Global Warming

Intro

For my 4th inquiry I decided to learn about global warming, because I saw this documentary on it and what will happen to the world in the not so distant future and it showed some of the effect and that's what got me interested in this inquiry. And i'm going to talk about what can happen, how it is caused?, what will happen?, when will it happen?, and what living organisms will be affected?. And a few others. Hope you enjoy!.

How is it caused?

There are many different theories of how it is caused but some of the biggest ones are fossil fuels and greenhouse gases. First the fossil fuels are caused by nothing but us which is not so good considering we're going to feel the results. Every year people around the world produce 35 billion tons of fossil fuels. Now people are making energy out of coal, natural gas, and oil, releasing that burned off fuel into the atmosphere. It is also the gas we use when we drive our vehicles everywhere it contributes to global warming. Another one is methane gas which is one greenhouse gas that comes from cows which is mostly our fault again for feeding them, and the cow's fault for eating it. Now greenhouse gases are having a huge effect on global warming, when the sun gives us heat and light. Greenhouse gases trap the heat into the atmosphere making the earth warmer.

What is going to happen to the ocean?

The ocean is one of the biggest things that can slow down global warming, by going for a swim you can escape the heat. But the problem is that there's going to be too much ocean. But how is that?. With icebergs, glaciers ice and snow melting as far as Antarctica, and the arctic. With all that frozen water will probably travel into the ocean making it a lot deeper. Putting most coastal cities underwater. The bad thing is that Nasa says that greenland is losing 286 billion tons of ice and snow per year which

Is a lot and if we don’t do anything about it the number will keep rising. In the 20th century sea level rose about 20 to 50 centimeters. Another bad thing is when carbon dioxide is mixed with seawater it forms a weak carbonic acid, which is a chemical acid that can affect people by, making the bloodstream lower, and breathing rate, breathing volume, heart rate, and blood pressure increases. This will also cause a huge effect in the sea life economy, with all the sealife gone there will be nothing to work with except dead sea life.

How will life be affected?

Quite a few living organisms will be affected by global warming in all habitats. First animals that live in cold places such as penguins, polar bears, and most arctic creatures will most likely go extinct due to the ice melting and there food changing habitats, secondly marine creature will have a lot more space to live in but of there is a possibility that the carbonic acid will affect marine life hugly, and fraction of them might go extinct due to the water heating up. They probably won’t even last due to pollution in the ocean so they are not going to last very long. The most important question is what will happen to us?, by the time global warming starts to have a huge impact on the world we will have sent people to mars. But the people left on earth will have to deal with very high temperatures, and I think people will have to make quite a big lifestyle change.

When will global warming start affecting us?

The answer to this is it already has, just not in New Zealand, but in cold icy snowy places such as siberia, greenland, alaska, the arctic, antarctica, and icebergs have been melting quite fast. In June Siberia, thought to be far too cold, had a wildfire released about 59 megatonnes of carbon dioxide. That is what is going to cause the ocean to turn into carbonic acid. And it will also cause us to have no air in our lungs.

Alaska has also had a bad few years where the ice and snow is melting. People's houses have collapsed because the snow underneath has become unstable. Alaska also has hundreds of frozen lakes around the country, they are also melting. You may think that's not such a bad thing, but no that is a very bad thing. Under those frozen lakes there are methane bubbles. A lot of people have tested them with a match and will light them on fire, but what a lot of people don’t know is that under all of those lakes there is two times as much methane under them than there is oxygen around the world. Another thing in Alaska is some living organisms that have been frozen for 11,000 to 26,000 years, that have the possibility of coming back to life, people have found a bacteria that is regenerating, it doesn’t have a name yet.

Will it affect us in New Zealand?

The answer to this question is yes but it won’t affect us here as much as other countries. But I think we still need to make a change. Because we still have factories all over the country that produce fossil fuels. An example of one is the fertiliser factory in tauranga.

Conclusion

i think to prevent global warming from happening in the future, is stop using cars that use fuel so electric cars stop all of the fossil fuels that cars with petrol realise. But the problem with that is that it will cost everyone a lot to buy a new car. So that's gonna be pretty hard to do. Another way i think people can solve this problem is by making electricity out of water not coal or gas.