What Is Global Warming

Author admin on July 18th, 2008

What is global warming? It is the effect of heat and energy made up of greenhouse gases being trapped in the earth’s atmosphere. Scientists acknowledge that some natural causes occur, but the majority are convinced that humans are having a profound effect by adding multitudes of greenhouse gases which would not occur naturally.

The term global warming refers to the average rise in the earth’s temperature, this in turn causes climate change. As the earth becomes warmer this may lead to changes in rainfall patterns, a rise in sea levels and potentially an enormous effect on animals, plants and humans.

It is known that the Artic circles are shrinking and that glaciers are melting at a faster rate than previously recorded. Loss of ice sheets on polar land could potentially have a dramatic effect on the amount the sea levels rise; the rising sea levels will in turn have an impact on the coastlines, also with major changes being seen as the sea inundates low lying lands.

Manmade gases, predominantly carbon dioxide and to a lessen extent methane, trap infrared radiation, in other words the heat radiation which cools the earth. For the earth to remain at a constant temperature it must lose the same amount of energy through heat radiation as it gains from the sun, this is known as energy balance. The burning of fossils fuels such as oil and coal produce carbon dioxide, which is now fifty percent higher than it was at the turn of the twentieth century.

One of the ways the earth loses its heat is via rain clouds, and it is thought that changes in current rain patterns and expected changes in future rain patterns will contribute to global warming.

Deforestation by man and by natural causes are also contributing to global warming; while natural deforestation caused by forest fires raging out of control can most probably be counter effected by nature’s natural rhythms the vast amount of deforestation by man is making the balance tilt towards the lack of plants and vegetation being able to absorb the increase in carbon dioxide.

So the answer to the question ‘what is global warming?’ can be partly explained by scientists and researches however, there is still much uncertainty as to the actual or potential impact global warming will have on the earth.

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