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Despite the controversial debate and various disputes among climate and atmospheric scientists with certain government officials, politicians, or members of the ‘elite’ – global warming is a very real, and quickly rising global threat.

As the population on the planet rises, resources are being consumed at an astonishing rate. As resources (such as coal-mining, oil-digging, deforestation, industry, among others) increase in demand, our energy output as a whole, skyrockets. As global Co2 (carbon dioxide) emissions rise, they get trapped in the upper atmosphere, also known as the greenhouse effect.(1) These gasses eventually build up and warm the entire planet, causing permanent and perhaps irreparable damage.

Due to this, the Earth is having a hard time coping, essentially – our abuse of the planet is acting as a virus to its health and in response, Earth now has a fever.

The effects of global warming pose an immediate danger to all living things on the planet. As temperatures rise, polar ice caps melt. This causes sea levels to rise. Rising waters and the warming of the oceans has the potential to wreak havoc on Earth’s atmospheric stability, causing any number of natural disasters and risk factors to occur as consequence.(4)

13 Dangers of Global Warming That Should Concern You…

1. Melting Polar Ice Caps

A vast majority of the world’s glaciers are melting at an alarming rate. Faster even than new snow and ice can replenish them. Unfortunately, scientists predict the rate of the ice caps melting to accelerate, causing potentially serious implications to occur.

2. Rising Seas / Increased Coastal Flooding

As sea levels rise, incredibly large portions of land bordering the ocean will become submerged. Entire cities and towns, including any national landmarks, coastal military bases, and countless families will be forced to evacuate over time or risk going under.

3. Heavier Precipitation and Rainfall

As polar ice caps melt, raising the sea level and introducing more water into Earth’s atmosphere, heavy rainfall will become increasingly prevalent. This brings the risk of higher flooding and the potential evacuation of entire family homes among certain areas.

4. Extreme, Unprecedented Weather Events

Global warming has the potential of initiating several natural disasters. Everything from heat waves, extreme precipitation events, severe droughts, coastal flooding, heat waves, and powerful hurricanes, among others.

5. Changing Duration of Seasons

Spring currently arrives around 10 days earlier on average in the Northern Hemisphere than it did many years ago. Snow is recorded as melting sooner and reservoirs fill too fast, thus needing to be released for flood control. Winters and Summers are increasingly warmer, and vegetation and soils then tend to dry out earlier and drier than they should.

6. Increasingly Destructive Hurricanes

Recent research indicates that the power and intensity of hurricanes have been steadily growing since the 1970s, particularly in the North Atlantic region, due to rising temperatures of the water.

7. Frequent, Intense Heat Waves

Hot weather also occurs more frequently than it has even 60 years ago, at dangerous levels.(5) Scientists expect these frequent and severe temperature levels to continue rising as global warming intensifies. This then leads to a number of health risks including heat stroke, exhaustion, and/or aggravate any existing medical conditions.

8. Severe Droughts In Some Areas

Climate change plays a significant role in causing droughts as temperatures warm up, especially in areas of the Western United States. Several climate studies also unanimously project the increase of drought potential in the American Southwest, putting a strain on agriculture, groundwater supplies, and causing an alarm for accessible water to many households.

9. Food Supply Disruption

Due to severe droughts and heat waves, as well as flooding and heavier precipitation, crop and meat production will likely become significantly impacted. Possibly even disrupt the food supply to such a degree that costs are driven upward, and many products or produce items become increasingly difficult to acquire.

10. Loss of Hundreds of Miles of Forest

Tens of millions of trees have died in the Rocky Mountain Forest over the past 15 years due to wildfires and stress from heat and drought.(6) Dry, hot conditions amplify these effects and continue to add stress to the health of the forest.

11. Longer and More Damaging Wildfires

Higher Spring and Summer temperatures, as well as earlier Spring snowmelt, unfortunately, results in forests that quickly become too hot and too dry, causing fires. Depending on the ecosystem of the forest, such as how hot and dry it is, determines how long these fires burn and the amount of damage they cause.

12. Costly and Growing Health Impacts

As temperatures rise and natural disasters increase, air pollution gets more stirred into the atmosphere, causing several health risks that may begin to emerge more frequently than they already are. Such concerns as more intense allergy symptoms, the spread of insect-borne diseases, and the effects of dangerous heat waves or heavy, flooding rainstorms.

13. Disruption To Plants and Animals

As rising sea levels completely transform the surrounding landscape of continents and countries, many species of plants and animals will be faced with shrinking habitats and potential extinction. Most of which including polar bears, penguins, and several other ice-dwelling inhabitants. This change will cause a shift in the entire food chain, changing animal behavior and causing mass disruption to Earth’s ecological system.

These findings are alarming and should shake even the sleepiest of us humans awake. However, this process can be significantly slowed, if not reversed. A few ways to help lower carbon dioxide emissions is to carpool, walk, or bike more than drive, conserve energy, use less water, recycle, plant seeds (especially tree seeds), among many others.

If not, we may be facing a real disaster, pushing the limit’s of Earth beyond the tipping point and creating an apocalyptic outcome. These changes may not happen overnight, yet gradually over time, consequences of their effects will become more discernible and ‘felt’ by those around the World. And by then, it may be too late.

Sources:

(1) http://www.livescience.com/37743-greenhouse-effect.html

(2) http://www.energytrendsinsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/GlobalGHG.jpg?00cfb7

(3) http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/imageo/files/2016/01/Dec-2015-anom-1.gif

(4) http://climate.nasa.gov/

(5) http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/impacts/global-warming-and-heat-waves.html#.V9ddLSgrKUk

(6) http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/impacts/climate-change-impacts-rocky-mountain-forests.html#.V9dfPygrKUk

Image: https://www.africangreenelements.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/african-agriculture.jpg

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