What is Climate Change?

Climate change is one of the greatest problems this generation is going to be faced with. Climate change, also known as global warming, is a gradual increase in the overall temperature of the earth's atmosphere generally attributed to the greenhouse effect caused by increased levels of carbon dioxide, and other pollutants. These greenhouse gases, such as methane, water vapor, and carbon dioxide, trap heat. Over time, this causes the global temperature to increase, affecting every living thing on this planet. This abundant amount of greenhouse gases are released through our everyday activities.

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Human activity, which releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is what causes the greenhouse effect. These activities include almost everything an average person does on a daily basis, such as, using transportation, electricity, and simply breathing. The effects of global warming is immense. We are the cause, but it effects other living things more severely, which is really sad. The consequences include sea level rising, more droughts and floods, severe heat waves, melting of glaciers, limited access to clean water, species going extinct, ecosystems being ruined, and more. These negative effects give rise to more problems. For example, floods and droughts can cause people to immigrate. We are causing this problem, but we are not the only ones dealing with the consequences.

What most people don't realize is that these effects are happening right now. Most of us tend to think it will happen in the distant future, or even only after a million years, but it is happening THIS. VERY. SECOND. Yale Program on Climate Change Communication did a study, and found out that only 63% of Americans know that global warming is real, but don't know why. The study also found "important gaps in knowledge, and common

misconceptions." It is important that we are educated about what impact we are making on the environment. We have to be conscious about our carbon footprints, and spread knowledge.

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Global warming is a huge problem, but all problems have a solution. There are two things we have to do to reverse climate change.

First, we have to emit less greenhouse gases. We can do this in many ways, such as saving electricity in our homes, finding cleaner vehicles for transportation, not leaving the plug in the outlet when it is not being used, etc. This will help with preventing more emissions.

To remove the carbon dioxide, we have already released, we need to plant trees. Planting trees is almost the only big solution to climate change. There may be other things, but planting trees an growing plants is one thing everyone can do in their backyards. It is very crucial that everyone grows as many trees as possible. People may think that everyone should plant one tree in their lifetime. This will help, but we should maximize the amount of trees in the world. If everyone in the entire world plants one single tree successfully, Earth will have seven billion trees! Emitting less, and planting trees is what will bring the carbon dioxide levels down, and make the world a better place.