The Effects Of Global Warming On The Environment - 1632 Words

Fossil fuel burning, deforestation and the release of industrial chemicals is rapidly heating up the Earth’s surface at an immense rate, and the negative effects of this not only impact society today, but future climates will differ significantly, leading to a global warming without precedent in human history. The greenhouse effect will cause major alteration of rainfall and temperature patterns disastrously impacting nature and the global economy that is so closely tied to the environment. The temperature of the Earth’s surface depends on a delicate balance between the incoming short-wavelength radiation of the sun and outgoing radiation of the Earth. The atmosphere warms up the Earth’s surface with the use of water vapor, carbon dioxide†¦show more content†¦The impact of this has been shown to adversely affect economic activities. For example in the summer of 1988, North America experienced high spring and summer temperatures and a drought, the conditions that are to be expected from the heating of Earth’s surface. Because of this extreme dry condition and increase of temperature, the public was faced with the largest wildfire breakout in the recorded history of Yellowstone National Park, water rationing, lower water quality as sewage treatment discharges were undiluted, reduction of the operation of power plants because of insufficient cooling water, crop failures, and a lack of seasonal jobs depriving migrant workers of income, all of w hich caused economic effects that rippled through society. At present, the concentration is â€Å"three hundred fifty parts per million (ppm) and is increasing at four percent per year, retaining an additional three billion tons of carbon per year† (Abrahamson 7), almost tripling carbon dioxide emissions over the past fifty years (Kellogg and Schwarz 146), making the twentieth century the warmest in the past century and the ten warmest years in the last thousand years have