Opinion | Nothing is being done about climate change

According to NASA the global temperature has been steadily increasing since the early 20th century, and it is only increasing as time goes by.

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View of the melting Collins Glacier in Antarctica, showing the effects of climate change. (Photo courtesy of the United Nations)

Isaac Wardyn, Opinion Columnist
Nov. 7, 2022

Climate change is a regularly debated existential threat that is set to destroy the world as soon as tomorrow and as late as never. The ongoing debate over whether climate change is real or not is irrelevant: our planet is suffering, and we are to blame. 

According to NASA the global temperature has been steadily increasing since the early 20th century, and it is only increasing as time goes by.

The 21st century has housed 20 of the hottest years on record. According to NASA, The EPA, NOAA and almost every organization that has a climate research department, the increase in temperature is due directly to an increase in CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions into the air. The EPA explains, “Gasses that trap heat in the atmosphere are called greenhouse gasses.” The EPA lists the most present greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere today: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gasses. 

Of these gasses, the most present is carbon dioxide, and it is the greatest waste product of the burning of fossil fuels, and is currently the most abundant greenhouse gas in our atmosphere. It is important to note that we are able to track current and historic atmospheric content.  

Scientists can and have tested the content of our current atmosphere using basic sampling tests, but when looking back on even ancient examples of atmospheric content, scientists were able to test the makeup of ancient frozen glaciers that contain little frozen bubbles. These bubbles have been frozen for anywhere between ten to a thousand years, and are also nicely layered like a cake. Scientists are able to see the carbon dioxide and other substantive make-ups of the bubbles and have found that carbon dioxide emissions are at an all time high. This is all according to NASA’s own climate research. 

The effects that these emissions have on the environment are no joke. We are already seeing the linked effects, and climate scientists are not seeing an end to this dire matter anytime soon. The detrimental health risks that climate change poses to individuals is very real and present, not in the future, but right now. These include a rise in the sea levels leading to areas on the planet that are currently habitable, becoming uninhabitable. An increase in wildfires and their severity with a steady increase in burned area in the U.S. over time, and the same rule for extreme weather, with not only a large increase in frequency, but also an increase in potency. 

Saying that these are risks to the Earth is an extreme understatement. Ecosystems are already starting to collapse, and in some cases have been damaged beyond repair. That alone threatens our very existence, but with the raw effects of our world leaders’ ignorance and arrogance being as severe as they are, super powers threaten the lives of us and our loved ones. 

Until a large motion to stop and reverse the damage is undertaken by our leaders, and solutions to fill the holes that the fossil fuel industry leaves behind are proposed and actually implemented, we are on track to lose the only home humanity has ever had.

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