Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Ethics of the Individual “The most important thing about global warming is this. Whether humans are responsible for the bulk of climate change is going to be left to the scientists, but it's all of our responsibility to leave this planet in better shape for the future generations than we found it.” –Mike Huckabee, politician Do individual greenhouse gas emissions cause harm? In short, yes. Though this harm may not exactly be measureable on the individual level,
Reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission, particularly from industrial production, to combat global climate change is one of the biggest sustainable development challenge for the international community. Countries are adopting Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs), low carbon development strategies and climate change policies to tackle issues of climate change and at the same time meet their development goals. At the global level, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
Global Warming and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Overall, emissions of CO2 increased by 0.3% to 6.8 tons per person in the United States. Emissions of greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide, which account for 17% of total greenhouse gas emissions, declined by 0.6%. Emissions from the industrial sector declined 1.3% even though the U.S. economy grew 3.9% in 1998. However, CO2 emissions from transportation grew by 2.4% while CO2 emissions of regulated utilities expanded by 3.2% as a result of
Greenhouse gas are a number of gases contributing to global warming which heat up the earth. The greenhouse gas that is emitted are carbon dioxide, methane , nitrous oxide and more. The greenhouse gases absorb infrared rays (heat) emitted from the Sun, which will be kept in the earth’s atmosphere rather that it being reflected away into space which helps the earth’s temperature to remain constant. The industrial world in earth contributes carbon dioxide by burning fossil fuels in factories.Fossil
wished to have legally binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions to be included in the summit, but the United States of America refused to agree because it claimed that there were still scientific uncertainties regarding the need to take action in limiting gas emission. Besides, since limiting gas emissions will cutting energy consumption, it will give unacceptable economic impacts. Since the United States is one of the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, so it was very important that the
of these events are comparable to the +7.1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions that are being produced in the United States of America yearly.(Tonto.eia.doe) As Al Gore once stated in his book, Earth in the Balance, “the process filling the atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other pollutants – is a willful expansion of our dysfunctional civilization into vulnerable parts of the natural world” (234). These greenhouse gas emissions will pollute our atmosphere causing catastrophic events
The rising levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHG) caused by the increased use of fossil fuels for energy services—notably transportation, heating, and the generation of electricity—is known to be one of the foremost drivers of climate change. The United States is responsible for one-fourth of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions, representing only 5% of the world population and it becomes the world’s single largest emitter of atmospheric greenhouse gasses (EPA, 2011) . Since 1970, the
Air pollution and greenhouse gases are the reason for the planet as it is today; the reason why we see campaigns flooding the media informing us to ‘switch off’, ‘save the planet’ and ‘turn down the heat’ and the reason why the government is trying to develop a successful scheme, such as the carbon tax scheme, to reduce air pollution caused by major industries. Air pollution and greenhouse gases are the two immediate causes of global warming and climate change. Air pollution occurs when chemicals
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
achieving the "stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system’’ The Protocol was initially adopted on 11th of December 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, and entered into force on 16th February 2005. As of September 2011, 191 states have signed and approved the protocol. The only remaining signatory not to have ratified the protocol is the USA, who actually releases more greenhouse gasses than any other nation
not harm Earth and the living species, since it is a colourless and odourless gas that is the main part of the living cycle. While carbon dioxide concentration contributed to better plant growth as well as animals do better in growth. Therefore, carbon dioxide is not considered to be a pollutant as it is beneficial and a key component to the Earth. Instead, they thought that water vapour, the most important greenhouse gas in the atmosphere could be account for about 98% of the warming process. Also
more with a vegetarian diet than we get by riding a bicycle, it seems like we as a civilizations are choosing the wrong answers. Vegetarianism is proven to be a better diet for our environment, and to choose this diet is to choose a reduction of greenhouse gases, as well as habitat and water conservation. Take action against the damage we do to our own earth, and choose a vegetarian way of life.
Canadian citizens are seeing the long term effects of global warming as greenhouse gases are relatively increasing in Canada. Most of how Canadian’s produce greenhouse gas emissions is through Home energy, food/shopping, and cars/transport as this strategy of living can cause polar ice caps to melt in the northern and southern hemisphere causing habitat loss, sea levels rising/decreasing, temperature change, and El Niño. This global warming issue has taken a huge effect in Canada as finding alternative
Greenhouse Effect This Earth is getting older and older. Can you imagine what life will be like if the temperature in the Earth keeps on rising due to the excessive amount of heat trapped in the atmosphere? No one would want that to happen. The atmosphere plays an important role in our daily life. It keeps the Earth warm, which is also known as the greenhouse effect. Due to ozone depletion and global warming, the atmosphere is not able to function normally like how it used to. Human activities such
was finally acknowledged when the climate became the hottest within the century (Maslin, 2008). The greenhouse effect became a concern and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was founded. Damages from greenhouse gases could include severe climate changes, altered ecosystem, extinction and loss of biodiversity (Shogren, 2004). The Kyoto Protocol was introduced to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The main six chemicals that needed to be reduced were CO2, CH4, N2O, HFCs, PFCs, and SF6 (Parker
strategies, and increase the jobs opportunities in the country. The goal of the Paris Agreement is so mitigate global warming as a planet. Canada produces almost 722 megatonnes of greenhouse gases each year and despite the effort, the greenhouse gases have just continued to rise. The new international target is drop 17% of the greenhouse gases by 2020. With several countries working together alongside Canada, the risks and impacts of global warming and climate change would significantly
generally attributed to the greenhouse effect caused by increased levels of carbon dioxide and other pollutants (Global warming, Wikipedia). Moreover, the effects of global warming will bring ecological and social changes. Because there is no exact way to predict the effects of global warming, it is almost impossible to say how strong global warming will affect life in the future. Scientists blame the greenhouse gas effect in combination with societies greenhouse gas emissions for the rising temperature
fossil fuels to create energy. These gases being released into the atmosphere are also known as greenhouse gases. These gases trap heat within the atmosphere. While we need energy for many everyday uses there are a lot cleaner ways to make the energy. The public needs to be informed on the negative effects of creating energy this way and ways to make clean energy. CO2 is the number one greenhouse gas in our atmosphere. CO2 is released from many things like cars and factories from burning fossil
the hottest day you’ve ever experienced throughout your life, the hot sun beating down on you and the only thing you’re thinking of is “how long do I have to deal with this?” Well, with the current effects taking place due to excessive amounts of greenhouse gases and use of non renewable resources going on, after a certain period of time that weather will be a whole 12 degrees hotter than it is today. So imagine that same day, the heat you had dealt with, except a whole 12 degrees even hotter, that
becoming more evident to the world’s population that climate change is being caused by changes in the reflectivity of earth’s atmosphere and surface, the ever changing variations of energy from the sun reaching the earth, and the daunting increase in greenhouse gasses. When sunlight is emitted from the sun it is either reflected or absorbed by the earth’s atmosphere. The reason for this is because the sun’s rays are either absorbed or reflected according to the dark and light colors of the earth’s surface