Main Causes of Climate Change

What are the Main Causes of Climate Change?

The majority of climate scientists agree on the main causes of climate change.

A Warming Atmosphere

Climate change is caused by an increase in greenhouse gases which include:

water vapour
carbon dioxide
methane
nitrous oxide
and chlorofluorocarbons.

These gases are responsible for the greenhouse effect, which is responsible for warming the troposphere, the lowest layer of the atmosphere.

Air pollution is responsible for millions of deaths each year, and also contributes to the greenhouse effect

Carbon Dioxide: the Fundamental Cause

Carbon dioxide takes up a small percentage of these gases.

Even though they do not make up a large part of the atmosphere (only 0.041% ), they are critical nevertheless.

Levels of carbon dioxide are now higher than at any point in at least the past 800,000 years (Source).

This gas is naturally emitted through cellular respiration and volcanoes.

By these natural processes alone, carbon dioxide will increase/decrease very slowly over time or remain constant.

Animal and marine life that have decomposed over millions of years turn into fossil fuels, which include coal, petroleum (oil) and natural gas.

Humanity is releasing about 90 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each day as if it were an open sewer.

Mankind has released great amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as if it were an open sewer

Humanity's Contribution to the Problem

However, mankind has drastically increased the concentration of carbon dioxide from 280 parts per million to 413 ppm in the last 200 years (as of March 2020, it was recorded at 413 ppm) (Source).

This rapid change of carbon dioxide will have several effects on humankind and precious ecosystems.

Humanity has burned these fossil fuels to harness its energy to do work. The carbons released from the combustion of these fossil fuels combine with oxygen in the air to then create carbon dioxide.

These are the numbers for greenhouse gas emissions in the United States by sector for 2017 (Source):

Transportation - 29%
Electricity - 28%
Industry - 22%
Agriculture - 9%
Commercial - 6%
Residential - 5%

2017 US Greenhouse Gas Emissions by Sector

Specific Causes to Global Warming

Carbon dioxide is mainly emitted because of

agriculture
deforestation
the meat industry
transportation
construction
heating for residential and commercial buildings (in some cases)
incineration of wastes
industries
manufacturing
mining
and power plants using fossil fuels

The tar sands in Alberta, Canada's worst environmental disaster, contributes an incredible amount of greenhouse gases every day.

Moreover, environmental catastrophes such as the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and deforestation of the Amazon rainforest also contribute to global warming.

By reducing our carbon footprint, we can help solve the climate crisis. A carbon footprint is how much carbon dioxide we emit directly or indirectly in our daily lives.