Article Analysis Essay on "What Is Global Warming, Explained" by Christina Nunez

Introduction

The increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from the start of the industrial revolution caused by anthropogenic emissions and changes in land use is already causing global warming and climate change that is projected to worsen throughout the 21st century. This paper provides a critical review of selected literature on global warming and climate change with the focus of understanding the concept of global warming, its causes, impacts, and possible mitigation approaches. From the selected four literal works, the central hypothesis is that global warming is a direct result of increased greenhouse gases that are higher now than they have been in the last 800,000 years. This process has also caused climate change, which encompasses extreme weather events and a host of other catastrophic weather-related issues that are plaguing the environment. The articles create awareness about the rising temperatures as a global challenge that needs to be addressed before its impacts get out of control.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Critical Review

The article, "What is global warming, explained," written by Christina Nunez (2019) attempts to persuade the reader as to the effects that human behavior has on global warming and the overall conditions of climate change. The article lays out a list of occurrences that are a direct result of increased greenhouse gases and lists a historical overview as to how this increase has affected global climate. In the article, Nunez discusses the impact that humans have on the current global warming crisis. She illustrates that humans are causing the past century's global warming at an alarming rate. She summarizes the effects that greenhouse gases have had on global warming and our current climate change. Through a persuasive approach, the author explores the causes and the impacts of Climate Change as a direct consequence of global warming. The author describes global warming as the progressive increase in the average temperature of the planet caused today, fundamentally, by the accelerated rise in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, product of the increasing emissions by the activities developed by humanity, especially in what concerns the industry, the waste of natural resources and the change in land use.

In understanding the greenhouse effect, Nunez (2019) notes that the progressive increase of the global average temperature driven mainly, according to studies carried out and according to the records, by the increase of greenhouse gas emissions constitutes one of the challenges that humanity must face in this century given the trend towards possible climate change. These observations are also noted by Denchak who argues that the rise in greenhouse gases has created a problem that we as a civilization may not be able to adapt to the changing climate as it may change faster than we can adapt. A major concern is that current icebergs such as Antarctica and Greenland have been melting at an alarming pace. This means that as global warming increases, extreme weather conditions will become more prevalent. It is estimated that by 2050, sea levels may rise between 1-2 feet as glaciers melt. If this takes place, it will affect our water supply, ranges that animals and plants can live, the intensity of major storms, droughts, the growing of our food supply, and a host of other challenges to our current way of life.

The article also sheds more insights into the question of whether temperature changes are natural or human-induced. The concern and debate about climate change are that it goes beyond the limits of resistance of the natural systems within which man participates. As Nunez observes, human activity is not the only cause of global warming. Natural occurrences such as volcanic eruptions and the intensive combustion of billion of tons of carbon convert the atmosphere 5 times richer in carbon dioxide for more than 10000 years, brutally raising the global temperature for more than 7 c.

Climatic changes have been present during the life of the planet and have been decisive in establishing the different stages through which it has passed. However, as Christina Nunez notes, the GHG emissions are increasing at a rate that many living things will find it challenging to adapt. The author posits that the unpredictability of climatic conditions poses a severe threat to the existence of life on the planet as we know it.

Rapid population increases the effect of which is urbanization represents a milestone in the transformations of the cities and the life of its urbanites, characterized by the tremendous technological advance, transport, and communication. Population dynamics, the irrationality of resource consumption, the degradation of the global environment increasingly reveal the extent of critical environmental levels with irreversible repercussions on global ecosystems. Uncontrolled urban growth eventually turns many of the modernist planning projects into a failure because of their inability to accommodate and adapt the new realities that come with their recent inhabitants. Green buildings and cities can divert the urbanization of its negative impacts such as increased temperatures and carbon emissions thus maintaining ecologically balanced and sustainable cities that offer options, opportunity and hope to its inhabitants.

Global warming has been projected in the context of its impacts on unique regions such as coastal areas and urban areas where most of the emissions occur. The increasing urbanization scenario and its high power of diffusion in the cities completely transfigured the patterns of production, actions, and consumption in the urban environment. In the rapid process, there would inevitably be significant and irreversible gaps in the ecosystem's' carrying capacity manifested in large ecological footprints. As a way to promote sustainability, many new urban development projects have been developing green cities. In addition to the services and functions they provide for their central character, green spaces are elements that confer beauty, leisure, energy, and tranquility to the inhabitants and the cities own image. In the face of the varied forms, applications and multiple services they provide - both at the environmental, social and economic levels - these elements are often inserted in the medium as a form of organization, definition, boundary, and containment of spaces. From parks and gardens (public, private, urban), rest areas, promenade, sports, nature reserves, marginal vegetation, groves, slopes, embrace an undetermined spectrum of mixtures.

Large populations are moving into the cities, a situation that is wrecking the urban environment. Urban areas are a significant contributor to the increase in climate impacts, an undeniable reality whose magnitude is felt on a global scale and with increasingly variable repercussions. The strong dependence in energy system cities, coupled with the multiple activities responsible for the strong GHG emissions - from burning fossil fuels -, the provision of water, food and consumer goods, buildings, and means of transport are increasingly affected by its more than 8 million inhabitants. As Nunez (2019) argues, the planetary heat is continually being turned up by carbon pollution. The scenario is aggravated by predictions such as the undeniable rise in temperature, water scarcity, more critical weather patterns, rising sea levels, floods, more eternal realities that have many impacts on the quality of life and stability economic and social development. In the past two decades, New York City, for instance, has averaged 95F for three days. By 2075, this situation is expected to increase significantly. Cities are a target quite battered by calamities related to climate change. The intensification of the occurrence of these events together with the increase of the average level of the sea puts several cities at risk by causing problems of sanitation, destruction of infrastructures (due to inability to accommodate the intense flow), and public health issues (inhibition of access to drinking water, quality of water and disease spread). Heat waves - mainly felt in urban areas - will affect not only populations but will also compromise local energy systems.

Melissa Denchak (2019) in the article "Are the Effects of Global Warming Really that Bad?" interrogates the intensity of the impacts of global warming on the global population as a way of cementing the reality that indeed, global warming can be catastrophic. According to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the scientific consensus defines the boundary to distinguish between safe and dangerous climate change, for which it sets a reasonable maximum of 2 C for raising temperatures ( pre-industrial period). Above this limit, climate risks can be catastrophic. Sea level can rise by one meter, enough to submerge 12% of the territory of the Bahamas and 10% of the region of Vietnam. The pressure on coastal zones could affect about 56 million people in developing countries. It could also start the collapse of the Amazon rainforest and endanger 20 to 50% of the species in Southern Africa. The most significant risks should be for countries located in the tropics, where most developing countries are found and where studies estimate that there are an additional 600 million people at risk of hunger. This risk should be associated with the reduction of agricultural production, which in turn should be affected by the increase in temperature and the decrease of precipitation in the tropical region. Regarding human well-being, climate change can pose a more significant threat than any other environmental change. This is due to its irreversible character, its global spatial scale and its combination of social and ecological factors that give it some degree of uncertainty regarding the magnitude and tendency of its impacts.

The literature surrounding global warming identify extreme temperature changes as a direct consequence of global warming. The UN warns that the last three years have been the warmest recorded to date and the rate of global warming observed during this period is "exceptional." "It has already been confirmed that the years 2015, 2016 and 2017, which are clearly part of the trend of long-term warming caused by the increase in atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, are the three warmest years so far recorded" , announced the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), a specialized agency of the UN. Average temperatures on the land surface in 2017 exceeded by 1.1 degrees those of pre-industrial times, approaching the ceiling of 1.5 degrees established as the most ambitious limit for global warming by almost 200 countries in the Paris Agreement. The WMO general secretary revealed that 17 of the 18 warmest years belong to the 21st century, and the rate of warming observed in the last three years is exceptional, the latter being particularly marked in the Arctic. The continued temperature rise will have lasting and far-reaching repercussions on the level of the ground and the meteorological regimes in the other regions of the world,"

However, the current warming trend causes concern given the evidence that exists and that support the theory that we are approaching a possible climate change that may be disastrous for humanity, although there is still a lot to know about it. We have no choice but to make the necessary efforts that are within our reach because global warming is a reality and it is little or much anthropogenic impact on the trend towards possible climate change, we have to do our part.

Global warming is responsible for more frequent and severe weather. As Denchak, (2016) and Nunez (2019) noted, increased temperatures create an atmosphere capable of collecting, retaining, and dropping more water which changes th...