Global warming is the term used to describe a slow and steady increase in the average temperature of the Earth’s atmosphere and its oceans levels, a change that is believed to permanently change the Earth’s climate.
There is a lot debate between people, and sometimes in the news, on whether global warming is real or it a hoax. The scientists looking at the data and facts, agree the planet is warming. While many view the effects of global warming to be more substantial and happening faster than others do, the scientific consensus on climatic changes related to global warming is that the average temperature of the Earth had rised between 0.4 and 0.8 °C over the past 100 years. Fossil fuel, land clearing , agriculture, and other human activities that are linked to the rise of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, are believed to be the reason over the past 50 years of global warming.
Scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate (IPC) carrying out global warming research have recently predicted that average global temperatures could increase between 1.4 and 5.8 °C by the year 2100. Changes resulting from global warming may include rising sea levels due to the melting of the polar ice caps, as well as an increase in occurrence and severity of storms and other severe weather events. This mean my grandkids might experience a hotter Earth than we are experiencing now.
Extreme weather events
Extreme weather is another effect of global warming. While experiencing some of the hottest summers on record, much of the United States has also been experiencing colder-than-normal winters. Changes in climate can cause the polar jet stream — the boundary between the cold North Pole air and the warm equatorial air — to migrate south, bringing with it cold, Arctic air. This is why some states can have a sudden cold snap or colder-than-normal winter, even during the long-term trend of global warming, Werne explained.
The definition of climate is the long-term average weather. One colder winter or one hotter summer doesn’t have much effect on the overall climate, the problem begins when those colder winter and hotter summer become more frequents. Global warming may also lead to extreme weather other than cold or heat. Some scientists believe that hurricanes may become less frequent, but more bigger and stronger, and in new different locations.
And even if they become less frequent globally, hurricanes could still become more frequent in some particular areas, said atmospheric scientist Adam Sobel, author of “Storm Surge: Hurricane Sandy, Our Changing Climate, and Extreme Weather of the Past and Future” (HarperWave, 2014). Scientists are confident that hurricanes will become more intense due to climate change. This is because hurricanes get their energy from the temperature difference between the warm tropical ocean and the cold upper atmosphere.
Scientists project that extreme weather events, like heat waves, droughts, blizzards and rainstorms will continue to occur more often and with greater intensity due to global warming. Global warming will cause climate patterns to experience significant changes. Changes include major shifts in wind patterns, annual precipitation and seasonal temperatures variations. Also because high levels of greenhouse gases are likely to remain in the atmosphere for many years, these changes are expected to last for several decades or longer, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Ice melt
One of the primary effects of climate change so far is ice melt. North America, Europe and Asia are all seeing a trend of less snow cover between 1960 and 2015, according to 2016 research published in the journal Current Climate Change Reports. According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, there’s 10 percent less permafrost, or permanently frozen ground, in the Northern Hemisphere than there was in the early 1900s. The thawing of permafrost can cause landslides and other sudden land collapses. It can also release long-buried microbes, as in a 2016 case when a cache of buried reindeer carcasses thawed and caused an outbreak of anthrax.
One of the most dramatic effects of global warming is the reduction in Arctic sea ice. Sea ice hit record-low in both the fall and winter of 2015 and 2016, when the ice is supposed to be at its peak, but it was lagging. The melt means there is less thick sea ice that persists for multiple years, because less heat is reflected back into the atmosphere by the shiny surface of the ice and more is absorbed by the darker ocean, creating a loop that causes even more melt, according to NASA’s “Operation IceBridge”.
Glacial retreat, is an obvious effect of global warming. Right now there is like 25 glaciers bigger than 25 acres, those are now found in Montana’s Glacier National Park, where there used to be around 150 glaciers at some point in time. A similar trend is seen in glacial areas worldwide. According to a 2016 study in the journal Nature Geoscience, there is a 99 percent likelihood that this rapid retreat is due to human-caused climate change.
One thing we know is the cause of global warming, and it’s mankind. The greenhouse gases we release into the atmosphere, most come from our cars, factories, and electricity production. The main responsible gas in carbon dioxide (CO2), others factors are metal from landfills and agriculture, nitrous oxide from fertilizers, has used in refrigerators and industrial processes, and deforestation.