been observing significantly warmer day- and nighttime temperatures, especially at higher Northern Hemisphere latitudes, a troubling rise in sea levels has been measured. Sea level rise is attributable to both the thermal