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How Does Global Warming Happen?

Global warming is a phenomenon of increasing average air temperatures near the earth’s surface.
The gradual increase of the earth’s surface over a long period of time could cause a number of
environmental problems, including the melting of the polar ice caps resulting of ocean levels to rise
and flooding coastal areas. Then how does this threatening phenomenon happen?

The Earth is naturally surrounded by a warming blanket of air, called atmosphere, which helps
maintain temperatures suitable for life. Without it, the Earth would be a frozen and too cold for
living organisms to survive. The atmosphere contains small amounts of carbon dioxide, methane,
nitrous oxide, and other gases, which are known as Greenhouse Gases.

These gases help retain heat to a vital, natural process known as the Greenhouse Effect. This
process happens when sunlight passes through the atmosphere and reaches the earth, some of
the light is reflected by the Earth’s atmosphere and surface, but most light is absorbed. The
absorbed light warms the Earth’s surface. The heated surface then emits infrared light into the
atmosphere. Some infrared radiation escapes to space, but some is absorbed by greenhouse
gases and reradiated toward Earth, warming the Earth’s surface and lower atmosphere.

Due to human activities in burning of large amount of fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and natural gas
for transportation, electricity generation, and industry, the amount of Greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere has dramatically increased over the last three hundred year. For example, levels of
carbon dioxide have risen by 35 percent since 1750. With more greenhouse gases in the mix, the
atmosphere acts like a thickening blanket and traps more heat.

Plants remove carbon dioxide from the air as part of their natural processes and give up oxygen
as a byproduct of photosynthesis. Photosynthetic planktons in the sea do the same. But as forests
are harvested and oceans become polluted, the plants and planktons, as well as their ability to
restore the air, are removed from the ecosystem and the balance of the air chemistry may change.

As the concentration of carbon dioxide increase in the air, the earth’s natural greenhouse effect is
enhanced. Most gases in the air do not slow the emissions of heat back into space from the earth.
However, carbon dioxide in the air holds some of these heats near the earth surface. As carbon
dioxide increases in the atmosphere, its ability to retain heat also increases, resulting in an
increase in the world’s surface temperature, known as Global Warming.

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