CLIMATE CHANGE

So for this week, Caroline has requested that we speak on the topic of Climate Change. This is a very important topic and one that is coming up in the media a lot as of late due to the catastrophic weather events that have been taking place around the world. Now, for today I’m just going to speak about the basics of climate change. However, for next week, I will delve into more detail about what’s truly going on in the world today due to climate change.

Now to begin, I want to bring up a few examples of strange weather occurrences that we have seen recently around the world:

• In Madrid-which is the capitol of Spain, they experienced record breaking levels of snow in the first few weeks of 2021. It was the most snow they’ve experienced in 50 years, and caused 1.2 billion dollars’ worth of damage.
• In February of 2021, Texans experienced a substantial amount of snow as well, which was extremely abnormal. When you think of Texas, I don’t think any of us could really say that you think of snow! It’s right above Mexico, and to the right of Arizona and New Mexico, so it’s a HOT area. In some parts of the state, the temperature plummeted to -13℃ and most of the state went without power for some time leaving many vulnerable people in extremely cold conditions.
• Wildfires across Greece and Italy due to heatwaves
• Fiji was hit by two Cyclones within the time span of one month
• Dust storms in China which caused hazardous air quality
• Flooding in Germany
• And so many more events globally

Weather changes are different than climate change, however they go hand in hand. Climate change is the progress of long-term alteration of temperature and typical weather patterns in a place. Climate change may cause weather patterns to be less predictable, and has been connected with other damaging weather events such as more frequent and more intense hurricanes, floods, downpours, and winter storms.

These unexpected weather patterns can make it difficult to maintain and grow crops in regions that rely on farming because expected temperature and rainfall levels can no longer be relied on. Due to this, we are seeing rising food shortages and lack of resources to amend these concerns. An example of this would be the tremendous amount of flooding that has been occurring in different regions of China. The population relies greatly on rice fields, as well as the whole world. China is responsible for 1/3^rd of all of the rice eaten globally and it is the most consumed food in China itself. To harvest the rice, you actually have to drain the flooded fields (normally farmers themselves would flood them for the rice to grow), however, due to the flooding due to weather, this is not possible in some areas as there is nowhere for the water to go.

In colder areas, we are seeing rises in temperatures which has caused ice sheets and glaciers to begin melting which is contributing to rising sea levels. With the rising levels we are now seeing the results of damaged coastlines, increased chances of flooding and erosion.

Now, let’s watch a brief video on climate change:

The culprit for a vast majority of the changes that we are seeing are actually human activities, like burning fossil fuels like natural gas, oil and coal. We burn these materials to make things, products we use in day to day life, our houses, cars, our clothing, shoes, bags, and all of the luxuries we use as well, the gas needed to run our cars, everything. We as a society are now so focused on selling products, making profit and enjoying luxuries, so the idea of cutting any of this out is unimaginable. We as consumers will continue to buy these products and the people in charge and who are at fault for continuing the burning of these materials will not stop, because they see the amount of money they are making. To reduce the emissions, means to lose millions and millions of dollars. However, burning these materials releases what are called greenhouse gases into Earth’s Atmosphere. When in the atmosphere, these gases trap heat from the sun causing our planets temperatures to rise.

It’s normal for our earths weather conditions to change over time, this has always happened, but in slow progression. However, in today’s day and age, the human influenced climate change is causing this to occur at a much faster rate.

The Cop26 climate summit starts in Glasgow, UK, on the 31st of October and all the big-polluting countries must deliver tougher pledges to cut emissions to keep the goal of 1.5C within reach. Research published on Monday showed that children born today would experience many times more extreme heatwaves and other climate disasters over their lifetimes than their grandparents, even if countries fulfill their cut

We will end today’s class with a few more videos on climate change, which includes one from Bill Nye, who is of course everyone’s favourite. And then next week we can discuss things that we can do to help reduce our own carbon footprints, as well as what industries have to do to reduce their own, as they are the change we must see to make any serious progress.

And lastly, I think a movie day soon would be wonderful and I have a film in mind. It’s not exactly about climate change, but it follow a major issue that contribute to it. I’m not sure if any of you have seen it yet, but even if you have I myself have viewed it a couple times now, its that good! It’s called Seaspiracy and it’s a documentary on Netflix that came out this year! It focuses on the impact that fishing and pollution is causing to our oceans and it truly opens your eyes. So, lets watch a trailer now for the film, and you guys can let me know if you’re interested!