Natural versus anthropogenic climate changes
Human activities or anthropogenic factors have resulted in the accumulation of green house gases, which perpetuate climate changes. These gases include methane, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and other halogen-based carbons. Transportation processes have led to the prevalence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere as the fuels used to power most modern forms of transport are carbon-based.
Furthermore, modern industries manufacture chemicals whose products are carbon dioxide. An example of such an industry is cement manufacture. Man utilizes a lot of resources that cause wastage. These items stay in landfills where they radiate methane into the atmosphere.
Aerosols have caused halogen-based carbons to accumulate in the stratosphere; these emanate from industrial and mineral processes. In essence, these man-made activities result in a much faster accumulation process than natural factors (Solomon et. al., 2007).
Natural forces also explain climate change in the earth today. These include volcanic activities and solar contributions. Volcanic activities lead to the release of aerosols into the atmosphere. However, these eruptions must be quite large to cause significant effects on the Ozone layer.
The latter insulates the earth from intense solar radiations. Solar, orbital variations have increased the earth’s energy. This has altered the concentration of carbon dioxide and other green house gases thus leading to temperature increases.
Whether global warming is real
Global warming is a true phenomenon. Historical temperatures of the earth indicate that they are increasing. Approximately 140,000 years ago, the earth was about six degrees Celsius colder than modern times. While skeptics claim that 10,000 years later, this temperature increased rapidly and then reduced to a lower level then changed again. However, the overall trend is towards an increase in temperature.
Additionally, the temperature in the near term also supports these findings. Over the past century and a half, global temperatures have reported increases of 0.5 degrees C. These temperature findings are reliable because researchers altered them to accommodate long term or historical deviations in temperature. Polar ice caps are melting, and this has perpetuated an increase in the sea level. Currently, the earth has 5.7*106 cubic miles of ice.
This number is a reduction in the number of ice caps that existed before. Alteration in wildlife habitats also proves that global warming is real. Temperature increases caused certain species to change their migration patterns, such as the bark beetle in Alaska. Also, some animals like polar bears are becoming extinct because they no longer have access to their natural habitat, which is sea ice (Dornbusch & Poterba, 2003).
Mitigation strategies
Fuel efficiency is one of the strategies that can be used to mitigate climate change. Homes can switch from reliance on electricity for heating systems to the use of fuel oil. Electricity dependence is the biggest culprit in green house emission; therefore, making this switch would reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by 890 Mt annually, yet it would cost -$62 per CO2 ton.
Industries can also work on fuel efficiency by increasing the efficiency of the motors, lighting systems, and machines. This causes a CO2 reduction of 10% (Rubin et. al., 1992). Industries in the petrochemical industry, as well as those in the heavy metal industry, can improve their processing equipment. They can also work on their furnaces to consume less energy and yield fewer emissions.
The transportation sector plays a critical role in fuel inefficiency. Therefore, vehicles can be made more fuel efficient. They can also rely on environmentally- friendly sources like electric power or ethanol. However, government policy would need to support the development and distribution of these fuel alternatives, and this may be a challenge.
Carbon taxing is also another strategy for mitigating climate change. This method has been highly controversial because unscrupulous business persons have found ways of going around the policy. Theoretically, the method can work because the worst polluters suffer monetarily for their actions.
Nonetheless, to minimize deceit, certain policies must be in place. First, the tax should be applied fairly among all carbon emissions; upstream industries like refineries should carry the heaviest burden. Additionally, enforcement of the laws should be done strictly. The taxes should also be used to achieve green goals.
Policies to stabilize climate change
Countries that perform poorly in climate change are China, the US, Russia, and India, in that order. National policies should be enacted to ascertain that their energy sources come from nonfossil fuels.
Leading energy conservationists like Switzerland rely on hydro and nuclear power for their resources. Therefore, big polluters should have policies that enable these transitions. However, issues concerning the hazards of nuclear power ought to be addressed (California Environmental Protection Agency, 2013).
The transport sector is the biggest contributor to climate change in the US. This means that companies that produce vehicles and the ones that supply fuel are the biggest culprits of green house emissions.
They need to develop and introduce fuel-efficient cars. Furthermore, refineries and other mineral industries need to watch the amount of carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases they produce. Policies like carbon taxes can work for those industries as they respond very quickly to rising costs. Vehicle makers should have incentives and support to produce those cars.
References
California Environmental Protection Agency (2013). Economic sectors portal. Web.
Dornbusch, R. & Poterba, M. (2003). Global warming: Economic policy responses. MA: MIT Press.
Rubin, E., Cooper, R., Frosch, R., Lee, T., Marland, G., Rosenfeld, A. & Stine, D. (1992). Realistic mitigation options for global warming. Science, 257(5067), 148-149.
Solomon, S., Qin, M., Manning, M., Marquis, K., Averyt, T., Miller, H. (2007). Climate change 2007: The physical science basis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Pres.