Global Warming and Its Implications Global warming has become increasingly important topic in the world we live

in today. Mass burning of fossil fuels and other forms of pollution have led to the increasing amount of greenhouse gases in our environment and is slowly heating up this planet we live on. Larger nations such as the United States and China have been handed most of the blame for this phenomena due to their massive economic industries that dump massive amounts of pollutants into the air, but being an eventual global problem, a global consensus should be made to prevent the predicted natural and economic effects of global warming. Some governmental action has been taken to hinder global warming, and some has been proposed on a much larger scale such as the Global Marshall Plan Initiative, but nothing on a global scale has yet been done to combat global warming. A global interest in the matter and a plan of action is what is needed to prevent major damage to the natural and economic aspects of our world in the future. Global warming is the phenomenon of increasing average air temperatures near the surface of the Earth over the past one to two centuries. (Mann) Climate change is another term that is often used in reference or confused with global warming. Climate change, while encompassing the topic of global warming and rising air temperature, also covers other aspect of climate such as other weather patterns dealing with topics such as wind, ocean currents, and other matters of climate. (Mann) Surface temperature is rising due to the enhanced version of the Greenhouse Effect that human activity is creating. The greenhouse effect is how the Earth maintains its current temperatures and without it this planet would most likely still be covered mostly by ice, so the greenhouse effect in itself is not a bad thing to have. The greenhouse effect is simply the gases in the atmosphere that reflect the Suns energy that is trying to escape back into space, back down to Earth. The part of the greenhouse effect associated with global

warming is that due to the large amounts of excess greenhouse gases being produced mainly by burning fossil fuels are enhancing its effect and have the ability to eventually warm up our planet by several degrees. The three major greenhouse gases are Carbon Dioxide, Ozone, and Methane. Carbon Dioxide is naturally produced around the globe by humans, volcanoes, combustion, and decay and the ecosystem can balance the amount of Carbon Dioxide emitted from these sources by natural sinks such as vegetation using Carbon Dioxide to produce energy, and other oceanic processes. (Mann) Human activity, however, is expected to double the amount of Carbon Dioxide currently in the atmosphere leading to a warming of 2 to 5 degrees Celsius (3.6 to 9 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial times. Methane is the most important of the greenhouse gases due to its ability to reflect more energy back towards Earth, but it also occurs less frequently in our atmosphere than others and takes less time to decay than Carbon Dioxide. Methanes natural sink is the atmosphere itself where it can readily react with other molecules and also soil. However like Carbon Dioxide, Methane is also on the rise in our atmosphere due to human activity such as rice cultivation, livestock farming, decomposition of organic matter in landfills and the burning of fossil fuels. (Mann) According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) methane emissions are almost 50 percent due to human activity. (Lerche) The third most important greenhouse gas is surface Ozone. Ozone naturally occurs in our atmosphere and is part of what keeps our temperatures here what they are, but human pollution has caused the amount of surface ozone in our atmosphere to increase and is therefore keeping the Suns energy from escaping back out into space therefore trapping more heat inside of our atmosphere. Besides these three main greenhouse gases, there are also a number of other gases that should be mentioned that are

attributed to global warming including Nitrous Oxides, Aerosols, deforestation (destroying one of our natural sinks for Carbon Dioxide), and the thinning of Stratospheric Ozone. Each and every one of these factors could have major consequences on our natural and economic lives. The effects of global warming are widespread and by the end of the 21st century could prove to cause mild to catastrophic change both naturally and economically throughout the world. At the worst case scenario end of the scope, rising sea levels could put coastal cities such as Miami completely underwater and tropical storms including hurricanes and typhoons will devastate the coastal cities that remain. Disease would spread unprecedentedly in flooded areas by creating environments where disease carrying creatures can thrive where they previously could not survive. Extreme heat waves and drought could produce wildfires worse than any we have previously seen and a diminished water supply in these regions could lead to millions of deaths worldwide. The destruction of ecosystems could cause species of animals to become extinct on land, due to deforestation and desertification, and water, due to acidification of the ocean from rising water temperature. Some species will migrate to keep their needed environments and others will become extinct. The nations left may become increasingly more hostile towards one another due to lack of resources and failing economies eventually leading to war and conflict. (Trimarchy) Sounds like a fun time right? While this is a worst case scenario at least one of these possible major catastrophes will affect us on at least a minor scale by the end of the century. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has concluded that while some areas may benefit from the warming, the majority will be put into worse circumstances than they are currently and the net cost of warming will increase over time. The forecast from the IPCC states that the contraction of snow cover areas, increased thaw in permafrost regions,

decrease in sea ice extent is virtually certain (>99% chance). Among the very likely (>90% chance) effects are cold days, cold nights, and frost less frequent over land areas, more frequent hot days and hot nights, and in the future increased frequency of heat extremes, heat waves, and heavy precipitation. Also in the future they believe it is very likely that precipitation will increase in high latitudes, and decrease in sub-tropical regions, and that there will also be a decreased water supply in semi-arid areas such as the Western United States and the Mediterranean Basin. (Jenkins) Rajendra K. Pachauri, chairman of the IPCC and energy expert from India said Its the poorest of the poor in the world and this includes poor people even in prosperous societies who are going to be the worst hit. People who are poor are least equipped to be able to adapt to the impacts of climate change, and therefore, in some sense, this does become a global responsibility, in my view. (West) These poorer people may become what will be known as 'climate refugees' and would become a global responsibility. These people would be any person displaced from the places that they live now by natural phenomena such as those described that cause their land to be destroyed or become uninhabitable and put a lot of stress on the global economic system. With global warming a great toll would be taken on the economy in general due mostly to collapse of industry, fallout of natural phenomena and industries that rely on the environment could be severely damaged. Take the fishing industry for example. With the rising temperatures of oceans and the increasing acidity of its waters due to the temperature increase, ecosystems could fail and the fish there would either be forced to migrate or die leaving the fishing industry of that area left behind. With other industries that rely on the environment having similar outcomes a national economy could fail or at least take significant losses. With the increase of strength and frequency of storms and natural weather more damage will come to

property and have to be rebuilt or abandoned. For example, the increase in number and strength of hurricanes in the Atlantic are expected to increase and the amount of damage they are predicted to cause is around $109 Billion by 2100, double what we spend yearly today. Also alarming is that over 50 percent of the United States economic production lies in areas able to be effected by coastal weather. This hurts the economy on two levels. The first is the money from the government that has to be allocated to the affected areas. Secondly, insurance rates would rise substantially in this area which also has the potential to unbalance the economy. The finger has usually been pointed, and rightfully so, at developed and developing countries for the cause of global warming and pumping toxins into the environment, because usually these are the areas that use and require the greatest amount of energy to power their countries and large industries. The top 4 Carbon emitting countries in 2009 (the order remains the same today) were China producing 7,710.5 million metric tons of Carbon Dioxide, the United States producing 5,833.1 million metric tons of Carbon Dioxide, India producing 1,602.1 million metric tons of Carbon Dioxide, and Russia producing 1572.0 million metric tons of Carbon Dioxide. (Snarr) In every case, the burning of fossil fuels, whether from automobiles, power plants, or industry reigned supreme in accounting for for these totals. With the exception of some European countries, these 4 countries are the premier for economic growth and industrialization. Unfortunately, industrialization requires more energy and therefore requires more fossil fuels to be burned due to the fact that fossil fuels are, at the moment, the cheapest for of energy available. Due to the fact that this is the cheapest type of energy available this is usually the path to economic development for poorer countries.

Factories that are involved with industrial processes contribute to ground level ozone which, each year, causes 500 million dollars worth of reduced crops. Also, while these factories may have reduced their use of CFC's (chlorofluorocarbons) they are replacing them with Global Warming Potential gases or GWP's which are not as potent as CFC's, but are nonetheless potent synthetic greenhouse gases. Carbon Dioxide and Methane are also released in massive quantities from power plants and other industrial facilities. (Lerche) The industries contributing to these emissions the most would be the industries involving deforestation and the industries creating metals, plastics, and minerals, as these release the most Carbon into the atmosphere as a byproduct. Carbon emissions in the United States have seen little to no improvement on the whole. While the threat of global warming may finally be making it to the industry CEO's and other business leader's eyes their plans to make any attempt to reduce their emissions are miniscule and vague thus far. The amount of Carbon emitted into the atmosphere will continue to rise as energy needs keep rising, especially in developing nations such as India, until some form of global or national policies or regulations start preventing them from releasing these toxins into the atmosphere. On a global level, there have been many conferences between nations addressing the rising concern of global warming. The topic was first presented in 1972 during the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (also called the Stockholm Conference). 114 governmental bodies and many other nongovernmental organizations gathered to discuss issues surrounding the destruction of the Environment. No international law or statute was passed but it did serve as a sort of catalyst to international discourse on global environmental issues. (Snarr)

In 1992, the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development (also called the Rio Conference or Earth Summit) finally discussed reducing Carbon emissions to try to hinder the development of global warming. This was attended by 178 countries and 110 heads of state (excluding the US). One of the five major documents produced at this conference was the framework convention on climate change and its purpose was to stabilize greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to prevent future damage to the climate due to human activity. The Bush administration fought against the declaration to reduce Carbon emissions back down to the levels that they were in 1990 by 2000 but this position was later reversed during the Clinton administration. However, most of the initiatives enacted by the United States Congress were weakened in 1994 and 1995 due to the economy and remained severely underfunded. (Snarr) In 1995, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) which is a coalition of nations that would be severely affected by rising seas of just one meter due to global warming, proposed that industrial nations reduce their Carbon Dioxide emissions by 20 percent at the Berlin Conference. The goal of this conference was to innovate ways to reduce carbon emissions and to create test projects aimed at exchanging alternative low Carbon technologies among nations. The proposition proposed by AOSES was resisted by most oil-producing states and the larger Carbon emitting countries but did provide hope for formulation a global policy concerning climage change in the future. The Berlin Mandate did, however, instruct governments to create proposals in the form of a treaty to reduce emissions within time-frames such as 2005, 2010, or 2020. The Kyoto Protocol was the result of these efforts. This protocol was adopted in 1997 and contains legally binding emission targets concerning greenhouse gases. The agreement required ratification by the fifty-five countries and of these countries must include 55 percent

of the total Carbon emissions worldwide. The problem with the Kyoto Protocol was its vagueness. Countries that were producing too much carbon dioxide would trade their excess carbon to countries that were below their allotted level of emissions. Another vague point was the degree that carbon sinks should count towards a countries effort to combat global warming. This protocol also would not go into effect until the required amount of countries and percent of carbon emissions were met which would not be until much later. (Snarr) In 2000, the Hague Conference approached the question of how to count reductions in carbon emissions. Major carbon emitters favored the approach of using flexible approaches such as carbon sinks and market based mechanisms but other countries viewed this as an alternative to actually reducing their emissions. Most of the countries at this point would not meet the emission cuts stated in the Kyoto agreement and the United States wanted to achieve the Kyoto targets without reducing greenhouse gases to the corresponding increased coal and oil prices that this would encompass. The Hague Conference ended in a deadlock over how to measure emission reductions. (Snarr) In 2001, negotiators from 160 countries met in Morocco and agreed on the details of the Kyoto Protocol. Finalized, the treaty stated that industrialized countries would reduce their emissions by an average of 5.2 percent below the levels of 1990 by the end of 2012. The United States at this point withdrew from negotiations under the Bush Administration due to economic best interest and due to the fact that no binding commitment was placed on developing countries such as China and India. It was not until the end of 2004 when Russia, who had been reluctant to sigh the treaty, ratified it and the protocol went into effect the next year in 2005 and would be the world's only international treaty on global warming to date besides the Montreal Protocol, despite the absence of the United States. (Snarr)

In 2007, the Group of Eight summit in Germany set a major goal of securing commitment from the richest nations to prevent an average rise in global temperature of 2 percent. Also in 2007, the second phase of the Kyoto Protocol talks were convened and aimed to design a strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, a week before the Group of Eight summit, president Bush announced that the United States was going to convene a series of meetings with the other ten to fifteen highest greenhouse gas producing nations to construct a post-Kyoto agreement setting no mandatory or binding emission targets while focusing on technological solutions, with each country free to set its own goals and emission targets. With this announcement the only agreements that the Group of Eight were able to make were to make substantial cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. In Bali, an agreement was made to a two year process to create a post-Kyoto agreement. (Snarr) In 2009, the Copenhagen Conference laid out a framework to limit the average rise in temperature to 2 degrees Celsius, creating a process to design specific emission cutting programs for individual countries, creating processes for reporting and verifying emission reductions, a commitment for developing nations to generate $30 billion in additional resources in 2010-2012 to aid developing countries in reducing emissions, preserving forests, and addressing climate change needs of developing countries by the year 2020. They agreed to come to a fuller agreement in 2010 in Mexico. No legally binding emission targets were set, but the fact that the world could not afford a global rise in temperature of 2 degrees Celsius was acknowledged. (Snarr) The 2010 conference in Mexico based on the agreements reached in Copenhagen, is where finally all three major economic powers agreed to reduce their emissions, and the groundwork for binding agreements for the upcoming conference in Durban, Africa in 2011.

At this conference the agreements basically renewed an agreement based on the Kyoto Protocol with a few changes such as including South Korea and establishing a fund called the Green Climate Fund for Developing Nations which will try to have an account of $100 billion per year beginning in 2020 to develop green technologies for developing countries. Again, no binding agreements were made. (Snarr) In 2012, the conference in Boha, Qatar ultimately renewed the Kyoto Protocol. However, fewer countries signed the agreement this time around so only about 12% of emissions are covered by this agreement. Also, the talks previously held in Cancun and Copenhagen about creating a long term commitment to cover 80 percent of global emissions virtually ended. On the bright side, the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action was set up to produce a new treaty to appeal to all parties and cover 100 percent of global emissions. (Light) At the present, this is where we stand today with talks to be resumed at Warsaw sometime in 2013. Little has been accomplished from these conventions due often to the battle between economic growth and the environment. At the moment, the environment is not economically friendly and for a developed nation to stay a leading developed nation, taking an environmental route could severely deflate their economy. The actions they take are therefore in complete disregard for interdependence and instead focus on their nation at hand instead of looking at the world as a global community. Other problems include nations that gain access to a good through other nations and do not contribute or regulate their provisions of it. While a lot remains uncertain for the future of the amount of global involvement in global warming, the looming fact that if something is not done soon to curb emissions of

greenhouse gases into our atmosphere we will be dealing with much bigger problems in the future. For a treaty to be made that will be accepted by the majority of the highest carbon emitting countries the solution would have to be environmentally effective, cost-efficient, and have equal goals set for emissions for nations, and not point fingers at the top emitting nations of the past. Industrialized countries should, however, realize the part they have played in global warming and find ways to reduce their carbon emissions back down to the agreement of half of their global emissions compared to pre-industrial eras. Developing nations should realize the part that they will play in the future of carbon emissions and take all steps possible to promote less carbon-intense development focused on environmental sustainability. In order for this system to be just, individual goals would be set up fro nations approved by a majority, or a council of other unbiased nations. In order to achieve these goals there should be a global 'carbon emission' market of sorts with a cap on total emissions and emission goals. This would provide a flexible way for countries struggling to make their emission goals and avoid international penalty. A system to tax countries not meeting the emission goals would be used to generate revenue for groups to develop new technological solutions to reduce carbon emissions and/or to improve existing solutions. Even if every individual country met their emission targets these taxes would be useful as a way to motivate countries to invest in development of greener solutions to emissions on their own that could potentially be shared with other countries to reduce carbon emissions elsewhere. These technologies should be aimed at cost-efficient approaches to emissions so that the choices between economic growth and environmental sustainability do not conflict with one another. Individual nations should also regulate and tax excess emissions of the highest carbon producing industries such as

industries involved with deforestation and petroleum-based or petroleum using products. These funds should be used in a similar manner as the international taxes suggested would be used. With the topic of global warming becoming increasingly more apparent and the cause of it becoming almost undoubtedly due to human activity, time is of the essence when the topic of global warming is concerned. Continuing down the current path could lead to a future of natural and economic destruction while walking past the point of no return. Industries could fail, millions of people could be displaced from their former lifestyles, and war could break out due to the amount of limited natural resources left available to us. A time for global action is upon us and international and national regulations and policies need to be implemented sooner than later in order to avert the future that awaits us. As Mike Huckabee said, The most important thing about global warming is this. Whether humans are responsible for the bulk of climate change is going to be left to the scientists, but it's all of our responsibility to leave this planet in better shape for the future generations than we found it.

References Jenkins, A. Web. 7 May 2013. <http://climate.nasa.gov/effects>. Lerche, J.. N.p.. Web. 7 May 2013. <http://greenliving.nationalgeographic.com/factoriespollution-other-causes-global-warming-2551.html>. Light, Andrew, Rebecca Lefton, Adam James, Gwynne Taraska, and Katie Valentine. <http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/green/report/2012/12/11/47728/doha-climatesummit-ends-with-the-long-march-to-2015/>. Mann, M., and H. Selin. Web. 7 May 2013. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/235402/global-warming>. Snarr, Micheal, and Neil Snarr. Global Issues. 5th ed. Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc, 2012. 273-287. Print. Trimarchy, M. <http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/curiosity/topics/worst-effects-globalwarming.htm>. West, L. Web. 7 May 2013. <http://environment.about.com/od/globalwarming/a/ipcc_report_two.htm>.