Impact of Climate Change
Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the use of fossil fuels for production, energy, and transportation has grown. Fossil fuels, which are formed through the process of decomposing plants and animals under immense heat and pressure underground becomes a form of energy (Denchak 2019). Fossil fuels including coal, petroleum, and natural gases have produced a large number of energy resources globally. This has paved the way for countries to utilize these resources and stimulate their economy and further their influence worldwide. However, the issue of climate change has become a greater issue in the last century. These different forms of energy have led to an increase in the changes in the climate and have contributed to climate change as a whole. While there is a notion that fossil fuels are the main reason why climate change has rapidly grown in the last century, as well as being the main contributor that we have to combat. However, human activity including the burning of fossil fuels and changing the landscape through deforestation and agriculture are other main factors that have a great impact on climate change which are not as prevalent in people’s basic understanding of the climate crisis as a whole.
Climate is the average weather pattern in an area that is documented over many years and even generations. According to the Government of Canada’s research into climate change, the earth’s climate naturally varies and can be affected by natural factors. These factors include volcanic eruption to even the earth’s rotation around the sun. These natural causes are
“primarily influenced [by] the amount of incoming energy [from the sun]. Volcanic eruptions are episodic and have relatively short-term effects on climate. Changes in solar irradiance have contributed to climate trends over the past century but since the Industrial Revolution, the effect of additions of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere has been over 50 times that of changes in the Sun’s output.” (Climate Change Canada 2019)
Science has proven that gases, such as methane, carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases (Causes of Climate Change 2017) can trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere through a phenomenon called the Greenhouse Effect. While this process of trapping heat in the earth’s atmosphere is important because it makes our planet habitable, however, the change in the balance of the gases in the atmosphere can have negative effects. Natural gases and fossil fuel emissions are harmful to the environment. The way that fossil fuels and natural gas energy are released is through burning it. Through this process, it releases large quantities of CO2 into the atmosphere, which contributes to the greenhouse effect. This leads to degrading the ozone layer due to the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere which is exceeding the amount that is normally in the ozone. “In the United States, the burning of fossil fuels, particularly for the power and transportation accounts for about three-quarters of our carbon emissions.” (Denchak 2019) This is important because looking at fossil fuels, which is important to the transportation industry through the forms of gasoline and diesel, 28.9% of greenhouse gas emissions come through these forms.
These forms and usages of transportation add to the growing issue of climate change and Is a factor that we need to be aware of in the future. The build-up of greenhouse gases has led to a natural enhancement of the natural greenhouse effect. While this is induced by fossil fuels, it is humans that have added to the acceleration of emissions which have added to the greenhouse effect. Other main issues are a byproduct of fossil fuels like air pollution and ocean acidification, which is going above a neutral level of a pH of 7, “ the ocean has become 30 percent more acidic [due to fossil fuels]. As the acidity in our waters goes up, the amount of calcium carbonate—a substance used by oysters, lobsters, and countless other marine organisms to form shells—goes down. This can slow growth rates, weaken shells, and imperil entire food chains.”(Denchak 2019) As acidification rises, we see that other factors including farming and land degradation through human intervention have had a large impact on the climate change crisis. Agriculture is one of the leading factors in climate change that is not being talked about.
While most of the time, we think that climate change is truly due to the impact of fossil fuels and the transportation/energy sector that is used for mankind; we fail to evaluate the impact that farming on the environment. Agriculture and livestock account for 9% of the total greenhouse gas emissions by companies. Factors including livestock, including cows and other farm animals, which contributes to methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions. “Livestock is responsible for 65% of all human-related emissions of nitrous oxide – a greenhouse gas with 296 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide, and which stays in the atmosphere for 150 years.” (Cowspiracy 2014). While we think about the methane production that comes from cow farts in general, we don’t truly think about the impact that it has on the environment and climate change as a whole. However, we see that it affects the greenhouse effect and impacts climate change.
Furthermore, land degradation has a large impact on the environment. From the unearthing process of gas and oil to deforestation of critical wildlife habitats which is important for breeding and migration becomes fragmented and destroyed. “Animal agriculture is responsible for up to 91% of Amazon destruction.” (Cowspiracy 2014) This deforestation which has led to land degradation is due to making space for agriculture like cows for the production and consumption of beef. This affects our world because the reality of the situation shows that vegans only need 1/6th of an acre of land, someone who has a vegan diet needs about 3x the land that a vegan’s needs and a meat-eater need about 18x the amount of land (Cowspiracy 2014). This is important because while humans are the main cause of this issue, there is a solution for them in this land degradation issue. Additionally, land degradation comes in the form of the energy business.
“The fossil fuel industry leases vast stretches of land for infrastructure such as wells, pipelines, access roads, as well as facilities for processing, waste storage, and waste disposal. In the case of strip mining, entire swaths of terrain—including forests and whole mountaintops—are scraped and blasted away to expose underground coal or oil. Even after operations cease, the nutrient-leached land will never return to what it once was.” (Denchak 2019)
While fossil fuels seem to be its own entity in itself, it is intertwined with human intervention and effects how the world produces energy as well as add to the issues of climate change.
In industrial countries, the notion that climate change exists is something that people don’t want to accept because they would have to come to the conclusion that they need to make a change from their everyday lives. These countries would have to shift their economies, which would have them take responsibility for their actions which affect these climate shifts which have become unnatural at this point. Living in a time where we have a president which likes to completely ignore the fact that climate change is rapidly approaching and will further place our country into economic and physical strain is evident. However, we need to make changes and look at all of the factors which impact climate change. Looking at the relationship with human interaction with different parts of the economic sector could change the longevity our the earth in the long run.
Work Cited Page
Anonymous. “Causes of Climate Change.” Climate Action – European Commission, 28 June 2017, ec.europa.eu/clima/change/causes_en.
Climate Change Canada. “Government of Canada.” Canada.ca, Government of Canada, 28 Mar. 2019, www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/climate-change/causes.html.
Denchak, Melissa. “Fossil Fuels: The Dirty Facts.” NRDC, 16 July 2019, www.nrdc.org/stories/fossil-fuels-dirty-facts.
COWSPIRACY, 2014, www.cowspiracy.com/.
“Sources of Greenhouse Gas Emissions.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 13 Sept. 2019, www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emissions.
