As a great saying goes “Welcome, O life! I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race.” Vanamahotsava is the festival of life. It was started in India, as a campaign to save mother earth. BUT HAS THIS CAMPAIGN REALLY BORE FRUIT? We all might have heard, some of us experienced the dreadful effect of global warming. The reason, greenhouse gases. The solution, stop emission. But is that possible? No country is ready to sacrifice its economy for the ecology! And when fossil fuels are continued to be burnt everyday, the amazon forest that sustains life on earth is being destroyed at a steady rate! SO did we miscalculate the after effects? Yes we did and now a lot of scientists tell that it’s necessary to develop forests. But with the growing population, I doubt there would be enough resources to do so. So I came up with this new alternative when I was surfing the net one day. It’s called URBAN FORESTRY, mainly involves the development of green belts in cities. To do this you need not go and plant trees on the roadside, start from your own backyard. So this vanamahotsava, are you all ready to do a little. Remember that one tree in your garden, can surely make a difference, because a single tree can absorb about one ton of CO2 in its lifetime!

Remember if the current rate of emissions goes on, the current rate of melting of ice continues, within a span of 30 years sea levels will rise by 20 feet. Now some people will say this is all a hoax, but scientists prove it! If the sea levels rise by 20feet, all coastal cities will be wiped out. And those cities like Bangalore high up there will have acute water shortage, food shortage, and a 200% rise in diseases!

My dear friends if you think I’m a fool, please see the movie “AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH”. Hats off to Al Gore for his efforts to save mother earth.

Some of you might say, we won’t be there at that time, but did you all just forget your children, or grandchildren? If you all really care for them, please try planting atl east one sapling this year. You decide your vanamahotsava to plant it.

Please try following the below energy saving measures. These energy saving measures can cut down your expenses as well as cut your household CO2 emissions by 1.5 tons!

Reduce-Reuse-Recycle

Do your part in reducing wastes by choosing reusable rather than disposable products. Try using recycled paper and plastics as much as possible

Replace your light bulbs with low energy consuming CF bulbs. These not only use less electricity, but also last 15 time longer.

Drive less Drive smart Try not using a vehicle to ply small distances, use your feet. Remember every litre of petrol you save, prevents about 2.5kgs of CO2 from entering the atmosphere.

Buy energy-efficient products When its time to buy a new car choose one that offers a good mileage. Always buy home appliances that have a good energy efficiency value. If you reduce your household garbage by 10% you can save 600kgs of CO2 emissions annually.

Use the “OFF” switch: Save electricity and reduce global warming by turning off the lights when you leave the room. And remember not to keep televisions, video players…in the standby mode, as a lot of energy gets wasted.

And the last step is: Plant a tree in your backyard.

Friends these are a few steps we all can/must try to implement if we Our future generations live happily. Climate change due to global warming is not reversible now. But what can be done is, its effects can be minimised. So I kindly call upon all of you to sacrifice a little now, which will surely make a big difference in the years to come. Do this if you have heart in there, which says, “I care”.

Royston Fernandes
Author,’Shall we save the earth?’
mariramona@gmail.com

The author is a 18 year old student, trying his level best in educating the world about the ill effects of climate change.He has already authored a book called ‘Shall we save the earth?’. He requests all readers to join hands with him to make his movement a successful one.

Please Note... All links within articles are placed by their author-owners and not by this blog.Products with in those links may or may not be the best in the world.If it sounds too good to be true it could be a scam.Articles are posted for their info,ideas and or entertainment value only.

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Since the late 1960s, but more prominently in the last twenty years we have all heard of the phrase ‘global warming.’ Generally most people by now have an idea that this has something to do with the planets temperature, but, that it’s cause’s and effects are often hard to identify and quantify.

Global warming is a natural occurrence, think of planet Earth as a very, very complex machine, it has many intricate systems which allow it to sustain life, and global warming is simply one of  those systems, whereby ‘greenhouse gases’ as they have become known, trap solar heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. Greenhouse gases can be natural, such as water vapour, but the levels of others such as carbon dioxide (CO2) are not always so natural. By trapping solar heat greenhouse gases affect the Earth’s temperature and keep the planet from getting too cold (alternatively we might experience global cooling). In this respect it is a vital, natural event that makes our planet habitable, but the fear is that it is a process which has been affected by human behaviour which could have serious repercussions.

Perhaps the most important and controversial question is, to what extent has human activity increased or speeded up the process of global warming, and how? It has been argued that since the  industrial age, the burning of naturally found fossil fuels such as coal and oil has increased the amount of carbon dioxide that has been released into the Earth’s atmosphere, and that this has speeded up global warming. Further more as the world’s population increases, so has our need for energy, meaning the problem increases year on year, especially, when considering the additional pollution from emerging countries such as China.

Public opinion seems to be mixed generally on this subject, varying from people who adamantly don’t believe or care, to people who devote their life to creating awareness. Even governments’ aren’t entirely convinced, or are at least, slow to act. The previous American administration, under President George W Bush, toed an almost non-committal line based on G8 recommendations to halve carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, and seemed impartial when faced with the issue of the human impact on global warming. This may largely have been to do with national policy, but there is also a hint that it is based on personal belief as well as financial interests (The US had a preferred policy of burning home coal reserves as opposed to using cleaner gas energy). Factor into this that China refused to reduce it’s own carbon footprint until America did so and sometimes the situation seems deadlocked (but please read further).

This is ironic considering that after losing the 2000 American Election, Mr Bush’s opposition leader, former Vice President Al Gore presented in a film about the same issue, An Inconvenient Truth  (David Guggenheim, 2006), details exactly how man’s behaviour is having an effect on the environment. Reiterating that the burning of fossil fuels, air travel, car use and the depletion of green / forest land has increased the amount of carbon dioxide (and other man made greenhouse gases) that accumulates in the atmosphere. 

The issue is so important that in 1988 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was set up. The aim of the IPCC is to offer an objective source of information about the causes of climate change, its potential environmental and socio-economic consequences. It comprises of many scientists writing papers to outline those causes and effects that they believe are man-made or being sped up by human behaviour.

And, as previously mentioned it’s not new news, as early as 1968, Paul R. Ehrlich commented in his book The Population Bomb that: the greenhouse effect is being enhanced now by the greatly increased level of carbon dioxide, that [a]t the moment we cannot predict what the overall climatic results will be of our using the atmosphere as a garbage dump.

So what has taken us so long? Because over 40 years later we can see what the effects of using our atmosphere as a garbage dump, are. Our polar ice caps are melting. Vast areas of American landscape’s are changing, such as in Patagonia where glaciers are disappearing. If shelf ice in Greenland melts, sea levels could raise by as much as 20 foot, reducing land mass across the planet (not to mention the amount of extra trapped greenhouses gases they will release on breaking up). The ice is also fresh water which will affect the salinity in the water affecting natural sea life. Greenpeace also states that based on our current behaviour and negligence, within 50 years one third of all land based animals will face extinction. And, as  natural disasters increase, such as hurricanes (Katrina), droughts, floods, its not hard to see that already it is having an impact on human life, with around 150,000 people dying every year as a direct result of global warming.

In summary, whether you believe in man’s affect on global warming or not, we as humans need to take more responsibility for the care taking of our planet. I’ve personally known people who regard the whole thing as rubbish, and that’s their belief (in my opinion they are dangerously wrong), but understanding two basic things must / should still prompt people to action, which is; that no country can afford not to recycle, and, sooner or later we WILL run out of fossil fuels, the burning of which are a proven link to increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

The two easiest things that we can do to alleviate this problem on an individual level is try to recycle as much as possible and reduce our energy usage. Think carefully about the products you buy, do they come in recycled packaging (indeed is half the packaging required), can you get your energy from cleaner providers? Should you invest in a greener car, or failing that use public transport more often, remember to switch off appliances when not in use, use energy efficient light bulbs. Everything that we do, can done be in a greener way. As the world is a complex living machine, see yourself as a part of the whole. As the study aid for  An Inconvenient Truth suggests ‘Think globally, act locally.’ Your actions will have an impact on your local, and then, the world  wide environment. Although we seriously are threatened by what has been labelled by the Prince of Wales as, ‘mankind’s greatest challenge,’ we still have time to make a difference.

For more similar articles, visit http://www.theglobalwarmingoverview.com and read about facts, maps, news and myths.

Please Note... All links within articles are placed by their author-owners and not by this blog.Products with in those links may or may not be the best in the world.If it sounds too good to be true it could be a scam.Articles are posted for their info,ideas and or entertainment value only.

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