A Growing Problem
Al Gore has devoted a large portion of his life to addressing
the issue of Global Warming. The spark of his passion began when he took
a course at Harvard University from Professor Roger Revelle. Revelle was one
of the first scientists to measure carbon dioxide in the environment.
In addition, his religion fueled him to call on the people to protect the planet we
live on. In the film, An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore explains the factsbehind global
warming through a power point presentation which he presents on a regular basis.
In this power point, he discusses the alarmingly high changes in temperature, Carbon
Dioxide levels, and sea levels due to global warming. Gore uses this scientific
data along with his strong religious beliefs to persuade the public that global
warming is a serious issue that requires immediate action.
Part of Gore’s argument comes from his personal faith. He is a
devout Baptist and in “Environmentalist of the spirit” he conveys God’s message
as, “the duty to care for the earth is rooted in the fundamental relationship
between God, creation, and humankind.”Although Gore did not state this in his
documentary, he believes that it is an ethical and moral issue to care for our
earth. As humans, we can articulate
what is right and wrong. He believes that we are suppressing this ability by
ignoring the effect our day to day lives have on the earth. Gore stated in the
documentary that, “we have the technology to fix our problem but yet we do not
use it.” The ignorance in our country for our environment needs to stop before
it’s too late to reverse the damage we have caused. Gore’s faith allows him to
strengthen his argument by adding a moral side to his scientific
argument.
Throughout his presentation, Gore used an abundance scientific
knowledge to validate his arguments.
For starters, he discussed the distressing rise of Carbon Dioxide
levels. In his presentation, he
showed the Keeling curve, which measures CO2 levels in the atmosphere over the
past 50 years. The graph shoes that CO2 levels are exponentially raising, which
is bad for the environment. In addition, Gore provided temperature records since
1880 which showed the hottest years measured were all in the past fourteen
years. In correlation with rising temperature, ice caps and glaciers are
beginning to melt at a much faster rate. To illustrate this, he showed several
images of glaciers as they began to disappear. The article, Glaciers Dominate
Eustatic Sea-Level Rise in the 21st Century, backs up this statement. In the
article, they state that melting ice is the cause of nearly all sea-level rising
that 60% of the ice loss is from glaciers and ice caps. CO2 levels increasing is
leading to the increase of temperature which is in turn leading to the melting
of glaciers and rising sea level. There are several steps that humans can take
to prevent this rapid increase from continuing.
There are many solutions that are here for us, the human race,
to use to help regulate our climate again. It has been proven that humans have
had a hand to play in global climate change. The first solution that we need to
get a hold of is fossil fuels. This is perhaps the most daunting challenge as
citizens of richer nations literally eat, wear, work, play and even sleep on the
products made from such fossilized sunshine. And citizens of developing nations
want and arguably deserve the same comforts, which are largely thanks to the
energy stored in such fuels. If I had a say in this then I would choose nuclear
power even though it does produce nuclear waste and is an unstable source of
energy. However, nuclear power produces a much greater supply of electricity
without producing any harmful greenhouse gases. If we can get the right hold on
nuclear power than it is the way of the future. Transportation is the second
leading source of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. (burning a single gallon
of gasoline produces 20 pounds of CO2). This is a very easy fix, we can come up
with better public transportation that is friendly to the environment. Or
people could move closer to work so that they do not need to drive an hour to
work every day. Electric cars could eventually become the way of the future
with a new discovery by two UCLA Professors of Chemistry and Biochemistry. What
they discovered is that a material called Graphene can act as a super
supercapacitor. What this means is that after charging the capacitor made from
this material for 2-3 seconds, you can then power a light bulb connected to the
capacitor for 5 minutes. This is a breakthrough discovery if it can be produced
into batteries. If it can replace batteries someday then an iPhone will charge
in 30 seconds and the possibility of an electric car being able to charge in
minutes instead of hours. Graphene is also a carbon based material, this
ultimately eliminates the messy disposal we have with modern day batteries
because of their chemicals, Graphene would simply become part of the Earth.
This could ultimately solve the transportation problem. Why would we need to
use vehicles that produce greenhouse gases when we can use an electric car that
actually has the same qualities of a gasoline powered vehicle. This in turn
goes back to the beginning of the paragraph, we would need to clean up the way
we produce electricity in order to achieve this, but if we do, we could
eventually reduce our carbon emissions from the two biggest proponents of
greenhouse gases to basically zero. Al Gore was completely right in saying that
we have the technology to fix our problem but yet we do not use it. This shows
that there are ways to reduce our carbon footprint to very close to zero,
getting the whole human race on board though, which is a little over 7 billion
people, is a whole different problem we face.
Global warming is a serious issue that is overlooked by many
Americans. There are a number of steps one can take in their everyday life to
decrease in CO2 emissions and help the environment.
In An Inconvenient Truth Al Gore made it quite obvious that the
repercussions of the changing climate. If we do not begin to take the necessary
steps to treating the environment better, the generations after us will
suffer.
the issue of Global Warming. The spark of his passion began when he took
a course at Harvard University from Professor Roger Revelle. Revelle was one
of the first scientists to measure carbon dioxide in the environment.
In addition, his religion fueled him to call on the people to protect the planet we
live on. In the film, An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore explains the factsbehind global
warming through a power point presentation which he presents on a regular basis.
In this power point, he discusses the alarmingly high changes in temperature, Carbon
Dioxide levels, and sea levels due to global warming. Gore uses this scientific
data along with his strong religious beliefs to persuade the public that global
warming is a serious issue that requires immediate action.
Part of Gore’s argument comes from his personal faith. He is a
devout Baptist and in “Environmentalist of the spirit” he conveys God’s message
as, “the duty to care for the earth is rooted in the fundamental relationship
between God, creation, and humankind.”Although Gore did not state this in his
documentary, he believes that it is an ethical and moral issue to care for our
earth. As humans, we can articulate
what is right and wrong. He believes that we are suppressing this ability by
ignoring the effect our day to day lives have on the earth. Gore stated in the
documentary that, “we have the technology to fix our problem but yet we do not
use it.” The ignorance in our country for our environment needs to stop before
it’s too late to reverse the damage we have caused. Gore’s faith allows him to
strengthen his argument by adding a moral side to his scientific
argument.
Throughout his presentation, Gore used an abundance scientific
knowledge to validate his arguments.
For starters, he discussed the distressing rise of Carbon Dioxide
levels. In his presentation, he
showed the Keeling curve, which measures CO2 levels in the atmosphere over the
past 50 years. The graph shoes that CO2 levels are exponentially raising, which
is bad for the environment. In addition, Gore provided temperature records since
1880 which showed the hottest years measured were all in the past fourteen
years. In correlation with rising temperature, ice caps and glaciers are
beginning to melt at a much faster rate. To illustrate this, he showed several
images of glaciers as they began to disappear. The article, Glaciers Dominate
Eustatic Sea-Level Rise in the 21st Century, backs up this statement. In the
article, they state that melting ice is the cause of nearly all sea-level rising
that 60% of the ice loss is from glaciers and ice caps. CO2 levels increasing is
leading to the increase of temperature which is in turn leading to the melting
of glaciers and rising sea level. There are several steps that humans can take
to prevent this rapid increase from continuing.
There are many solutions that are here for us, the human race,
to use to help regulate our climate again. It has been proven that humans have
had a hand to play in global climate change. The first solution that we need to
get a hold of is fossil fuels. This is perhaps the most daunting challenge as
citizens of richer nations literally eat, wear, work, play and even sleep on the
products made from such fossilized sunshine. And citizens of developing nations
want and arguably deserve the same comforts, which are largely thanks to the
energy stored in such fuels. If I had a say in this then I would choose nuclear
power even though it does produce nuclear waste and is an unstable source of
energy. However, nuclear power produces a much greater supply of electricity
without producing any harmful greenhouse gases. If we can get the right hold on
nuclear power than it is the way of the future. Transportation is the second
leading source of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. (burning a single gallon
of gasoline produces 20 pounds of CO2). This is a very easy fix, we can come up
with better public transportation that is friendly to the environment. Or
people could move closer to work so that they do not need to drive an hour to
work every day. Electric cars could eventually become the way of the future
with a new discovery by two UCLA Professors of Chemistry and Biochemistry. What
they discovered is that a material called Graphene can act as a super
supercapacitor. What this means is that after charging the capacitor made from
this material for 2-3 seconds, you can then power a light bulb connected to the
capacitor for 5 minutes. This is a breakthrough discovery if it can be produced
into batteries. If it can replace batteries someday then an iPhone will charge
in 30 seconds and the possibility of an electric car being able to charge in
minutes instead of hours. Graphene is also a carbon based material, this
ultimately eliminates the messy disposal we have with modern day batteries
because of their chemicals, Graphene would simply become part of the Earth.
This could ultimately solve the transportation problem. Why would we need to
use vehicles that produce greenhouse gases when we can use an electric car that
actually has the same qualities of a gasoline powered vehicle. This in turn
goes back to the beginning of the paragraph, we would need to clean up the way
we produce electricity in order to achieve this, but if we do, we could
eventually reduce our carbon emissions from the two biggest proponents of
greenhouse gases to basically zero. Al Gore was completely right in saying that
we have the technology to fix our problem but yet we do not use it. This shows
that there are ways to reduce our carbon footprint to very close to zero,
getting the whole human race on board though, which is a little over 7 billion
people, is a whole different problem we face.
Global warming is a serious issue that is overlooked by many
Americans. There are a number of steps one can take in their everyday life to
decrease in CO2 emissions and help the environment.
In An Inconvenient Truth Al Gore made it quite obvious that the
repercussions of the changing climate. If we do not begin to take the necessary
steps to treating the environment better, the generations after us will
suffer.