The article “Global Warming Rapidly Melts Massive Greenland Glacier” focuses on global warming in Greenland, when a massive glacier in the northeast region has melted and will end up raising global sea level by one foot and a half if it is melted completely. The article talks about how impressive the melting speed of the glacier was. On the other hand, scientists are not sure how long could it take for the entire glacier to melt and affect the planet, but they guarantee that according to recent events, it shouldn’t take long. These glaciers that have been melting in Greenland and other regions in the world are due to warming temperatures both in the sea and in the air. The ice part outside water melts due to the warmer air, and the ice inside the water melts due to the warmer ocean water passing by.

The article also talks about other ice sheets that are compromised due to this issue the world has been suffering lately. The two major ice sheets on earth are located in Greenland and Antarctica. The impressive fact about these two ice sheets is that it makes up to 99% of the freshwater ice in the planet. Global warming on the ice sheets can now be noticed by naked eye, and severe actions must be taken in order to control this situation in not only Greenland, but also other regions that are directly affected by global warming. Rising of sea level would cause a drastic effect in small islands around the world as well as cities located in the coast.

Reference: http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2015/11/12/greenland-glacier-melting-global-warming-climate-change/75661092/

The article “Russia takes a skeptical approach to climate change thanks to Putin” talks about the reaction of Russia regarding a topic that has been debated a lot in the past few years: climate change. Due to its geographic location, which is close to the Artic, Russia is one of the countries that can get most affected by climate change and therefore the rise of sea level. Most people would think that because of this, people in Russia are really worried about it and are trying to figure out a way to fix this issue, right? But the answer is no.

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, is trying his best to avoid Russian citizens to obtain more knowledge regarding this issue. After a visit to the Arctic in 2010, Putin was able to see retreating ice caps all over the place, but he still believed that the reason for climate change is not human activities. Putin believes that climate change is occurring naturally and humans are not related to it. It is said that one of the reasons why he believes this is because Putin is just plain delusional. Another good reason is because money. With climate change and the rise of sea level occurring in the world, polar ice would melt. With that happening, new areas of oil exploration would be opened near Russia, and the country would end up getting benefited by that. People are claiming that Putin should stop thinking about money and start realizing that the world’s future is in risk.

Reference: http://grist.org/article/russia-takes-a-skeptical-approach-to-climate-change-thanks-to-putin/

The article “Climate Change is a Massive Threat to Food Security and Agriculture” talks about the impact of climate change in Australia for the future. It starts by alerting the Australian people that they can expect climate change to make food scarcer as well as expensive in the near future. The fact that the earth is getting warmer and warmer every day is having a significant impact on crop yields in southern Australia. Another fact that is also contributing to this impact is the low rainfall that Australia is suffering lately due to climate change.

The bad news is that these negative factors will only become bigger in the future and therefore crop yields will continue to be affected and in a larger scale. It is important to note that some extreme weather events such as droughts, cyclones, and bushfires will end up leading to a significant decrease in productivity regarding the agricultural sector in Australia. This is a really big issue in the country since agriculture is responsible for $50 billion of the country’s GDP, which represents about 2.4%. Besides that, Australia exports a big number of agricultural products, and suffering from the decrease in production will lead to less money coming into the country. These factors discussed previously will also cause Australia’s strong food security characteristic to become less strong.

Some farmers have started to change their way of production in order to try to escape from this severe issue. They count on the young generation of farmers that seems to be more knowledgeable regarding this topic. Australia definitely needs to make changes in its agricultural culture in order to be able to adapt to climate change, otherwise the country will suffer severely from food security as well as in economic power.

Reference: http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/10/06/climate-change-massive-threat-food-security-agriculture

The article “How is Climate Change Affecting the Philippines?” talks about the effects of recent climate change in Philippines. The article first starts by showing data on an increase of typhoons in the country. Five of the ten worst typhoons in Philippines’ history happened after 2006. The worst one, Typhoon Yolanda, occurred in 2013 and killed more than 6,000, causing severe damages to the country. So the question that should be asked is: Why are the numbers of typhoons in Philippines increasing so much in the past few years? The answer to that question is climate change. One of the effects of climate change that is happening in our planet is an increase of tropical storms. Scientists also say that two other factors, geography and development in Philippines, are other reasons for such devastating consequences in the country.

The increase of ocean’s surface temperature leads to more heat released in the atmosphere. Due to this, more frequent and stronger storms are expected to happen. This is even more intense in the western Pacific Ocean, where Philippines is located at. This is why its geography is considered one of the factors for the occurrence of this natural disaster. Regarding development, Philippines is still lacking preparation to deal with these types of situation. Factors such as evacuation plan, early warning systems, and shelters would be critical in assisting the population when a typhoon is approaching.

Due to these factors, Philippines was ranked in 2013 as the number one country most affected by climate change by the “Global Climate Risk Index”. The expectations for the upcoming years are even worst, so the country needs to prepare itself by creating assisting action plans to the population in order to try to decrease the devastating effects these typhoons have on the country.

Reference: http://ecowatch.com/2016/01/22/climate-change-affecting-the-philippines/

The article from Climate Central, “ With Climate Change, Brazil Faces Drop in Crops”, talks about one of the main effects that climate change will have in Brazil. This effect is on the growing of crops, such as soya beans and corn, that will automatically make farmers take an attitude in order to adapt to climate change. There are several consequences to Brazil regarding climate change, such as drastic changes in rainfall, higher temperatures, lower productivity, and more disease. It is expected that by the end of 2100, the temperature in Brazil would be 3-6 degrees Celsius higher than nowadays. The change in rainfall is one of the main reasons for which crops would be affected by climate change. It is said that the north and northeast areas of Brazil would suffer a decrease of 40% of rainfall, while the southern part would increase something around 30%. These changes will consequently have a dramatic effect on harvests in one of the world’s major food producing countries, since Brazil is the world biggest exporter of coffee and meat, for example.

A possible way to fix this scenario for the future is to invest intensively in mixed agricultural systems, and avoid any type of monoculture practice that might have been done before. Farmers should try to increase the fixation of nitrogen as well as reduce continuous use of pesticides. Another action that farmers will need to eventually take is to increase the rotation of crops in order to balance the situation. It is already possible to see a little decrease in the production of crops in Brazil taking in consideration the past years. Since 2000, some regions have suffered a small decrease in productivity. But now that scientists have found some solutions that farmers can take in consideration for the future, Brazil will have a way of coming back to its old days of intense production.

Reference: http://www.climatecentral.org/news/with-climate-change-brazil-faces-drop-in-crops-16439

The article “How Global Warming is Changing the Wild Kingdom” talks about how changes that are occurring in the wild kingdom are showing scientists that innumerous shift and changes are happening in the world besides the global warming effects and temperature rise that has been debated a lot lately. Several changes in the wild kingdom has occurred lately as a response to global warming. Many fish species are moving to the north in order to find cooler waters. Polar bears are suffering from global warming and are thinner and less healthy than the ones of 20 years ago. Red Fox are migrating to the north as a response to warmer climates. Besides these changes in the life of several animals around the world, scientists have come up with four possible ways that species might respond to the rise of temperatures that have been occurring lately in our planet.

The first one is what they call “divide and destroy”. By that scientists mean that species will migrate to the north or to areas where elevations are higher in order to survive. They emphasize that with the presence of humans in some of these parts in the world, it makes it harder for some species to migrate. The second response is in the timing of natural events, such as migration, egg laying, and flowering. The change in temperature has a direct effect on the natural timing of these events in some species. The third response is that humans have nothing to do with the shifts we are seeing in the animal world and that these changes are likewise natural. Scientists also says that changing certain characteristics of the surface can impact more the animal life than increasing one or two degrees of temperature. The last response is that global warming will not only affect the animal world, but also our human community as well. It says that health risks will increase, and that poor countries will suffer even more from this change. Besides that, the article says how gas prices will change as well as the sales of hybrid cars. Generally speaking, global warming is an issue that will affect the entire ecosystem that we live in.

Reference: http://www.livescience.com/3864-global-warming-changing-wild-kingdom.html

The article “Climate Change Will Not Be Dangerous for a Long Time” by Scientific American talks about the decrease of global warming compared to predictions made by scientists. The article also states that due to this slower warming that is happening right now, the world will have enough time to prepare itself and develop new sources of technology that will assist humanity in fighting against the consequences of global warming. If climate change remains at the same rate as it is nowadays and sensitivity continues low, the world will only start to suffer more severe effects from global warming in about one century from now. According to the article, there is no reason to rush and try to develop subsidizing and inefficient technologies to fight global warming.

The world has been trying in the past few years to make plans and promises that it will be in fact capable of tackling climate change. But these plans and promises have not yet been really efficient. About ten years ago the world derived something close to 87% of its primary energy from fossil fuels. As of today, the world is still in that same range and no improvements have been made in order to make that statistic better. There has been in fact a significant decline in nuclear power, but this has been matched by the rise in renewable resources. One aspect that has room for improvement is the use of wind and solar in renewables, since it is still only 1% of that proportion. The main job our scientists have nowadays is to spend the next decades trying to come up with new researches and technologies that are more efficient in order to tackle global warming.

Reference: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-will-not-be-dangerous-for-a-long-time/

The article “Five Facts that Reveal a Warming Planet” from Live Science talks about how some politicians still deny the fact that the climate is changing in the past few years, and that the mean global temperature is in fact increasing as time goes by. The article presents as a response 5 facts that prove that the climate is changing.

The first fact is that climate change never took break. Since 1880, the average global temperature increased 1.8 ^oF. 2015 was in fact the hottest year in history, and the predictions for this year is even worse.

The second fact is that the climate is changing faster than any time period in history of human civilization. Today, humans unload an average of 30 gigatons of carbon dioxide into atmosphere. Besides that, temperatures are increasing faster than they have in the last 10,000 years. These statistics shows that the climate change rate is significantly higher now than it was before in the past.

The third fact the article talks about is the cause of climate change: humans. Some people believe that natural variations in Earth are the main cause for climate change. But the truth is that humans are the main cause. Carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases emitted by humans from trucks, power plants, and factories, have a much bigger effect on climate change than natural variations.

The fourth factor is the fact that 97% of climate scientists agree with it. When comparing an opinion about climate change of a politician with a climate scientist, it is obvious that climate scientists have a much bigger understanding and knowledge about the topic than politicians. And when we see the statistic that 97% of them agree that there is climate change occurring in our planet, we definitely need to take that in consideration.

The fifth and last factor the article talks about is that climate change poses a serious risk. With this change occurring in our planet, sea level will rise and as a consequence we would have less freshwater. Besides that, cities that are located on the coast would be in danger of flooding.

Reference: http://www.livescience.com/53554-five-facts-that-show-earth-is-getting-warmer.html

The article “Rising Seas Slowed by Increasing Water on Land” talks about an innovation in one of NASA’s satellites, in which water storage on land is now able to be identified and quantified. This issue is directly related to the rate of sea level rise. With ice sheets and glaciers being melt in the past few years, the Earth has soaked about 3.2 trillion tons of water in soils. A consequence of that is the decrease of rising sea level in about 20%. It is said that the amount of water that has been soaked by Earth is equal to the volume of Lake Huron, which is the world’s seventh largest lake. This new innovation in NASA’s satellite also allows scientists to observe global patterns of changes in land water storage. It was possible to notice from this analysis that regions that are typically considered more wet, such as regions close to the equator, are getting even more wet, and dry regions are getting even more dry. These patterns are consistent with previous observations made by scientists of changing precipitation in oceans and land.

Scientists always believed that there was a big dependency of people on groundwater for irrigation and consumption. With that in mind, they thought that this would lead to a consequence of water being transferred from land to the ocean. With this new discovery in NASA’s satellite, scientists are now able to better understand variations in sea level change. It will also help in making long-term projections of sea level rise, which will help society as a whole get better prepared for further consequences.

Reference: http://climate.nasa.gov/news/2398/

The article from “The Washington Post” talks about the United States being the biggest responsible for global warming nowadays, and how the country will suffer the most from this issue that has been discussed a lot in the past few years. The United States has produced around 27% of the total carbon dioxide emissions of the world from 1850 – 2011. It is important to notice that no other country was close to that percentage for this period of time. On the other hand, China has passed the United States as the biggest producer of carbon dioxide emission of the world taken in consideration only the last decade. Still, the United States is on the top of this ranking. The article then explains how the earth would get its revenge on the United States.

West Antarctica has been one of the biggest victims with global warming increasing in the past few years. If this trend continues, West Antarctica could collapse entirely, which would increase the sea level by a lot. With that being said, it has being determined by scientists that the United States would receive more sea level than any other country in the world. This happens because of gravity, and therefore areas that are farther away from Antarctica, like the United States, would suffer more than areas closer to Antarctica. It is expected that the United States would get about 25% – 27% more sea level rise than the global average. About 12 million Americans live on land that would theoretically be under water in the future based on that. Therefore, the United States should start planning in advance to protect its people and nation.

Reference: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/01/22/the-u-s-has-contributed-more-to-global-warming-than-any-other-country-heres-how-the-earth-will-get-its-revenge/

The article I chose is from the National Geographic and it talks about the sea level rise. It starts by describing the reasons for the rise of sea level in the past few years. The burning of fossil fuels as well as other human and natural activities are the main causes for the rise of sea level, since it makes the Earth’s surface temperature increase. With the increase in Earth’s temperature, water is expanding even more than usual due to thermal expansion theory. Besides that, the melting of glaciers, polar ice caps, Greenland, and West Antarctica are constantly helping the rise of sea level. With that being said, coastal habitats are suffering devastating effects with the increase in sea level. Another consequence that is important to be mentioned is the fact that the higher the sea level is, the higher a storm in the coast will be. Therefore, cities like Miami and San Francisco have a higher chance of being hit by heavier storms. In general, the rise of the sea level is an issue that the world should start thinking about it as soon as possible, even if the process requires years to happen. Consequences can be serious to coastal cities and islands around the world, which would force people to abandon their homes and relocate to somewhere else.

Reference: http://ocean.nationalgeographic.com/ocean/critical-issues-sea-level-rise/

As most of us may already know, climate change has had a huge impact on our daily lives and it will continue to affect us in the following years if not enough actions are taken to prevent the consequences. The article “Climate Change Threatens Health – Air Pollution: Smog, Smoke, and Pollen” from Natural Resources Defense Council talks about some of the effects that climate change may cause to us humans. With climate change, air pollution will increase which will lead to more ozone smog accumulated in our atmosphere. Air pollution may come from various different factors, such as vehicles, power plants, and wildfire. With air pollution being increased, our health becomes more volatile as it gets more exposed to respiratory diseases. Our lungs, throats, and eyes, are some of the human parts that are exposed to these diseases caused by air pollution. It is important to notice that people who have allergies and asthma, for example, have a higher risk of getting more affected in these situations. There are several actions that can be taken in order to prevent the rise of air pollution, such as the use of bicycle instead vehicles. A lot of states in the United States are taking actions to control air pollution, as the article talks about it. Michigan, for example, is trying to expand research of air quality threats from climate change in order to try to control the situation. It is really important that not only the United States, but also other countries around the world take actions to prevent air pollution from rising.

Reference: http://www.nrdc.org/health/climate/airpollution.asp

Hello everyone! My name is Luis Rezende, I am a senior in Industrial Engineering graduating this may. I am doing a minor in Six Sigma and another one in Business. I’m from Brazil and I love to play soccer in my free time. This is my first class regarding earth’s climate and systems. I believe it is a really important class since it deals with future changes that may occur in our planet and will eventually affect all of us. I am really excited about it and hope to have a good semester.