greenfuelconversion.com » Climate Change

Climate change opinion shifts

Amelie — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:56:41 +0000

Climate change is the current hot topic in environmentalism and science as we all know, but it has taken a while to get to that position. For too long people simply thought nothing was down to their own actions, that it was all down to others. Now it seems that just as the idea that humans are having an effect on the climate of Earth was gaining ground, it is losing it again.

The problem has always been that the theory behind climate change is constantly evolving. When the public have been convinced of one concept and believe it to be true and then a new, improved theory pops up, it convinces them that everything they learned before was wrong. Repeat the cycle too many times and you get what we have now – a shift towards people dismissing the whole thing.

Well that is happening now in the UK, with the 4 months between November 2009 and February 2010 showing 10% of people no longer believe that climate change is really occurring. Sure, the unusually cold winter experienced during that period could have had something to do with it. Even the scandals over private e-mails between climate researchers could have had an effect.

Whatever caused it though, the important thing is to work towards reversing this trend.

Coppenhagen Climate Summit to Open Today

Amelie — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 09:24:11 +0000

The long awaited conference on climate changes is to open today in Copenhagen. Representatives from 192 countries will be there to discuss how we can reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases that are widely excepted are responsible for rise in temperature of global climate.
The two week conference will see 15,000 delegates and 100 world leaders attend the conference. Some scientists are describing the conference as the most important the world has ever seen. Many pledges have been made and these are intended to supplant the 1997 protocol on climate change which will run out in 2012.
In particular discussions will centre on:

greenhouse gas emission targets and especially those of developed countries.
financial support for developing countries to make changes
carbon trading scheme with the aim of ending the destruction of the World’s forest.

The Trillionth Tonne of Coal

Amelie — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:52:50 +0000

The science museum has been put in charge of a single tonne of anthracite coal. They will keep it until the total emission of carbon dioxed released into the atmosphere reaches, in their best estimate, a trillion tonnes.

It has been done to raise awareness of how much carbon dioxide has been released since the start of the industrial revolution. When the coal will be used depends on how well we are doing to cut back on the use of fossil fuels.

Incidently, as an individual, if you were able to cut your carbon emissions to zero for the rest of your life (which you can’t), it would delay the process of global warming for around two seconds so it is important that everyone works together to reduce the total quantity of carbon dioxide released in the future.

At present, we are around the half-way stage. Since 1750 to the present researchers estimate that around 0.5 trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide have been released into the atmosphere raising the temperature of the atmosphere by around 1 degree Centigrade.

At our present rate of emission of CO2 the science museum will keep the coal until sometime between 2020 – 2050. By the time we reach 1 Trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide, we will have crossed the threshold of temperature change which many scientists consider to be a dangerous level for climate change on the Earth. If we are to keep below this threshold the science museum must keep the coal forever.