by Luke Dearden

Created on: May 21, 2009

Global warming is one of the most politically heated topics today. Scientific research has proven that the earth's average temperature has increased one degree Fahrenheit over the last century, but scientists and politicians are left asking why. Some insist that humans are fully responsible while others say that Earth is going through its natural cycle. Others believe that the cause lies somewhere in between. Reports have stated that the earth's temperature will rise by 7 more degrees in the next century, but others disagree. Although I do believe that humans play a part in global warming, they are most certainly not completely responsible.

When ice cores have been tested, they have shown that as CO2 increased during the last hundred thousand years, the temperature also increased. This indicates that carbon emissions do play a role in global warming. Although there are many ways to release carbon emissions into the atmosphere, three ways stand out among the rest. An estimated 40% of emissions released within the United States come from power plants. Furthermore, emissions from vehicles account for 30% while slash burning and forest fires add on 20%. Although I am not sure how much, these key issues, along with others, do add onto the global warming affect.

Whether power plants and transportation have a large or small effect on global warming we should do what we can to eliminate our responsibility. This will not be easy. Today, we rely on energy and transportation immensely, and cannot give it up. However, we should invest time and money in cleaner technology.

It is evident to me that global warming is not purely our fault. Earth has a natural cycle. Just like there was an ice age, why can't there be the opposite? A physicist, Fred Singer, notes in his book, Unstoppable Global Warming, that most of the temperature increase in the last century was before 1940. This, obviously, was before panic about global warming existed. Also history has shown that Earth has endured at least 600 moderate temperature increases in the last million years. Increased flooding in the Nile River five thousand years ago and historical reports of the Medieval Warming only begin to suggest this idea. Global warming could also be partially due to the sun's cycle. Many scientists argue that our sun's cosmic rays are intensifying. As a result, the amount of low cooling clouds is decreasing.

If global warming is as serious as some make it out to be, severe consequences could take place. Polar wildlife will die off, wildfires will intensify, and oceans could rise to dangerous levels. On the other hand many say that global warming is significantly better than global cooling. I am a supporter of clean technology, and do believe that humans are partially the cause of global warming. However, there is no need to panic like some are. The Earth is going through a natural cycle, and I believe that we cannot make it better, but we can make it worse.

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