On Friday, in more than 3000 protests worldwide, young people walked out of their classes in a youth-led climate strike. Estimates claim as many as 4 million people participated in the mass walk out, and their demands were clear: it’s time to take fast and decisive action to stop climate change so that our children have a future.
Over the past 100 years, the average surface temperature of the Earth has risen 1.62 degrees Fahrenheit, with most of that warming happening in the last 35 years. Ocean temps have risen by 0.4 degrees at the surface and sea levels have risen globally by 8 inches. Glaciers are retreating globally from the Alps to the Himalayas to the Andes, from Alaska to Africa. Greenland and Antarctica have seen hundreds of billions of tons of ice loss.
With the effects of climate change being so widespread and irrefutable, does this mean we are too late? Is there still time to slow it down?
Greenhouse gases still live in the atmosphere
Human contribution to climate change is mostly through the emission of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels. But even if we stopped emitting all greenhouse gases tomorrow, global temperatures would continue to rise. That’s because of something scientists call “thermal inertia.” Basically, greenhouse gases live on in the atmosphere. We’ll be paying the price for greenhouse gases we’ve already emitted decades into the future.
Even if we stopped emitting all greenhouse gases tomorrow, global temperatures would continue to rise.
The oceans remove the majority of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere over timescales of a century or so and have a stored heat capacity. In addition, the remainder of carbon dioxide, some 20-35%, is removed much more slowly and lingers in the atmosphere for as long as thousands of years. By contrast, methane (another greenhouse gas) only hangs out in the atmosphere for 10-12 years before it's lost to...
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