As I am writing this, I am realizing why there were only a few pictures of me taken during winter months when I was little. I clearly remember some winters with a little or no snow on the ground, if any, and how it was happening almost every year. I did not know why this was happening for a very long time, and frankly I did not know much about it, until later after finishing high school. It was and it is all connected to climate change, and according to the study conducted by a researcher Christoph Marty on European Alps (Marty, 2013), the evidence points to the rising temperatures on the planet that are causing shorter winters with less snow.
The title of my article may seem too harsh, but it is an unavoidable truth. It takes an exceedingly long time for CO2 to disappear, three hundred years or more (Buis, 2019), and the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are the highest in the last 15-20 million years already (University of California, 2009). When we look back into other parts of Earth’s history we can see how high temperatures, sea levels and CO2 go hand in hand, up or down, but that usually took many thousands of years. Sure, we do not know what Earth’s reaction will be to this quick rise of carbon and other air pollutants, into the atmosphere in the long-term, but in the short-term, for at least three hundred years we will be on the path leading to a very angry mother nature.
I am, quietly, applauding to the countries like the US and China (Myllyvirta, 2022), the planet’s two biggest CO2 contributors, trying to limit the amounts emitted, but with the speed that they are doing it and how long it took them to be persuaded that climate change is happening, is incredibly disappointing.
Image: https://phys.org/news/2018-04-arctic-messageclimate-big.html
References:
Adema, Kaprilo Jr., and Molnia. Melting Denali: Effects of Climate Change on Glaciers, digital image, NPS, accessed September 9, 2022, https://www.student.unsw.edu.au/citing-images-and- tables-found-online
Buis, Alan. (2019, October 9). The Atmosphere: Getting a Handle on Carbon Dioxide. NASA.
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2915/the-atmosphere-getting-a-handle-on-carbon-dioxide/
Marty, Christoph. (2013). Climate change and snow cover in the European Alps. UpToDate. Retrieved September 9, 2022, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqxENMKaeCU&feature=watch- now-button&wide=1https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261037820_Climate_ change_and_snow_cover_in_the_European_Alps
Myllyvirta, Lauri. (2022, May 30) Analysis: China’s CO2 emissions see longest sustained drop in a decade. Carbon Brief.
University of California – Los Angeles. (2009, October 9). Last Time Carbon Dioxide Levels Were This High: 15 million years Ago, Scientists Report. ScienceDaily. Retrieved September 15, 2022 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091008152242.htm
