Greenhouse Gases

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Table of contents:

1. Introduction
2. What are greenhouse gases?
3. causes of increase in greenhouse gases concentration
4. Effects

Ozone layer depletion

1. Solutions
2. Conclusion
3. Bibliography

1. Introduction:

Global warming, is it a problem really? Problems are not considered big unless exaggerated. Global warming is not an exaggerated problem, but its causes were regarded as the development of the human race. Human race has been developing and will continue developing, but which way is the development going?

Everyone thinks development is good but its side effects are worse. Global warming is a side effect of development. The development is industrial revolution. Global warming has so many causes and the main one is greenhouse gases emission.

1. What are greenhouse gases?

Greenhouse gases are gases that trap infrared radiation reflected from earth. The infrared rays are trapped to maintain atmospheric temperature. If the greenhouse gases did not trap infrared rays the earth would be an ice ball. But what would happen if the concentration of greenhouse gases increased? The earth would just turn into a big blue ball with no green and brown colours (earth with sunken landmass) because the precipitation increases and evaporation increases too.[pic 3]

1. Causes of increase in greenhouse gases concentration:[pic 4]

The main cause is the burning of fossil fuels which we use to produce energy for our daily essentials. The fossil fuels are made up of carbon allotropes (allotropes: same element with different structures). Some examples are methane, ethane, etc. These substances have carbon as their base, but they have different structures.

Another cause would be deforestation. Plants absorb CO2 to make food and we release the CO2 after we digest the food. We were recycling the CO2 in the atmosphere, but now since there is too much CO2 in the atmosphere we cannot recycle it. We just have to plant more plants and wait for around 100 years so that the trees can absorb more CO2 and we can start recycling CO2 again.

Another occasion which adds up to the deforestation is a natural cause. The natural cause is earth exhaling. This happens around spring in the northern hemisphere. The earth exhales CO2 which increases the concentration, but the earth inhales it after the exhalation ends. Earth exhaling is basically us humans and other living organisms exhaling more CO2 or it can be assumed as increased cellular respiration rate.

1. Effects of increased greenhouse gases concentration:[pic 5]

Greenhouse gases have helped us get out of the ice age but it has more side effects when the concentration is increased. Global warming is the main effect. Some more effects are climate change, global temperature increase, ocean acidification, change in plant growth, etc. These changes are because of ozone depletion except for temperature increase. Temperature increase is because of deforestation and increased CO2 concentration.

Greenhouse gases’ concentration in the atmosphere has been increasing for a while now. Carbon dioxide’s concentration is 404 ppm as of June 2016. The greenhouse gases trap infrared rays that leave the atmosphere (explanation animation in movie ‘An inconvenient truth’ about the effects). Some other effects are listed below. 

Ozone depletion:

The Ozone protects us by absorbing the energy from the UV light. When the energy is absorbed the bonds between oxygen atoms are broken and the UV light’s wavelength is increased. UV light with shorter wavelength is more dangerous than UV light with longer wavelength. Waves with shorter wavelength have more energy and more energy means people with lighter skin colour are more likely to have a skin cancer later in life. Ozone depletion is definitely bad for white people because their melanin production is low which means less UV radiation is deflected by the skin. [pic 6]