Impact Of Anthropogenic Climate Change On Environment Essay

Impact Of Anthropogenic Climate Change On Environment - Essay Example Both proponents and opponents of man-made causes of climate change appreciate the warming effect of greenhouse gases (68). These gases include methane, nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide. Carnegie Mellon University further observes that greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have increased by between 10% and 30% from the start of the industrial revolution. These gases allow the sunlight into the Earth’s atmosphere and then trap a significant portion of this radiation, preventing the reflection of sun’s radiation back into space. This leads to a warming effect on the Earth thus the contribution of human activities to global warming. Secondly, scientists have been able to identify carbon-dioxide from human activities as the largest contributor to greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, thus attributing global warming to human activities. According to these scientists, the pre-industrialization period had the atmosphere contain only 280 parts per million of carbon dioxide. By 2010, this had increased to 390 parts per million. This additional 100 parts per million of carbon dioxide is what is attributed to human activities (Poortinga et al. 1017). To show that this extra carbon dioxide is from human activities, scientists use the fingerprinting technique. From this, it has been noted that natural carbon dioxide has some low portion of carbon-14. The lack of this carbon-14 isotope in the additional 100 parts per million of carbon dioxide attributes its source to human activities as opposed to natural factors. Finally, the proponents of man-made climate change give evidence against natural causes. This school of thought argues that if the current climate was following the natural trend, then, the Earth should have been cooling and not warming.