LESSON 11

• Climate change - is a change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns when that change lasts for an extended period of time
• Global warming - refers to the increase in the average temperature of the Earth’s new surface and oceans in recent decades and its projected continuation
• Greenhouse effect - natural trapping of heat in the troposphere
• Svante Arrhenius - a Swedish chemist who first proposed the greenhouse effect in 1896
• Carbon dioxide concentration- Is responsible for 50-60% of the global warming from greenhouse gases produced by human activities since pre-industrial times.
• main sources of greenhouse effect; fossil fuel burning:coal, oil and natural gas (75%), land clearing and burning (25%) but carbon dioxide is the main driver of the greenhouse effect
• Chlorofluorocarbon- contribute to global warming in the troposphere and deplete ozone in the stratosphere. The main sources are leaking air conditioners and refrigerators, evaporation of industrial solvents.
• Methane concentration – It is produced when anaerobic bacteria break down organic matter in most places that lack oxygen. These areas include swamps and other natural wetlands, rice paddies and landfills, intestinal tract of a cattle, sheep and termites.
• Nitrous oxide concentration- It can trap heat troposphere and deplete ozone in the stratosphere. It is released from nylon production, burning of biomass and nitrogen fertilizers in soil, livestock waste