The Greenhouse EffectThis essay is going to describe what the greenhouse effect is andwhat it does. It is also going to say what causes the greenhouse effect and theconsequences of it. What is meant by the term the greenhouse effect is that the heatfrom the sun comes into the Earth’s atmosphere and cannot get out so becomestrapped.
It gets its name because this is very much like a greenhouse. This effectoccurs as the incoming short wave radiation is changed when it hits the Earth’ssurface into long wave or infra-red radiation. Heat energy in this form is thenabsorbed and stored in water vapour and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Many different things cause the greenhouse effect. The amount ofcarbon dioxide in the atmosphere is increased by 0.
4 percent each year becauseof the massive consumption of fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas. Another contributing factor is the the amount of forest logged, every second ofthe day the area of a football field in trees is cleared by either being loggedor burnt. Two other deadly greenhouse gasses which are entering the atmosphereeven faster than carbon dioxide are methane and chloroflourocarbons, althoughthey are not as damaging in the long run. These increases are likely to affect worldwide temperaturesdramatically. In 100 years time the average temperature for most parts of theworld will increase from between 2C to 6C if greenhouse pollution continues atits present rate.
This temperature increase would drastically affect the growthof many different crops and cause the polar ice caps to melt, thus increasingsea levels to rise up to several metres. If this rise in sea level was to occurmany areas would be much more prone to flooding, and generally much deeperfloods than would be expected nowdays. This flooding would happen paricularlyaround coastal regions worldwide, and also along many rivers that flow to orfrom coastal inlets. The greenhouse effect is very important because it leads to risingwater levels and temperatures which can have a large effect on the world’sclimate.
Changes in the climate can lead to significant changes in agriculturalindustries. This can lead to good farmland becoming deserts, make it too hot forsome crops to grow or let pests and diseases thrive. As a result some countriescan suffer bad economic conditions and people will have to move. Some low lyingcountries such as those on the Pacific islands or Holland could have a lot offlooding and a lot of money would need to be spent building sea walls and leveebanks to stop flooding. For these reasons it is very important to carefullymanage the greenhouse effect by reducing the amount of carbon dioxide going intothe air and planting more trees.
