Global Warming Opposing Viewpoints

Since the first articles and documentaries about Global Warming were released, different groups have expressed their viewpoint on the subjects. Many different opinions have been stated, all of them supported by different data. These are some of them.

Viewpoint	Characteristics
Global Warming is serious and is caused by humans	The increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, due to the burning of fossil fuels, has increased the amount of heat in the Earth. It states that these changes in temperature and climate are lethal and if they are not stopped or slowed they can destroy our civilization
Global Warming is happening but we're not the problem	Geothermal activity and Volcanoes are the cause of the increase in Greenhouse Gasses, which show that they are causing Global Warming
Global Warming is Natural and it happens every certain time	Through the Earth's history records show that every certain amount of time the global temperature increases and then decreases. This is why Ice Ages have been recorded. Since it is natural all the hysteria created should be ignored.
Media Hysteria	The media has exaggerated facts to make the problem look a lot more serious than it is.

I believe that the Earth does have its temperature changes but we are affecting the environment with the burning of fossil fuels and other activities. I believe that we are accelerating the Earth's temperature increase.

Challenges in Pollution Management

Three level model:

• Human activity producing pollutant
• Altering human activity through education, incentives and penalties to promote :
• Development of alternative tech
• Adoption of alternative lifestyles
• Reducing, reusing and recycling

• Release of pollutant into environment
• Regulating and reducing points of emission:
• Standards
• Measure to extract pollutants from emissions

• Long-term impact of pollutant on ecosystem
• Cleaning up pollutant and restoring ecosystems
• Extracting and removing pollutant from an ecosystem
• Replanting and restocking animal populations

Pollution Mangement

Pollution management focuses on detecting and monitoring of pollution it may be divided as followed:



Directly or indirectly

• Directly
• Measuring the concentration of pollutants
• Acidity on rain
• Amount of gas(ses)
• pH of soil
• Presence/concentration of nitrates/phosphates/sulfates/etc.
• Amount od organic matter in soil/water
• Amount of bacteria
• Concentration of (heavy) metals
• BOD: used to determine the pollution in water (>BOD, more pollution)
• Direct sampling
• In situ
• Reliable but instruments may be hard and costly to transport
• Ex situ
• Wider variety of methods and instruments
• May be repeate
• Indirect

• Indicator Species
• Biodiversity
• BOD
• Spectroscopy
• Chromatography

Major Pollutants

Pollutant	Causes	Effects on health and environment
Ozone	Formed when nitrogen and volatile organic compounds mix in sunlight. Nitrogen oxide comes from burning fossil fuels.	Frequent asthma attacks, sore throats, coughs and breathing difficulties. Hurts plants and crops.
Particulate matter	Particulate matter can be divided into coarse particles and fine particles. Formed form sources like road dust, sea spray, and construction. Fine particles are formed when fossil fuels are burned in automobiles and power plants	Can enter the lungs and cause health problems. Including frequent asthma attacks and respiratory problems
Lead	Comes from cars in areas where unleaded gasoline is not used. May be formed in power plants and  other industrial sources but is also contained in lead paint which may pollute water which is transported in lead pipes.	Toxic air pollutants can cause cancer. Some toxic air pollutants can also cause birth defects. Other effects depend on the pollutant, but can include skin and eye irritation and breathing problems.
Greenhouse gases	Carbon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas. It comes from the burning of fossil fuels in cars, power plants, houses, and industry. Methane is released during the processing of fossil fuels, and also comes from natural sources like cows and rice paddies. Nitrous oxide comes from industrial sources and decaying plants.	The greenhouse effect can lead to changes in the climate of the planet. Some of these changes might include more temperature extremes, higher sea levels, changes in forest composition, and damage to land near the coast. Human health might be affected by diseases that are related to temperature or by damage to land and water.

Waste and Pollution

What is pollution

• The presence of waste or agent which has increased and reached a point where it can't be managed and harms the environment

Types of pollution

• Point source
• Can be tracked to a particular source

• Non-point source
• Does not have a single source
• Red tide

Pollution management

• Problem since the industrial revolution
• Popular in the late 20th century

Sources per type

• Water
• Air
• Soil

Type	Point Source	Non-point Source
Water	Municipal Sewage Treatment Plant Discharges for chemical agents and organic matter	agricultural and urban runoff
	Industrial Plant Discharges may include metals and chemicals which change water's pH	runoff from mining and construction site
Air	power plants, smelters, industrial and commercial boilers	On road mobile sources like cars and trucks
	wood and pulp processors, paper mills, industrial surface coating facilities, refinery and chemical processing operations, and petroleum storage tanks	natural sources such as windstorms and fires
Soil	Agricultural Pesticides	Runoff

Population Sustainability

Countries around the world are searching for a sustainable population to face the continuous changes in population dynamics. Australia and Japan has established several policies to control their population and ensure that enough people will cover the growing percentage of aging people. These are the policies which have been established in each country:

Australia	Japan
Immigration policies will change so visas are easier to get and more SKILLED workers arrive Infrastructure will be generated in most populated areas Connections with international companies Increase food production and reduce resources used Relocate and decrease population in overpopulated areas	Angel Plan to increase births because of decreasing fertility rate Increase food production to reduce imports Relocation to reduce population in the capital and cities like Kyoto Free child care near train stations to help working parents Reduce costs in basic products to help families and motivate

MEDCs vs LEDCs

MEDC	LEDC
The cost of sample food items are relatively cheap	Staple food items may not be always affordable as prices fluctuate
Most people make purchases based on taste and preference	People tend to make purchases based on nutritional need and affordability
Produce seasonality has mostly disappeared due to globalization	Political and economic agendas can affect food production
This has also allowed for a greater international variety in most supermarkets	Even if food crops are not used as cash crops, food production is still impacted since arable land
The average caloric content per capital per day of food is 3314 calories. In the USA specifically, this number is 3774 calories	In LEDCs the average caloric content per capital per day of food is 2666 calories. In Eritrea this number is 1512 calories

Food consumption

	MEDC	LEDC
Meat	12.9	7.3
Fish and Seafoods	1.4	0.9
Cereals	37.3	56.1
Vegetables, fruits, fats	48.4	35.7

The American Association for the Advancement of Science suggests that there is an average of 2790 calories available each day for every human on the planet. That is enough to feed everyone.

If food production has kept up with population growth, why are there still so many problems with famine, hunger and malnutrition?

Factors to consider

• Distribution:
• If countries like Canada, USA, and Australia have an excess to food, can that be shipped to Bangladesh, Ethiopia, or Sudan? Who will pay for it? Do they even want that kind of food?

• Politics
• If excess food is not paid for, is the receiving country in debt of the donating country

• So far, food supply has kept pace with human population growth, seemingly refuting Malthus… however recently some are doubting if this can continue

• As we adapt an increasing amount of global NPP to human needs. use and degrade more land, eat more meat, contaminate more water, we are getting closer to the planet's K... we just don't know that this is yet.

• There are 1.1 billion people living in poverty... They are increasing and growing hungrier.

Annual grain yields per hectare have slowed their rate of increase since the Green Revolution (1990-2000 had the lowest increase since before the 1950s).