preview

Global Warming And Global Warming

Decent Essays

Carbon and Carbon dioxide create global warming when we break carbon bonds. Carbon is what scientist call a social atom; meaning it does not like to be alone. So, when carbon bonds are broken it looks for a new partner to grab onto. As it turns out the most desirable partner is oxygen, because it is such a stable, settled atom making it a perfect partner with carbon. However, carbon doesn’t like to just grab one oxygen atom it likes to grab two oxygen atoms, thus making carbon dioxide. The partnership makes it extremely hard to break this bond. CO2 then floats in the air where it will be eaten by trees or absorbed by the oceans when it rains. The problem that has occurred is that we are adding more CO2 into the atmosphere then the trees and oceans can effectively remove from the atmosphere. The direct result is that there is more CO2 in the atmosphere thus creating what scientist call a “greenhouse effect.” The greenhouse effect occurs when the sun rays bounce off the surface of the earth and back into the sky. When the sun rays hit the CO2 molecules they don’t break their bond because it’s almost impossible to break, they instead heat up, thus warming the air, which then warms the oceans, melts glaciers, and we can keep going on the domino effect this has.
What can be done to stop global warming is create less CO2. One problem with that statement is that carbon is the central element of life, since it is pretty much in everything that is alive, stopping global warming will be a huge challenge. The most obvious way to use less carbon is to start with using alternative energies like solar, nuclear, and wind are just a few popular examples. A more challenging way is to invent a way to capture Co2 from smokestack emissions, the sky, or any other place CO2 is omitted then stick it directly into the ground until a time when scientist can find ways to break the bond or use the energy cleanly without harming the atmosphere. This type of removal of CO2 is called carbon sequestration. Ensuring the preservation of the earths rain forests, so that there are more trees to eat away the CO2.
How do we know that global warming is occurring and causing significant harm to earth? NASA created a website titled “Global Climate

Get Access