Essay on Climate Change

Submitted By kri4
Words: 779
Pages: 4
Open Document
Developing countries contribute less to climate change than developed countries and should, therefore, take less responsibility for dealing with it. To what extent do you agree with this statement?

Climate change is an important issue, which affects all people around the world to a greater or lesser extent. The significance of this problem is that the effect might be tremendous in its scale and totally unpredictable. According to IPPC (2001), environmental changes accelerate the appearance of melting glaciers, rising sea level, floods, droughts, and other kinds of severe weather conditions, resulting in increased human mortality. All of the mentioned effects are primarily caused by the emission of greenhouse gases, produced as a result of industrialised countries’ activities. Therefore, it is essential to divide the responsibility between countries in order to mitigate the negative impact on environment. This essay is going to discuss to what extent should developed countries bear the responsibility for the climate change and if it should be divided between developing countries as well, before answering the given question.

Starting from the 18th century, developed countries have been emitting vast amounts of gases; using former colonies as an inexhaustible source of raw materials, they managed to gain significant wealth and achieve a high level of economical growth. According to Harris (n.d.), “no country bears more responsibility than United States, since it produces around one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gases”. Being a role model for all of the developing countries, if the United States remains inactive, others are likely to follow. Generally, Harris (n.d) argues that both of the sides are doing virtually nothing to lessen the future effect of global warming on the world’s poor. Moreover, the progress of encouraging the world to change for adjusting to these effects is still very basic. There is no incentive for developing countries to support the mitigation of climate change effects, because their contribution is much smaller and the limitations of further economic growth do not seem fair. It would be reasonable to give poor countries limited freedom in order to achieve basic levels of economical development and living standards.

Regardless of countries' wealth, urgent actions should be taken in order to reduce the devastating effect of global warming and other significant climate changes on nature and humanity. To do so, it is necessary to combine reduced energy demand with nuclear power, biomass energy, alternative energy sources and actions to reduce other greenhouse emissions (Mendelsohn, 2010). But not only big actions make significant change: each individual's behaviour is important in the sophisticated battle against harmful emissions. However, Armstrong (2005) suggests that for some people changing the lifestyle is not an option resulting from their responsibilities taking a political approach.

Furthermore, According to Hurrell and Sengupta (2012) emerging powers have deteriorated the situation by increasing the amount of emissions. In recent years BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) are facing the problem of fairness, since they fail to recognise the level of responsibility they have to bear. Compared to the speed of economic growth and rising emissions proportion, their attempts to mitigate possible negative effect on the environment are still relatively small.
Show More

Related Documents: Essay on Climate Change

Impact Of Climate Change

impacts Main article: Economic impacts of climate change Aggregating impacts adds up the total impact of climate change across sectors and/or regions.[126] Examples of aggregate measures include economic cost (e.g., changes in gross domestic product (GDP) and the social cost of carbon), changes in ecosystems (e.g., changes over land area from one type of vegetation to another),[127] human health impacts, and the number of people affected by climate change.[128] Aggregate measures such as economic…

Words 427 - Pages 2

Climate Change In California

deforestation, and technology are all factors when it comes to climate change. This issue is significant to me due to the fact that I was born and raised in California, and the recent drought there can be linked to global warming. Every day more and more CO2 is released and the world is becoming warmer and warmer. However, there are steps that people can take to counter the devastation these gases will cause. One of the causes of climate change includes electricity production which is responsible for…

Words 559 - Pages 3

Climate Change Essay

Natalie Sesco English 1 Uri Hertz May 17, 2012 Environmental Issues Everyone talks about climate change and how the Earth is slowly deteriorating, but no one seems to have specific examples. In Linnea Saukko’s “How to Poison the Earth,” she does use specific examples of what is causing climate change. She uses satire with a hint of sarcasm in her essay. She gives the reader specific examples of how to poison the Earth, but not really wanting to poison the Earth…

Words 1131 - Pages 5

climate change Essay

climate change is an issue that is affecting people all over the world. Climate change From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia For current and future climatological effects of human influences, see global warming. For the study of past climate change, see paleoclimatology. For temperatures on the longest time scales, see geologic temperature record. Page semi-protected Atmospheric sciences ShipTracks MODIS 2005may11.jpg Atmospheric physics Atmospheric dynamics (category) Atmospheric chemistry…

Words 7672 - Pages 31

Climate Change Essay

The Climate Change Debate 1. Article Review – ‘Perception of Climate Change’ by Hansen et al. This article investigates the phenomena climate change and its aim is to use statistical data to support that climate change is real. An aspect of climate change named as ‘climate dice’ is mentioned in the article which referred to the chance of extreme weathers such as unusually cool or warm seasons. In the past three decades, there has been evidence of increasing climate dice ‘loading’ occurring…

Words 3088 - Pages 13

Climate Change Essay

“We have to face the reality of climate change. It is arguably the biggest threat we are facing today.” (William Hague). Climate change is the change in the patterns of the global climate, caused by the increase levels of carbon dioxide that are produced. The tropical forests that are being destroyed and the fossil fuels that are used every day are two of the causes of the large quantities of carbon dioxide that are released into the atmosphere. Climate change is an issue that affects us all and…

Words 919 - Pages 4

Hurricane Climate Change

live in the states such as Texas and Florida need to understand why climate change has had a tremendous impact on the ferocity that these hurricanes have hit their homes. Additionally, citizens of states like Florida and Texas also need to learn the emotional and economic impact that a storm can have on families. There is always opposition about climate change, however, it is time for people to realize that because of the climate change that our world is undergoing, these people will see more dangerous…

Words 619 - Pages 3

The Importance Of Climate Change

Environmental Changes have become one of the major threats to the world in the last decade. Climate change, for instance, does not only impact a single state at a domestic level, but it also influences nations’ well-beings at an international level. Therefore, it is significant for scholars, and politicians to have a valid understanding of the relationship between human and nature, since humans are one of the influencing variables that cause environmental changes. Many studies have been done to explain…

Words 810 - Pages 4

Climate Change Essay

Climate Change The past – impact of volcanic explosions on climate Ice ages and hot periods – why The milankovitch cycles are the frequent and regular changes in the way the earth orbits the sun, meaning that there are consistent sequences of ice ages and warm periods. Its orbit moves from being a circular movement around the sun to a slightly elliptical rotation path. The angle of the Earth’s axis also changes fractionally, occurring every forty-one thousand years. Finally, the direction of the…

Words 788 - Pages 4

The Importance Of Climate Change

limate change is any long-term significant change in the “average weather” that a given region experiences. Average weather may include average temperature, precipitation and wind patterns. It involves changes in the variability or average state of the atmosphere over durations ranging from decades to millions of years. These changes can be caused by dynamic process on Earth, external forces including variations in sunlight intensity, and more recently by human activities. Climate changes reflect…

Words 694 - Pages 3