The famous adage “everybody talks about the weather but nobody does anything about it” is not valid in this century. A worldwide study recently showed that the average temperature of the earth has risen by as much as 0.2 C every decade. The rise in temperature is due to Global warming which has now become an imminent threat.

Our earth daily absorbs large quantity of solar energy from the sun. A considerably part of this is re-emitted to the earth’s surface and the earth’s surface get heated up. This increase in the temperature of the earth is known as the greenhouse effect. Carbon Dioxide gas which is a relatively insignificant non-pollutant gas in the atmosphere causes some serious environmental concerns. It has the potential to be compared with the nuclear wars in terms of massive damage caused to the environment.

Volcanic eruptions and forest fires are some of the natural causes that cannot be checked. But the current global trend is deforestation, along with increase in Carbon Dioxide content. Forests are areas where green leaves efficiently utilize CO2 to make their food. Deforestation reduces this utilization of CO2. Consumption of fossil fuels and household fuels like coal, firewood also gives off considerable amount of CO2. Already the rise in global temperatures had resulted in cracks in the Antarctic ice shelf. This melting may lead to flooding of many low lying areas on our planet.

Prevention is always better than cure. Human contribution and effort can certainly contribute in preventing and controlling global warming. It can be best carried out by checking atmospheric pollution. Deforestation should be stopped. Brick houses should be encouraged as they retain less heat.

Unnecessary combustion of fuel should be checked. In houses, combustion of fossil fuels and wood must be reduced. The main thing to reduce would obviously be traffic pollution and pollution by the industries when they leave out harmful substances into the earth’s atmosphere. We, humans have been taking our planet for granted and this has been for a long time. If this doesn’t stop soon then we are going to have to face some major consequences which might alter our life drastically.

Article Posted By : prajwal316  On November 17, 2012lView All Articles

Article Source :

http://www.veethi.com/articles/do-we-care-enough-about-global-warming-article-1235.htm

Keywords :
greenhouse effect , environment