Climate Change

Today in class we had a guest speaker, Dr Michael Edelstein.  He has been teaching for a number of years and today was talking to us about Climate Change.  A topic that we will need to know how to teach for when we are future teachers.  The main object when talking about climate change is the Earth and how the earth and humans are affected.

Today we learned that Earth is both an open and a closed system.  It is open because it brings energy in from the sun, and it is closed because of matter which would be us, humans, we do not change.  Dr Edelstein talked about how we should rely more on the sun than on fossil fuels.  This is because with the sun we are not putting harmful chemicals back into the environment, thus we are not polluting it.  Also, the sun will also be there whereas there may not always be fuels.  The message of Climate Change is that we have to change and fast.  Al Gore whom Dr Edelstein based some of his lectures off of has three questions: Must we Change?, Can we Change?, and Will we Change?
The atmosphere is made up of two different spheres: the troposphere which is where we live and the stratosphere which is where gases are trapped.  As gases like CO2 increase, the boundary between space and the atmosphere thickens.  We are dumping 110 millions of Manmade global warming pollution into the atmosphere every 24 hours.  In the troposphere, this pollution causes cancer and makes it harder to breathe.  In the stratosphere it causes combustion.  Greenhouse gases are another cause of climate change things such as air transportation, industrial agriculture, and even a cow farting is releasing something harmful to the environment.

Climate change is caused by human activities, the hottest year ever measured was 2016, hotter years have more fires.  The largest fire was in Alberta, Canada in May 2016.

The heat of the Ocean- bleaching out and killing the coral reefs, taking away the habitat for much of the life in the ocean.  Hurricane changes depending on if the ocean is warm or cold.

The Hydrological Cycle- Precipitation, Water Returns to the Sea, Evaporation
The same extra heat that evaporates more water from the ocean, causing bigger downpours and floods...pulls moisture even more quickly from the soil, causing longer and deeper drought.

October 13, 2014- Climate change "will likely lead to food and water shortages, pandemic disease, disputes over refugees and natural disasters in regions across the globe."
"Climate Change is a Medical Emergency" Professor Hugh Montgomery
We now risk losing up to 50% of all land-based species in this century