“It’s a well-kept secret, but 95 percent of the climate models we are told prove the link between human CO2 emissions and catastrophic global warming have been found, after nearly two decades of temperature stasis, to be in error,” writes Maurice Newman, chief business advisor to Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott (Dunn). With this bold and senseless declaration, Australia joined the community of global warming denial and thrust itself onto the international stage to become yet another participant in the dramatic environmental debate about climate change. Climate change, like no other global argument, has been an emotionally charged subject since it was first introduced at the end of the 19th century. It continues to polarize countries …show more content…
Australia, specifically, is home to some of the most unique species of animals and geographic phenomena that are found nowhere else in the world. The Great Barrier Reef is one of these magnificent natural wonders, but the fragile ecosystem of the reef is under extreme stress from a changing environment. If a healthy climate depends on the amount of various gases in the atmosphere and most gases have lengthy residual lives, our actions are essentially mixing a lethal cocktail of poison into the air and ocean on a daily basis. Scientists are just beginning to document this reaction and the tragic changes to marine life caused by excess carbon dioxide absorption in the ocean. Absorption of CO2 not only raises ocean temperature but it also changes the pH balance of ocean waters (“Ocean Acidification”) because unlike freshwater, seawater is generally alkaline. The current average pH level of the ocean near its surface at 8.1, a slight decrease from pre-industrial revolution estimates of 8.2 (Brewer and James). This decrease, although seemingly small, is particularly alarming since it was observed after a period of only 80 years and even the slightest change in the pH level of the ocean can upset the ecological balance of a marine ecosystem (Bohensky et al.). It is naïve and unrealistic to deny the effect our everyday actions are forcing on the environment. In a fatalistic and eye-opening …show more content…
Prior to 2013, Australia was governed with a much more liberal style of leadership by the Labor Party. Environmentally friendly, they recognized the dangers of a warming world. In 2012 they implemented a carbon tax on the 348 largest business polluters; charging them a little more than $22 for every ton of greenhouse gas emitted ("Australia Votes to Repeal Carbon Tax."). Unpopular and controversial from the beginning, it became a major political and social debate which the Liberal Party successfully used during elections to oust the Labor Party. The Liberal Party vowed immediate repeal of the carbon tax if elected and on July 11, 2014 they kept their promise (“Australia Votes to Repeal Carbon Tax”). It was replaced by a 2.5 billion dollar taxpayer funded ‘Direct Action Plan’ which instead pays polluters to emit less pollution and switch to cleaner energy. Carbon dioxide emission reduction is such an important global problem, it needs to be immediately addressed, but not at taxpayer expense. The new ‘Direct Action Plan’ is nothing more than a paper promise that will do nothing for both the environment or greenhouse gas reductions and has been widely criticized by the global community for not going far enough in reducing dangerous greenhouse gases (Taylor and Hoyle). Global governments, including the United States and China, question whether Australia will even be able to meet a 5% reduction of 2000 gas levels using
Nowadays climate change is the biggest problem of the human being. It is already happening and represents one of the greatest environmental, social and economic threats facing the planet. Climate change, also known as global warming is the seasonal change for a long geological period of time in the world that is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity, altering the composition of the global atmosphere. Australia faces significant environmental and economic impacts from climate change across a number of sectors, including water security, agriculture, coastal communities, and infrastructure.
The topic of climate change and global warming has always been one of great debate and controversy; however, it’s clear to see that Canadians should take precautions to avoid the problems their country faces. The Canadian government should do everyth...
My parents grew up in small town in Mexico. There was a little river that went through part of the town when they were growing up. Every weekend or so they would go out and would go swimming with their families, it almost became a tradition to go swimming there until they noticed that the river 's water level was becoming smaller and smaller. Today there is no river anymore, instead it 's a road that travels through the town. Every time I visit my family in Mexico it would alway be nice and warm up until this year when I went in December. I remember waking up and getting ready to go to my aunt 's house in clothes for warm weather. As I open the door, the cold air punch me and I saw snowflakes falling down. It 's not supposed to snow in that
Climate change has the potential to devastate millions in Australia. Rising temperatures will impact the landscape of Australia by decreasing Australia's forests. Australia is going to have to spend billions of dollars to make sure their safety from climate change. The people in Australia will need to be strong and flexible to make it through this tough time they're going through, and Australia will have to find a way to fix this problem before it's too late. Climate change is something that will affect the entire world and it's not an issue to take lightly. Australia’s solutions are not simple at all and in order for them to work everyone will have to work together. Climate change in Australia will impact the environment, the economy, and the lives of Australians, an example of a solution is to cut down on carbon emissions.
Ocean acidification is caused due to rising CO2 emissions created by industrial development and greenhouse gases. This increase in carbon dioxide causes changes within the ocean’s biochemistry. Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are expected to rise from pre-industrial level of 280 to 540-970 ppm by the year 2100, depending on future emission scenarios (IPCC, 2001). Eventually the oceans will become highly acidic if mankind is unable to control their CO2 emissions. About 30% of CO2 emissions are taken up by the oceans today (Freely et al. 2004) and this percentage will continue to rise if nothing is done to prevent it, potentially leading to enhanced levels of ultraviolet radiation at the earth’s surface (Harley, C. D. G., et al, 2006). While many marine organisms have adapted to thermal fluctuations in the last few million years, the expected changes in pH are higher than any other pH changes inferred from the fossil record over the past 200–300 million years (Caldeira & Wickett 2003; Feelyet al. 2004). The following diagram represents the effect of greenhouse gas emissions on the oceans causing increased CO2, decreased pH, sea level rise, storm frequency and potential upwelling.
The article by Aly (2017) focuses on climate change in Australia and the lack of proper policies for combating climate change. The author notes that climate change is real and Australia is not putting in place mechanisms for reducing carbon emissions and hence it is paying a hefty price. According to Aly, Australia response to climate change should include a proper means of reducing carbon emissions since the current strategies have failed leading to high energy prices as well as curtailed investments. The country has paid various hefty costs due to delayed climate action. Over the last decade, at least three prime ministers including Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd and John Howard have lost their positions partly for attempting and failing to deliver
In the terms of Climate Change, the Australian community has demonstrated the courage to care to some extent. The warming of our atmosphere is recognised as a huge issue that is globally affecting our earth and its occupants. Many people are very aware that this is a problem and that it is detrimental to our health and the health of our planet. Yet, people are not all fully aware of the extent of the damage already done to the natural environment. By considering and analysing the detrimental effects of Climate Change and Australia’s responses and involvement in Climate Change, Australians can make their own personal impacts by identifying the demand, enormity and urgency of the problem to change their compulsive behaviours and reduce their
For these reasons, global warming stands as one of the most daunting policy issues facing our world today. This is compounded by the debate over the very existence of climate change. While countless sources of empirical evidence testify to the very real presence of climate change the world over, considerable denial of the phenomenon still exists. The argument has been made that evidence about climate change is a gross overstatement, or in some cases, a complete fabrication. Despite the evidence to the contrary, many interest groups with considerable political clout have successfully perpetuated the argument that documented changes in the environment are a product of natural cyclical changes in climate, and are not associated with human activities. However, even the acceptance of this particular brand of reality is no grounds for the disregard of environmental consciousness. Even if one accepts the premise that recent climate change is not resultant of human activity, the rationale behind environmental conservation remains ...
The world in which we live in at the moment has become poisonous. It has been poisoned by the human species’ daily survival activities. Humans around the world have taken for granted the daily impact that we have on the natural world. It all boil down to each and every breath that we take. Each and every breath that we exhale releases poisonous chemicals into the atmosphere. Until when our existence becomes absent, the world will remain poisoned.
Climate change. The two letter word so feared by scientists, so ignored by the average human being. What is it that makes scientists fear this phrase so much? For the concept of “climate change” has been seen throughout the history of the earths existence. For centuries, our climate has fluctuated through increasing and decreasing amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide and climatic cycles. So what is the big deal? The problem, and the reason why this concept instills fear directly into the core of scientists is the rate at which over the past 1,300 years atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen. This unnatural increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide, due to the immense amount of anthropogenic burning of oil and coal, affects the transfer
Air pollution is a very big problem in our environment today, and the reason why is because of the cars, buses, planes, boats, and any factory plants that are producing smoke which causes a lot of radiation; many people that live near those industrial areas are in big risk of having cancer and the air they breathing is just affecting their health even more, many electric powered cars, which many companies says they are environmentally friendly has a battery made in a plant that affects the environment, and also the hybrid cars do have gasoline powered engines which will also affect the environment since they have mufflers on the back of the cars throwing out carbon monoxide putting many people’s health in danger.
Climate change is one of the most discussed topics of the twenty-first century. Although this subject is very often on the daily basis of lots of people, most of them do not know much about it. So let us define climate change. People think that climate change is the same thing as global warming. However, global warming only represents one aspect of climate that is temperature. Climate change is any significant change in temperature, precipitation, or a wind pattern that occur over several decades or longer.
Our planet is suffering from severe pollution, which ranges from contaminated air, water and soil as well. Humans are doing nothing to reduce the amount of pollution that is harming our earth. To understand how pollution works first you must understand that there are different types of pollution. The most common types of pollution and the ones that I will be focusing on which are the ones doing the most harm to our planet are air pollution, water pollution, soil contamination and littering. In order to help out and reduce pollution in our planet people need to be more aware of what these problems are and about the severe damages that they are causing our planet. Before industrialization really jumped into place and had an effect on large cities, nature had its own way of cleaning up its own air and itself. Wind scattered gases, rain washed many substances and the rest dissolved into the ground; while plants absorbed carbon dioxide and made it into oxygen. With big cities growing more every time and with more towns that were becoming more industrialized a lot of more waste began to be released into the environment and the atmosphere and soon this was more than enough for nature to handle. In order to stop and reduce pollution people need to understand the damage that it is causing our environment and our planet as well. People need to be more aware of how they can help out and do their part in reducing these problems that are causing our planet to die slowly with people not even noticing it.
Even if the reason of climate change may be the natural cycles, we humans are the major determinant to it. The huge amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is causing the climate change and this amount is rising day by day, as a result of our actions. Greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide, generally absorb and emit the heat in the atmosphere to keep the Earth’s climate habitable. However, as we continue to burn fossil fuels, this habitable Earth’s temperature will blow up, and as a result, some species will die out due to various problems which are caused by climate change. According to EPA (Environmental Protection Agency), the most obvious consequence of climate change is the rising sea levels, which will cause some seashore habitats to become unavailable to live to its species.
In the modern era, climate change is a variation of weather over a long period of time, and it is the most important and controversial global issue. It is arguable in different positions, especially on science, culture, and politics. These three fields all cause a lot of latent concerns. The science of climate change brings out several harmful phenomenon, such as global warming. With respect to the climate change, the culture of humanity may be changed because the changing climate is the most important key factor of forming today’s human societies. Instead, climate change is now a political issue, which will affect the public attitudes directly. In other words, it means the government tends to review and provide latest information in order to adapt and retard the climate change. Over a long period of time, climate change has been taking place because of human activities that affect the scientific, cultural, and political sides.