Arguing on Anthropogenic Climate Change - Coursework Example

Arguing on Anthropogenic Climate Change Introduction Both geological and observational records indicate that the climate is changing. Specifically, Mathez indicates that the climate of the Earth is warming (4). This issue of climate change has now become a concern for most nations because of the associated negative effects. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NASA cites compelling evidence on rapidly changing climate including the declining Arctic sea ice, shrinking Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets and extreme events like increased rainfall and hurricanes. The organisation collects this evidence from earth-orbiting satellites over many years. Borrowing from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, Harvey reports that with the current trend in climate change, global temperatures could rise by between 0.30C to 4.80C by end of the century. The seal levels could rise by 26cm to 82cm during the same period while the oceans become more acidified as a result of carbon dioxide absorption. This could lead to disrupted global precipitation distribution, forest fires and ecological disruptions. Due to these negative effects, various efforts have been initiated to stop further disruption of the environment. Importantly, understanding the exact causes of climate change would go a long way in providing lasting solutions to the problem. It has been widely argued that human activities contribute to climate change. According to Harvey, those activities involving use of fossil fuels increase the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from the resultant emissions. These emissions, particularly greenhouse gases trap more heat in the atmosphere and further deplete the ozone layer. In an effort to accurately determine the causes of climate change, there has arisen opposition against these arguments. Such arguments have scientific evidence against anthropogenic climate change and evidence for natural causes of climate change. This paper evaluates the arguments for and against anthropogenic climate change to give evidence-based argument for anthropogenic climate change. Argument for Anthropogenic Climate Change Human activities have been attributed to the observed climate change. According to NASA, human-induced activities have caused the earth to significantly get warmer over the past couple of years at a rate that could not have been imagined about 1,300 years ago. Industrial activities in particular have resulted in an increase in the levels of carbon dioxide from 280 to 379 parts per million over the past 150 years. There is increasing evidence that greenhouse gases resulting from human activities have the capability of causing global warming. These gases, including carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane have been noted to have a greenhouse effect on the Earth. Thus, they have been noted to cause the increase in global temperatures in the past 50 years (Pittock 68). Through the period of industrial revolution spanning about 150 years ago, Pall et al. document that human activities have lead to between 10% and 30% of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere (383). The greenhouse gases allow sunlight to enter the atmosphere of the Earth. They then trap a significant proportion of this radiation from the sun that should have been reflected back into space. The trapped heat adds onto the atmospheric temperature causing global warming. As noted by Ravilious, even opponents of anthropogenic climate change acknowledge the reality of greenhouse gases effect in the atmosphere. The reason why the atmosphere of the Earth is so vulnerable to such gases is because of its thinness. The second argument for anthropogenic climate change is that the current climate change does not arise from natural trends. If the Earth was currently on the natural trend, cooling would be expected to take place. According to Harvey, going by the 100,000-year glacial and the 10,000-year interglacial periods, the Earth is at the peak of the 10,000-year interglacial period. During this time, the temperatures would naturally be at their peak. During the pre-industrial period, the Earth was gradually cooling at about 0.50C over 8,000 years. Whereas the Earth should be exhibiting this cooling course, the current data indicates a warming trend. Therefore, factors other than natural ones are in force. This leads to the conclusion of the influence of human activities. Perhaps, the biggest argument would be to attribute the increased carbon dioxide to human activities. Indeed, scientists have found a way to fingerprint the human-caused carbon dioxide through its isotopic signature. According to Poortinga et al., the naturally occurring carbon dioxide has a low ratio of carbon-14 (1017). The scholars record the levels of pre-industrial atmospheric carbon dioxide at about 280 parts per million. As at the year 2010, this concentration had risen to 390 parts per million. The extra 100 parts per million of carbon dioxide did not bear the carbon-14 signature. This extra carbon dioxide could therefore be attributed to emissions from fossil fuels due to human industrial activities. Further radioactivity research studies indicate that the low-isotope carbon-14 cannot be bombarded by cosmic rays, these being strong rays hitting the Earth surface from space (Gillespie 24). As such, the carbon-14 observed in the atmosphere could only have come from underground. This is evidence for human activities involving digging up fossils, burning them and thus causing the carbon-14 isotope to find its way into the atmosphere. Hence, human activities contribute to increased atmospheric carbon dioxide responsible for climate change. Lastly, there is consensus in the scientific community that climate change, and particularly global warming, is chiefly a result of human activities. To begin with, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC has been on the forefront to argue for the role of human activities in climate change. The IPCC is a body of scientists formed under the guidance of the World Meteorological Organisation and the United Nations Environment Program in 1988. It publishes reviews and summaries of peer-reviewed studies on climate change every six years (Harvey). IPCC reports have therefore been a source of authoritative information on climate change for international consumption. Other authoritative sources that support anthropogenic climate change as given by Pittock include the National Geographic, NASA and credible media houses such as CNN and BBC (72). Interestingly, even after NASA gave evidence of melting Mars ice caps pointing at solar irradiation as a cause of climate change (Ravilious), the organisation’s stand on human activities as a major cause of climate change still holds. Therefore, with all these authorities backing up human activities as the lead cause of climate change, the credibility of this fact is obvious. Argument against Anthropogenic Climate Change Despite these scientific arguments for human caused climate change, scientific evidence has also been presented by opponents of anthropogenic climate change. First, these opponents negate that human activities contribute to the damaging of the ozone layer. According to this argument, there are already many naturally occurring chemicals in the atmosphere that could affect the ozone much more than humanity could. In support of this argument, Gillespie cites the evidence given by NASA in the mid 1970s (69). NASA negated the influence of chlorine from space shuttle as compared to that from volcanoes. Indeed, the eruption of Mount Pinatubo later in 1991 showed that the lower stratosphere ozone over the tropics was consequently reduced by 30% and 20% over the Antarctic and the Arctic respectively. Even so, the scholar further observes that even though volcanoes contributed to the ozone-damaging chemicals, their impact was not as much as anthropogenic impact. The same could be said of other evidences provided to negate anthropogenic climate change including the depletion of the ozone by solar cycles and solar flux radiation. Thus, naturally harmful chemicals only supplement human causes. Secondly, the opponents of anthropogenic climate change insist on the significance of the past in considering the present. They point out at geologic records showing the numerous cooling and warming periods of the Earth, not induced by carbon dioxide. These changes include great positive and negative changes in temperatures as well as significant fluctuations in the sea level (Knutson 160). In fact, the BBC reports that as the last Millennium begun, there was a Medieval Warm Period when temperatures in Europe rose higher than they now are. In Northern England, grapes grew and the ice-bound mountains in the Alps opened. In the 1930s, the Arctic was warmer than it is today. According to Mathez, these past records could be applied in the modern context of climate change (15). Certainly, carbon dioxide did not contribute to climate changes in the past and should not be attributed to the current climate changes. Nonetheless, BBC counters this argument noting that the ancient variations were a result of solar forcing, continental configurations or wobbling of the Earth’s orbit. Moreover, outside Europe, there has been irregular evidence on the Medieval Warm Period and does not tally with the data on warmth in Europe. Thus, this idea is incorrect. On the Arctic, it still remains as warm as it was in the 1930s, with more recent studies showing that it is even warmer now. Therefore, it is incorrect to argue that the current climate change is a natural phenomenon as occurred many years ago. Climate is majorly influenced by the sun. The history of the Earth shows that it responds to the cyclic changes in the energy output from the Sun. Warming in the past could be attributed to variations in the magnetic field of the Sun and the solar wind. To support this argument, Ravilious, a reporter for National Geographic News reports scientific evidence from NASA indicating that the ice caps at Mars’ South Pole have been diminishing due to increased solar irradiance. Solar irradiance thus plays more crucial role than human contribution. Indeed, solar variations affect climate. However, the BBC argues that this is not the sole factor determining climate changes. The renowned media house observes that there has been no negative or positive trend since the 1960s with regards to the solar index. Therefore, solar variations cannot be the cause for the currently experienced climate change. Furthermore, it would be appreciated that the difference between the solar maximum and minimum over the solar cycle that takes about 11 years is smaller by a factors of 10 as compared to greenhouse gases effect over the same period. Finally, opponents of anthropogenic climate change observe that the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rises after, rather than before, there has been an increase in temperature. Going back about a million years ago, there was a cycle of temperature and carbon dioxide rise at intervals of about 100,000 years (Knutson 159). It would be important to note that the rise in carbon dioxide always came after a rise in temperatures and not before. Gillepsie attributes this to the liberation of gases from the oceans (24). Despite the truth in this argument, pro-anthropogenic climate change activists consider it irrelevant. Carbon dioxide increase in ancient ice-cores occurred after temperature rise by a couple of hundred years. This length of time coincides with the time the ocean takes to respond to atmospheric changes attributed to the wobbling of the orbit of the Earth. However, temperature changes come after carbon dioxide changes. Additionally, the current situation is different. The 35% increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels over the levels during the pre-industrial period could be attributed to human activities. These levels are much higher than ever recorded in the 650,000 years when ice-core records were taken. In fact, these levels could be higher than ever recorded in the past three million years. Conclusion An assessment of both anthropogenic and non-anthropogenic climate changes indicates that the atmosphere would have been more stable had human activities not intervened. It is true that natural factors such as volcanism and cyclic changes in solar irradiation have caused climate change in the past and could be responsible for the current changes in the climate. However, the rapid climate change experienced in the modern context give an indication of a more significant contributor to the changes. There has been a consensus that greenhouse gases increase the temperature of the Earth and human activities are known to contribute largely to the increased level of these gases in the atmosphere. Scientists have been able to fingerprint the additional carbon dioxide resulting from human activities. Indeed, with the existence of many authorities arguing for anthropogenic human activities, there is little chance for a contrary argument. Even though the current climate change could not be wholly attributed to human activities, it is evident that human activities contribute by far to climate change. Works Cited BBC. “The Arguments Made by Climate Change Sceptics.” Bbc.co.uk. BBC News. 13 Dec. 2014. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Gillespie, A. Climate Change, Ozone Depletion and Air Pollution: Legal Commentaries with Policy and Science Consideration. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2006. Print. Harvey, F. “IPCC Climate Report: Human Impact is ‘Unequivocal’.” The guardian.com. The Guardian, 27 Sept. 2013. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Knutson, T. R., et al. “Tropical Cyclones and Climate Change.” Nature Geoscience 3 (2010): 157 – 163. Print. Mathez, E. A. Climate Change: The Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future. New York, NY: Columbia UP, 2009. Print. National Aeronautics and Space Administration.” Global Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Plant.” Nasa.gov. N.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Pall, P., et al. “Anthropogenic Greenhouse Gas Contribution to Flood Risk in England and Wales in Autumn 2000.” Nature 470.7734 (2011): 382 – 385. Print. Pittock, A. B. Climate Change: The Science, Impact and Solutions. New York, NY: Earthscan, 2009. Print. Poortinga, W., A., et al. “Uncertain Climate: An Investigation into Public Scepticism About Anthropogenic Climate Change.” Global Environmental Change 21.3 (2011): 1015 – 1024. Print. Ravilious, K. “Mars Melt Hints at Solar, Not Human, Cause for Warming, Scientist Says.” National geographic.com. National Geographic News. 28 Feb. 2007. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Read More