| Global Warming: True or False? By: Katie Guthrie Last month, a major storm swept through the Washington D.C. area, dumping an unprecedented amount of snow on the mid-Atlantic. The White House found itself mired in ten inches, while other parts of Maryland and West Virginia got over twenty. So, this means there’s no more global warming, right? Wrong. Climate change already is a hotly contested issue. The lack of action that resulted from last December’s Copenhagen Climate Conference demonstrated that most world leaders are afraid to take a definitive stance on this issue. Instead of creating effective policies, they simply concluded that no formal consensus, thus policy or action, could be reached. But waiting around isn’t going to make anything better. “Climate change is poised to become the single greatest threat to our biosphere,” said Ethan Clotfelter, associate professor of biology and neuroscience at Amherst College in Massachussetts. “It will affect basic ecological processes and species distributions all over the world. The quality of life for most people will be significantly altered.” But what about snowstorms? Doesn’t that show that the world isn’t getting any warmer? Weather and climate are two very different things, says Clotfelter, and people tend to confuse the two, especially “climate change deniers” as he calls them. Records snowfalls in Washington D.C. are not evidence of climate change, he says. “Most climate change scenarios predict changes in storm frequency and alterations of typical weather patterns, so these winter storms are quite consistent with climate change,” he added. Stronger legislation needs to be put in place before anything new and effective can be done in the battle against climate change. The White House recently issued a proposal that would require the nation to produce a certain percentage of “clean energy” over the next fifteen years. Unfortunately, it doesn’t require the nation to limit the amount of “dirty energy” it produces, so long as it meets the “clean energy” quota. Students have been picking up the government’s slack. They have been leading the way in eco-friendly innovation by building cars that get over 2,000 miles per gallon and demanding that their schools reduce their carbon footprint. “The idea that people are so concerned with preparing for nuclear war just in case something bad happens, but ignore what is already happening, such as global warming, is nonsensical,” said Drew Joseph, a junior at Dartmouth College. “People should take it seriously, even if they don’t believe it, just in case.” Colleges and high schools have been competing against one another for the past ten years to recycle more, waste less, and reduce emissions. Whether you live at home or at school, you can reduce your carbon footprint by always turning off the lights, unplugging appliances when not in use, and using energy efficient light bulbs. There are hundreds of ways to save energy and help make the world a greener place. |
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