Research Paper

Our climate issues are happening all over the world. Everybody is polluting the earth in so many ways. According to a report humans have caused all or most of the current planetary warming. Human-caused global warming is often called anthropogenic climate change. Humans have caused industrialization, deforestation, and pollution. Which have increased the atmospheric concentrations of water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide. Plants and oceans can't absorb the amount of carbon dioxide humans are releasing into the air. Gases such as Carbon Dioxide stay in the atmosphere for one hundred years. If we were to stop the emissions today there would still be effects from years prior. More than one million species will face extinction. According to an article from National Geographic "Some experts point out that natural cycles in Earth's orbit can alter the planet's exposure to sunlight, which may explain the current trend. Earth has indeed experienced warming and cooling cycles roughly every hundred thousand years due to these orbital shifts, but such changes have occurred over the span of several centuries. Today's changes have taken place over the past hundred years or less." (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/73625218.html).

In order for my climate issue to take effect there has to be greenhouse gas concentrations via the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is the process in which the emission of infrared radiation by the atmosphere warms a planet's surface. The warming of the planet’s surface is exactly what global warming is. The greenhouse effect gives off green house gases that could potentially be dangerous to Earth.

The environment and the people are effected greatly. Average temperatures have climbed 1.4 degrees since 1880. The last two decades were the hottest in the last 400 years. The IPCC reports that 11 of the last 12 years are some of the warmest since 1850. Temperatures in the Artic have risen at twice the global average. Artic ice is disappearing. The Artic may have its first completely ice free summer by 2040. Polar bears are already suffering form the sea-ice loss. Montana’s Glacier National Park now has only 27 glaciers compared to the 150 it had in 1910. Thaws come a week earlier and freezes come a week later. Coral reefs are under stress. They suffered the worst bleaching ever recorded in 1998. Some areas have seen bleach rates of about 70%. Bleach rates are expected to increase over the next 50 years. The increase in extreme weather events is aided by the climate change.

Many things could happen in the long run. According to IPCCIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) “Global warming could lead to large-scale food and water shortages and have catastrophic effects on wildlife.” Sea levels could rise between 7 and 23 inches and could flood many South Seas islands and swamp parts of Southeast Asia. Louisiana and Florida are especially at risk since they are coastal states. Glaciers around the world could melt. Natural disasters could occur more frequently. The ocean’s conveyor belt (global density-driven circulation of the oceans) could be permanently altered, which could cause a mini-ice age in Western Europe. “At some point in the future, warming could become uncontrollable by creating so-called positive feedback effect (feedback loop system in which the system responds to perturbation in the same direction as the perturbation). Rising temperatures could release additional greenhouse gases by unlocking methane in permafrost and undersea deposits, freeing carbon trapped in sea ice, and causing increased evaporation of water.”(http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/73625218.html). At http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/environment there are 51 things you can do to prevent global warming. To see more effects of global warming visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_global_warming .

There really were no predictions for global warming. It is an ongoing thing and it just progresses to be worse for us as the time goes by. There are many global warming warnings. Heat waves and periods of unusually warm weather, Ocean warming, sea-level rise and coastal flooding, Glaciers melting, and Arctic and Antarctic warming.

There are many people involved with changing the climate. Perhaps the most notable person is Al Gore. Al Gore produced the movie An Inconvenient Truth, which is all about global warming and how humans have impacted it and changed our future. It talks about his travels and how he wants to change the world and explain to everybody the effects of global warming. The band 30 Seconds to Mars is involved in the ice caps melting in Antarctica. They wanted to show their fans how concerned they were that they actually performed a music video on a glacier in Antarctica.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Information:

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 3 April 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_feedback
I got the definition of positive feedback from this website.

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc ,14 April 2008,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermohaline_circulation
I got the information about the ocean’s conveyor belt.

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 17 April 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
All the information about global warming,

National Geographic Society, 1996-2008
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/73625218.html
Everything else about global warming.

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 17 April 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect

1999
http://www.climatehotmap.org/
The warning signs of global warming

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc,18 April 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_inconvenient_truth

Virgin Records / 30 Seconds To Mars, 2007
http://www.abeautifullie.org/

Pictures:

(1.) Rugby471 ,25 October 2007
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Greenhouse_Effect.svg

(2.) Dragons flight,19 June 2006
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Greenhouse_Gas_by_Sector.png

(3.) Dragons flight, 13 March 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png

(4.) João Sousa, 21 October 2007
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Retreat_of_the_Helheim_Glacier%2C_Greenland.jpg

(5.) Angrense, 26 December 2005
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Recent_Sea_Level_Rise.png

(6.) Dragons flight, 29 March 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Thermohaline_Circulation_2.png

(7.) Dragons flight,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Risks_and_Impacts_of_Global_Warming.png

Weather Record 3/26-4/16

So we have been collecting the weather for the last three weeks. We recently had to graph out temperature highs and temperature lows. by the looks of the graph we had a rough few weeks. the temperatures were all over the place. my weather data goes to show that michigan's weather is slowly getter warmer sooner due to the climate change. We had near 70 degree weather in the beginning of April and then two days later we had light snowflakes. That is enough to confuse anybody. there isn't really much else to say about it. I didn't use any internet resources.


http://www.noaa.gov/ was used to get the weather data.

Activity D

Today in class we did an activity on the Coriolis Effect. This activity showed the movement of the wind and the movement of surface water. there is one way that i know of that relates this lab to my topic. if the wind and surface water move enough it could cause the the sea level to rise. As the sea level rises it could eventually cause a natural disaster. As the levels rise and the plates move then there could potentially be a tsunami. natural disasters are becoming causes of global warming. This activity was kind of boring. i don't like to do the activity from the white book they really aren't labs, you just answer questions. i don't really have much else to blog about since there is really no other relationship between our lab and global warming. Think GREEN!!!
Britt



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise

Activity 4

Yesterday in class we did a greenhouse effect activity. in the activity we took a plastic bottle and put some water in it (the other groups did different substances, and some had white paint to act as clouds). we stuck a thermometer into the bottle, not touching the water. we then taped the thermometer into the bottle sealing the bottle off from any outside air. we turned a lamp on and gave it direct heat. the temperature went up gradually every minute over the twenty minute time period.
This relates to my topic of global warming in a lot of ways. The greenhouse effect is the process in which the emissions of infared radiation by the atmosphere warms a planet's surface. Global warming is the heating of the Earth's surface over a period of time. It all fits together if you think about it. According to wikipedia global warming is believed to be the result of an enhanced greenhouse effect due to increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gases are the gases present in the atmosphere which reduce the loss of heat into space and therefore contribute to global temperatures through the greenhouse effect. Greenhouse gases are essential to maintaining the temperature of the earth; without them the planet would be so cold as to be uninhabitable. Likewise, an excess of greenhouse gases can raise the temperature of the planet to unlivable levels. that is where global warming kicks in. That is my connection. Think Green!!! Have a good day.
Britt


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas

April Fool's Day...

So today Mrs. Grivins wants us to blog about how Mother Nature is playing an April Fool's Day joke on us. By this she means the weather. So far this spring has been very crappy. the weather has been cold and really rainy. we actually got snow a couple days after the first day of spring. we've been keeping a weather record since March 26 and the weather just looks horrible. it is spring not winter or fall, give us some hot sunshine. Right now we are experiencing almost 60 degree temperatures which are expected to drop drastically. it looks as if it is going to thunderstorm all day long.The weather today seems as if it has potential to cause a tornado since the temperature is dropping so quickly.
We are supposed to mention ocean currents effecting Michigan, i haven't gotten that far yet but i found some good information on Lake Effect Snow. A few things effect lake effect snow, (i know this is a little off topic but i though it was kind of interesting to know) the position of the storm tracks, the degree and variations in lake water temperatures, the extent of ice coverage,prevailing wind directions and the frequency of strong wind speeds. Lake effect snow effects everywhere in Michigan. so here is the ocean current information. An ocean current is continuous, directed movement of ocean water. Ocean currents are rivers of hot or cold water within the ocean. The currents are generated from the forces acting upon the water like the planet rotation, the wind, the temperature and salinity (hence isopyncal) differences and the gravitation of the moon. The areas of surface ocean currents move somewhat with the seasons; this is most notable in equatorial currents.
So now she wants us to include information on the jetstream and why it could be causing our crappy weather.Jet streams are fast flowing, relatively narrow air currents found in the atmosphere around 10 kilometers above the surface of the Earth. They form at the boundaries of adjacent air masses with significant differences in temperature, such as the polar region and the warmer air to the south. The major jet streams are westerly winds (flowing west to east) in the Northern Hemisphere, although in the summer, easterly jets can form in tropical regions. The path of the jet typically has a meandering shape, and these meanders themselves propagate east, at lower speeds than that of the actual wind within the flow. n general, winds are strongest just under the tropopause (except during tornadoes,hurricanes or other anomalous situations). If two air masses of different temperatures meet, the resulting pressure difference (which causes wind) is highest along the interface. The wind does not flow directly from the hot to the cold area, but is deflected by the Coriolios Effect and flows along the boundary of the two air masses. I think that is all that i had to do this was a little harder than before. Have a good day everybody. Think GREEN!!!
Britt


http://www.islandnet.com/~see/weather/elements/lkefsnw3.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_currents
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jetstream

Activity C

Today in our activity we read about storms, and how dewpoint and humidity are connected, in the lower part of the country and answered a few questions. We learned how to read weather maps. we also learned about Atmospheric Moisture Advection. i am not real sure how to connect this to my topic of global warming. According to the book it says that the atmosphere helps water vapor move through Earth. so the way i look at it is if we keep up this whole global warming thing we are going to have places become very dry and have droughts because the atmosphere will not be able to move water vapors around and places will not get the water needed to survive. According to Wikipedia A good example of advection is the transport of pollutants or silt in a river: the motion of the water carries these impurities downstream. So in the end i think we should all stop polluting the Earth and then our rivers would have something else to to advect (if that's even a word) throughout the water system. Dew point is the temperature to which a given parcel of air must be cooled, at constant barometric pressure, for water vapor to condense into water. As the humidity rises so does the dewpoint. so if we continue to poison our o-zone layer the humidity will continue to rise right along with the dew point. Think GREEN!!!
Have a good day
Britt

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advection
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dewpoint

Activity One

Hello to everyone who reads the blogs posted by my science class. yesterday we did a lab on temperature and direct heat on things. we are supposed to relate the lab with our topic. in case you haven't noticed my topic is global warming. i am not sure what exactly we are supposed to write so i am just going to wing this. i believe that the lab relates to my topic since direct heat is a part of global warming. Global warming is the increase in the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-twentieth century and its projected continuation. In our lab we had to have a lamp hovering over top of 3 substances, dark soil, water, and snow (yes we still have snow :( it needs to go away, it is spring already). According to the definition of global warming it's the warming of the oceans which is like our warming of our water (which didn't change at all, but you get the idea). from what i have learned is that it takes longer for water to heat up because their is so much more area to heat. so that is why the water never fluctuated. so i this is what i learned and i hope this is enough for Mrs. Grivins (the only person that i know will read this). THINK GREEN!!!
Have a good day everybody
B~ritt

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
http://www.globalwarming.org/