What are the factors responsible for global warming?
Answer:
Most non-commissioned scientists would tell you, The Sun.
well,
gas stations,
stoves,
fire,
airplanes,
cars,
other vehicles
The answer to that question is beyond FunQA.com. I am sure it would take a PHD a life time to answer this one.
#1 Al Gore
cow farts
The largest factor of global warming is carbon dioxide that's released from volcanic activity! People and their pollutants are not NEAR as influencing to global warming!
Vehicle exhaust, methane gas from agriculture (cows), coal, wild fires, cutting down trees, perfumes, sprays, etc., etc.
radiation from the sun
greenhouse gases which hold heat in the atmosphere
earth surface covering (dark colored surfaces absorb solar radiation, light colored surfaces like snow reflect solar radiation)
life (including, but not limited to human life), which converts carbon from the earth to CO2, O2, methane, and other atmospheric gases
volcanic activity which spews gases into the atmosphere
many others factors too numerable and complicated to discuss here
Here is a link to a flow chart of human sources.
http://cait.wri.org/figures.php?page=wor...
The major factors are:
Anthropogenic.
Positive RF sources. (Sources that warm the Earth)
CO2 +1.66 W/m2.
CH4 +0.48 W/m2.
N2O +0.16 W/m2.
Halocarbons +0.337 W/m2.
Tropospheric Ozone +0.35 W/m2.
Black carbon on snow + 0.10 W/m2.
Linear contrails + 0.010 W/m2.
Negative RF sources. ( sources that cool the Earth)
Land use - 0.20 W/m2.
Aerosols (direct and cloud effect) - 0.50, - 0.70 W/m2.
Natural.
Positive RF sources
Solar irridiance + 0.12 W/m2.
Negative RF sources.
Volcanic Aerosol emissions: -
The combined anthropogenic RF is +1.6 [ -1.0, +0.8] W/m2.
The combined natural RF ( solar irridiance, volcanic aerosols) is + 0.12 [-0.06, +0.18].
* RF is defined as the change in net irridiance at the Tropopause (boundary between Troposphere and Stratosphere).
All measurements are showing the difference in RF between 1750 (preindustrial), and current (2005).
Radiative forcing is a measurement of how strong the factors that influence Earths climate by altering its energy balance are. A positive forcing increase the energy which will lead to a warming while a negative forcing reduces the energy and leads to a cooling.
Anthropogenic factors:
Greenhouse gases:
CO2 from fossil fuels
CH4 from many sources fossil and contemporary
N2O from nitrogen fertilization and agriculture
CFCs and their replacements
Land use changes, primarily deforestation
Global warming occurs when the earth heats up (the temperature rises). It happens when greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, water vapor, nitrous oxide, and methane) trap heat and light from the sun in the earth’s atmosphere, which increases the temperature. This hurts many people, animals, and plants. Many cannot adopt to a radically new environmental change, so they die. We are losing thousands of species every day due to global warming. It's an established scientific fact that humans are largely responsible for Global Warming. Here are some main culprits:
- GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS
Problems:
Increasing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases that result in CO2 emissions caused by burning fossil fuels (mainly coal and petroleum ) in power plants, automobiles, airplanes, improper building structures etc. In the U.S. alone, more than 90% of Some other examples of using energy and polluting the air are:
Solutions:
Ride bikes to work/school as much as possible
Drive cars with high MPG (eliminating SUV usage) such hybrid cars
Planning even the small trips to use gas more effectively
Using big trucks ONLY for farm / industry usage
Buying local produce to decrease the gas mileage on such products
- DEFORESTATION
Problems:
Humans are cutting trees at an alarming rate and using earth's resources in an improper manner to produce high $ crops over and over, which does not allow earth to regenerate its strength.
Solutions:
Plant trees in your backyard, neighborhood, city. Be more involved with local environmental organizations to take simple steps to make our planet greener. Speak Up against the big corporations profit at the cost of killing thousands of living species everyday and endangering our future.
- ENERGY WASTE
Problems
We can prevent energy waste simply by changing the way we do the things mentioned below:
Turning on a light
Watching T.V.
Listening to a stereo
Washing or drying clothes
Using a hair dryer
Riding in a car
Heating a meal in the microwave
Using an air conditioner
Playing a video game
Using a dish washer
Solutions:
Use everything mentioned above LESS
I'll answer the question twice, first a short answer then a much longer one.
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● BASIC EXPLANATION OF THE FACTORS
We receive heat from the sun in the form of solar radiation, this has a very short wavelength. This radiation passes through our atmosphere and is absorbed by surfaces such as glass, concrete, metal and the land and water on the earth itself. Once the ambient (surrounding) temperature drops this stores heat is radiated outweards as thermal radiation. Thermal radiation has a longer wavelength than solar radiation and it's progress through Earth's atmosphere is impeded by the greenhouse gases. This causes the planet to warm up - i.e. global warming, which in turn leads to climate change.
The greenhouse effect is largely a natural phenemenum, if it didn't exist our planet would lose much of it's heat retaining capacity and temperatures would be some 33°C lower than they are now, this would make the planet too cold for life to have evolved.
Since the onset of the industrial revolution we've emitted so much of the greenhouse gases that their total concentratrion in the atmosphere has increased by almost 40% pushing them up to record levels.
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● THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT
Our atmosphere acts like a blanket trapping heat and keeping Earth at a habitable temperature, it’s this retaining of heat that is referred to as the Greenhouse Effect. The greenhouse effect is caused by greenhouse gases that trap heat from the sun, the more greenhouse gases there are the more heat is retained
● GREENHOUSE GASES
Water vapour (H2O) is the most prevalent greenhouse gas and occurs naturally. Some greenhouse gases are both natural and manmade including carbon dioxide (C02), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (NO) and tetraflouromethane (CF4). There are several synthetic gases consisting of carbon and halogens, many of the manmade greenhouse gases are also responsible for ozone depletion.
As with temperature, there is a natural cycle in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Ice core samples extending back some 650,000 years show the minimum amount of atmospheric CO2 to have been around 190 parts per million by volume (ppmv) and the maximum about 300 ppmv. The worry is that the current levels of CO2 are considerably higher at around 385 ppmv .
● LEVELS OF GREENHOUSE GAS
Excluding water vapour, carbon dioxide is by far the most prevalent of the greenhouse gases accounting for over 99% of all of them. The only other gas present in appreciable quantity is methane and this accounts for nearly 0.5% of the greenhouse gases.
By comparing levels of greenhouse gases in 2000 with levels in 1750 we can see that there has been a 31% increase in the amount of carbon dioxide, a 16% rise in levels of nitrous oxide and a 149% increase in the levels of methane.
Different greenhouse gases are more effective than others at contributing to the greenhouse effect, an effect called the Global Warming Potential (GWP). Although carbon dioxide accounts for 99.4% of the greenhouse gases by volume, the contribution it makes as a total of all the greenhouse gases is considerably lower at just 72.3%; this is because, as greenhouse gases go, it's not very good. Nitrous oxide on the other hand is nearly 300 times as effective and although it occurs in very small amounts when compared to carbon dioxide, it manages to contribute 18.4% towards the total greenhouse effect. The other gases which make sizeable contributions are methane and dichlorodifluoromethane, respectively these are responsible for nearly 8% and nearly 1% of the contribution to the greenhouse effect.
● SOURCES OF GREENHOUSE GASES
One of the primary causes of greenhouse gas emissions for which humans are responsible result from the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas) and much of the remainder results from farming and agricultural activities. Fossil fuels are used in power generation, to heat homes and offices, to power factories, to fuel transport and many more uses.
Other manmade causes of greenhouse gases include deforestation, fertilisers, air conditioning units, open fires, fridges and freezers, numerous industrial and chemical processes, fire suppressants, coal mining, effluent, landfill sites, livestock and rice cultivation.
There are several natural causes of greenhouse gases including volcanic activity, the seas and oceans, natural decay of plants and animals and the natural melting of ice caps.
● THE CARBON CYCLE
There's a natural cycle of carbon dioxide. Annually 120 billion tons of CO2 are absorbed from the atmosphere by vegetation and soil whilst at the same time 119 billion tons are released into the atmosphere. A similar exchange takes place between the oceans and the atmosphere with 90 billion tons of CO2 being absorbed and 88 billion tons being released. The net effect is that each year the atmosphere loses 3 billion tons of CO2.
One very important factor not taken into account here is the anthropogenic effect. In 2006 humans added 7 billion tons of CO2 to the atmosphere just through the burning of fossil fuels resulting an overall increase in atmospheric CO2 of 4 billion tons.
● CARBON IMBALANCE
Left to it's own devices the natural carbon cycle is more or less in equilibrium and significant changes to levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere occur over timeframes spanning many thousands of years and correlate with the ice age cycles.
Over the last 400,000 years levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide have fluctuated between 190 and 310ppmv. The inset graph shows that for the last 1000 years atmospheric CO2 levels have been consistent until approximately 250 years ago when they began rising rapidly. Recently CO2 levels have been have been rising at least 100 times as fast as would be expected, even when natural levels are increasing at their fastest.
250 years ago the Industrial Revolution began, the demand for energy started rising and has continued rising ever since. Not only are there far more people living on the planet than ever before but the average amount of energy each person uses grows year on year. Today over 80% of the world's energy still comes from fossil fuels, before the days of nuclear power and renewable energy sources it was even higher.
Industrialisation is by far the biggest factor in the carbon imbalance but there are others including deforestation. Carbon dioxide plays a vital role in nature in that it enables plants to photosynthesise and each year some 17 billion tons of CO2 are absorbed in this way, this is just one of the natural processes which in total absorb 120 billion tons of CO2 a year. For many decades huge swathes of forest have been cut down and although new forests are being planted the net loss is still about 100,000 square kilometres of forest a year. With an ever decreasing amount of forest there is a corresponding decline in the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed for photosynthesis.
● SOLAR VARIATION
Solar variations cause changes in the amount of heat energy emitted from the sun and there are many reasons for this. The primary variation is caused by solar cycles, a pattern that repeats itself at 11 year intervals. However, the difference between the highest and lowest output is very small - about 0.1%.
In the short term at least, solar variation has little effect on global warming and climate change. Over many thousands and millions of years the changes are significant and together with other astronomical factors can explain global warming and cooling cycles over long periods of time.
● FEEDBACK OR COMPOUND PROCESS
Global warming is a self-perpetuating cycle. If we take the frozen tundra of Siberia as an example, the permafrost here is melting and in the last few years one million square kilometres has melted. Trapped in the peat beneath the permafrost is up to 70 billion tons of methane, as the ice melts the methane is released into the atmosphere. Methane, as we've established, is a more effective greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide and releasing this much methane has the same global warming potential as releasing 1.6 trillion tons of CO2.
The release of the methane increases global warming which leads to more ice melting, more methane released, more ice melting...
Further, as the ice melts it exposes the land beneath and forms melt-water lakes, both land and water are less reflective than ice so they absorb more solar heat radiation, further adding to global warming and the feedback process.
Global warming causes an increase in the levels of greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases cause an increase in the levels of global warming.
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