How to Save Antarctica

Have you ever heard of a term called global warming? Well if you have, skip on to the next paragraph. Global Warming is when man-made CO-2 (carbon dioxide) is released into the environment from cars and planes. When the CO-2 floats upwards into the ozone layer, it weakens it and the ozone layer is sort of like a blanket to the earth. It covers it and shields it from the sun’s harmful rays. When the ozone is weakened, the Earth starts to heat up because of the sun’s rays. When the Earth heats up, icy places like Antarctica and the North Pole start to melt.

Some new Antarctic measurements using data from two NASA satellites found that the water levels all around the world are rising by 0.4 millimeters a year. The continent of Antarctica holds around 90 percent of all the ice in the world and even just the disappearance of the smaller West Antarctic sheet of ice could raise the sea levels all around the world by and astounding twenty feet! That is enough to completely submerge places like Louisiana that are below sea level. So now you might be thinking, “How can I help stop the melting?”

The answer is to stop producing massive amount of carbon dioxide. If the CO2 levels drop all around the world by 50%, the ozone layer can heal itself and return to normal. Well how do you lower CO2 levels? Here we go!

This is the easiest way to start helping. It all starts with water. Most people in the world are afraid of drinking tap water. In the majority of the first world the tap water is more than clean enough to drink. Did you know

In the vast majority of the 1st world our tap water is more than clean enough to drink, but somehow we started to fall for marketing messages that tell us to go out and buy drinking water in bottles instead of just getting it from the tap. In fact millions of gallons of fossil fuels are used in the transportation of water bottles to supermarkets. Also lots of greenhouse gases such as CO2 are used in the production of the bottles. SO try drinking from the tap. If you are still worried about the water not being clean, you can get a water filter so it comes out superfiltered from the tap.

Try growing your own trees. Trees are a great way to absorb CO2. During the process of photosynthesis, the way a tree makes its own food, a tree absorbs CO2 and creates oxygen. Even one 8 foot tall tree can absorb 48 lbs of CO2 in a year. In a 50 year lifetime, a tree can generate up to $31,250 worth of oxygen, provides $62,000 of air pollution control, recycles $37,500 worth of water, and can even control $31,250 of soil erosion. If every family in America planted just one tree, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere in the world would be reduced by one billion pounds each year. That is close to 5% of the CO2 emissions in the world!

Try to get a more fuel efficient vehicle. An average car produces around 2.4x as much CO2 as a more fuel efficient one. Think it over, it will save you money and be good for the environment.

Another radical way to save the environment is to not travel by plane as much. An average long haul flight can release as much emissions as an average 1.6L car going 15,000 miles and that is per person on the plane!! Try to not travel as much and you cacn feel good about it.

There are many more ways to save the ozone layer, but these few steps can significantly reduce emissions all around the world. So try to work on completing 2 of the 5 tasks at least and you are set to saving the world!

I should have put some more time researching but thanks for reading and please like it and comment!

Image via Wikipedia

Image via Wikipedia