Global Warming: Human Causes and Solutions Explained

Introduction: The Scale of the Global Warming Challenge

Since its first mention at the UN General Assembly, global warming has come to be regarded as the greatest human development challenge of the 21st century (McInerney-Lankford, Darrow, Rajamani, & Banque, 2011). This has prompted multiple studies, conventions, and policy development meetings aimed at arresting the situation. One such study was the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Findings released in 2007 showed that global temperatures were rising unequivocally and accelerating. The magnitude — an average increment of 0.74 degrees Celsius over the past century — was notably the highest warming trend in recent times. The worrying aspect is that the warming trend is bound to continue, with a predicted increment of approximately 1.8–6.4 degrees Celsius in the coming years (McInerney-Lankford, Darrow, Rajamani, & Banque, 2011).

The increasing temperatures will have profound effects on life on Earth. The warming is expected to disrupt normal weather patterns, leading to a situation of extremes — severe droughts, high-intensity floods and cyclones, desertification, and land degradation. These will in turn affect quality of life, and the human race will ultimately have to contend with increased disease incidence and mortality rates.

Unlike in the 1970s and 1980s, the debate no longer revolves around whether the globe is actually warming. This is largely because the warming trend has already been established. The greatest question now is how this increasingly dangerous phenomenon can be stopped. The answer depends on our understanding of the causes of global warming. These two concerns form the basis of this study. The first question this paper seeks to answer is whether global warming results from human actions. The second is what measures humans can undertake to halt it.

Is Global Warming Due to Human Actions?

The simplest answer to this question is grounded in Berg's conclusion: over the past half-century, scientists studying global warming have become increasingly convinced, as evidence accumulates, that climate change results from human activity (Berg, 2008). Much of these findings are aggregated in the IPCC reports. The most revealing observation is that human-produced air pollutants have continued to alter the atmosphere over the years, resulting in the warming evident over the past 50 years. Multiple scientists have attested to this observation and contend that the warming process will continue throughout the 21st century. The only unclear point is the speed at which warming will proceed and the severity of its effects.

Global warming occurs due to the accumulation of greenhouse gases. These gases are carbon dioxide (the main greenhouse gas) and other trace gases, including methane, surface ozone, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons (Berg, 2008). Over the past century, these gases have increased in volume, and this has been identified as the main cause of rising global temperatures.

Global warming takes place because these gases absorb infrared radiation — in the form of heat — present in the atmosphere. This absorption, also referred to as the trapping of heat, is similar in some studies to the effect of a glass roof in a greenhouse, which is why the term "greenhouse effect" is used frequently when discussing global warming. As the gases trap heat, the natural heat-flow process is disrupted, forcing the lower atmosphere to warm. For many years, this process was critical in maintaining ideal global temperatures — without these gases, global temperatures could potentially decrease to negative levels, making the world uninhabitable. However, as greenhouse gases have increased in volume, radiation absorption has greatly intensified, raising temperatures in the lower atmosphere excessively.

Human activity has largely been at the centre of this phenomenon, because greenhouse gases increase in the atmosphere primarily as a result of burning fuels containing carbon. The other major human activity leading to increased greenhouse gas concentrations is deforestation. This has two effects: first, it reduces forest cover, and forests are a major mechanism for controlling levels of carbon dioxide through photosynthesis; second, deforestation and the consequent combustion increase the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Though not solely responsible for global warming, carbon dioxide is considered a major cause due to its high concentration (Maslin, 2006). The levels of trace gases have also risen at an equally alarming rate.

Even though current rates of deforestation and combustion are high, scientists are still convinced that the rapidity of warming is slower than the rate at which carbon dioxide has increased. The main reason is that water requires more heat than atmospheric gases to change temperature. For this reason, scientists have postulated that the effects of global warming will become more evident in the latter part of the 21st century as ocean temperatures rise.

Effects of Rising Global Temperatures

This cycle of events will produce several specific effects. One is rising sea levels. Increasing global temperatures will inevitably lead to the thawing of glaciers and polar ice caps (Berg, 2008). In the long run, sea levels will also rise as a result of thermal expansion — water, like solids, expands when heated.

Another effect is a change in precipitation patterns. Computer simulations have shown that as global temperatures increase, droughts will become more frequent. At the same time, there will be an increase in the frequency of snowstorms and rainstorms, which may intensify flooding.

A further effect is a change in the range of organisms. These changes will mainly affect plant growth and flowering patterns. For animals, global warming will disrupt migration patterns, which could become a source of future human-animal conflicts.

Global warming also poses significant threats to human health, particularly in developing countries where industrial activity contributes heavily to greenhouse gas emissions. Health impacts have already been well documented: this century has seen an increase in heat-related deaths among elderly people (Berg, 2008). Other health concerns include increased cancer rates and a rise in malaria cases as flooding creates new breeding environments for mosquitoes.

These effects, along with the risk of prolonged global warming, have raised the need for all stakeholders to explore ways to halt it. Fortunately, improved research has directly linked global warming to human activity, pointing to the fact that addressing global warming will require addressing the specific human activities that have driven it. Notably, this is not the responsibility of any single government — it requires concerted effort, as the effects of global warming are not limited by national or international borders.

Conclusion

Addressing global warming requires both adaptive and limitation strategies implemented concurrently by all stakeholders. Because the effects of greenhouse gas emissions cross all national borders, meaningful progress depends on shared global responsibility and coordinated international action. The evidence clearly links rising temperatures to human activity, and it is therefore within human capacity to slow — and potentially reverse — the most damaging effects of climate change through sustained, collective effort.

References

Berg, L. R. (2008). Introductory Botany: Plants, People, and the Environment. Belmont, CA: Thomson Brooks/Cole.

Islam, M. R., Chhetri, A. B., & Khan, M. M. (2011). Greening of Petroleum Operations: The Science of Sustainable Energy Production. New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Maslin, M. (2006). Global Warming. Stillwater, MN: Voyageur Press.

McInerney-Lankford, S. A., Darrow, M., Rajamani, L., & Banque, M. (2011). Human Rights and Climate Change: A Review of the International Legal Dimensions. Washington, D.C.: World Bank.

Peach, J. D. (2005). Global Warming: Emission Reductions Possible as Scientific Uncertainties Are Resolved. New York: DIANE Publishing.