Global Warming: How It is Affecting Us, and What We Can Do

Imagine major cities such as San Francisco always having to constantly build levees in order to stop the city from flooding. You wonder to yourself, what could have caused this, and then you remember that this is all resulted by global warming, which produces El Nino and melts glaciers, causing sea levels to rise. Americans will find what global warming can cause only until the catastrophes happen and then will try to solve it. The difficulty in solving a problem after the disaster is made is harder to solve than trying to solve it when it is starting to grow. As a result, I respectfully ask the citizens of America to put more effort into creating and using alternative energy sources to help prevent global warming from going any further.

I’m pretty sure now, it is almost impossible to live one day without electricity. Fifty percent of America’s electricity is created from coal that cause pollution by releasing carbon dioxide into the air. The main cause of global warming is from carbon dioxide, which acts like a greenhouse when there’s sunlight; it allows light and heat in, but not much heat out. This is called greenhouse effect and with a lot of it going on, the average temperature is rapidly rising. Everyday, the average household emits a few pounds of carbon dioxide, and with a population of about 300 million in USA, that’s a lot of carbon dioxide. This gas is also created from another source of pollution — the burning of fossil fuels in cars. Not only are the fossil fuels non-renewable, but when burned, they also emit lots of CO and CO2. For every gallon (2.8 Kg) of gas burned, 8.2 Kg of carbon dioxide is released out of the tail pipe. According to EarthSky Communications, Inc. a car in the U.S. on average puts out 7,700 Kg of Co2 (16,940lbs) a year. What might these gases and temperature raises affect in this world?

This phenomenon is not only affecting the human beings, but the creatures around us as well. Global warming thaws through thousands and thousands of tons of ice each year, mainly in Greenland, and Antarctica. The melting of ice raises sea levels and places thousands of cities in the world in trouble of floods. If all of Greenland and Antarctica do melt, then 3 feet (1 meter) will be added to the sea. If you do not think that’s not much, it’s like adding one more feet to a swimming pool that can only hold the amount of water it is holding now. The melting of ice also gives polar bears, seals, and many other arctic animals no place to stay, killing them from the unfamiliar habitat they are forced into and placing them on the “endangered” list. What El Nino also does is that it floods forests drowning many plants and trees such as the Pine Forests in British Columbia. The amount of oxygen dissolved in the oceans may decline, with adverse consequences for ocean life.