Atmospheric Pollution And Global Warming

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Atmospheric Pollution and Global Warming Environmental Science / SCI 275 3/6/2011 Instructor Name Atmospheric Pollution and Global Warming For nearly half a century, hundreds of scientist from around the world have been studying global warming and its effects. Global Warming is a direct result of atmospheric pollution generated by both natural and man-made sources. The air pollution given off by natural and man-made sources create trace gases that float up into the air and get trapped in the earth's atmosphere. Essentially, global warming is the product of accelerating the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect occurs naturally and is caused by the cycle of gasses that rise from the earth's surface and fall from the earth's atmosphere (the carbon cycle is one example). Some of these gases include: carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), CFC's, and tropospheric ozone (O3), all of which are also referred to as greenhouse gasses. These gasses are referred to as greenhouse gasses because they “trap the sun's infrared radiation somewhat like glass does in a greenhouse” (John Wiley & Sons , 2007). The greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere allow only 50% of the sun's infrared radiation to actually reach the earth's surface; but greenhouse gasses also trap in approximately 80% to 90% of the infrared radiation, keeping the surface temperature warm. The balancing of the sun's infrared radiation due to the greenhouse effect is what allows the earth's average surface temperature to be 15°C (59°F) rather than -18°C (0.4°F) (Cline, 1992). Humans are largely responsible for the acceleration of the greenhouse effect, or global warming. The rise of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere are extremely significant because greenhouse gasses stay in the atmosphere for very long periods of time; the greenhouse gasses we produce today will continue to
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