Global warming is something we shouldn’t keep ignoring. Our climate is changing more and more with every year that passes by. We need to take care of the planet that we all live on. Our home is the only planet inside of our galaxy that has life and we should keep it that way. If we don’t try to fix what we can now, we might not be able to reverse our damage soon.
We can’t ignore the recent snowfall that happened in the Sahara desert for the first time in 37 years. It’s considered one of the world’s largest low-latitude hot deserts. The Sahara is located in the area of the horse latitude under the subtropical ridge, which is a significant belt of semi-permanent subtropical warm-core high pressure. This is where air that’s from the upper levels of the troposphere tends to sink down towards the ground. The steady descending airflow causes a drying and warming effect in the upper troposphere. The air that sinks prevents water from evaporating and rising which would prevent adiabatic cooling, this makes cloud forming very difficult and nearly impossible. The result makes snow fall on the Sahara mountain ranges is extremely rare across the sandy dunes of the continent’s largest desert.
Jeff Masters stated that as the Earth is getting warmer and more moisture gets absorbed into the atmosphere, we will steadily have more extreme storms during all seasons. These storms could be capable of causing greater impacts on society. If our climate continues to get warmer, we should expect heavy snow to increase for a few decades until the climate becomes so warm that we will pass the point where it’s too warm for it to snow.
Snow is melting in the Antarctic and Arctic because of global warming, and what’s not reported as much is the glaciers that are melting in Himalayan. If the trends continue, global warming will soon impact people all over the world. The Himalaya glaciers are the Third Pole. They give water to the giant rivers of Asia, and support half of the humanity. The glaciers melting is a huge concern, and it’s something we need to pay attention too.
Another issue for concern is local extinctions, and some of these are related to climate change. This has already happened with hundreds of animal and plant species across the globe. New research was published on December 8th by the journal PLOS Biology, stating that extinctions have already taken 47% of 976 animal and plant species. It’s predicted that climate change will threaten more species, but determining how species are going to respond in the future is challenging. Many studies have shown that species are shifting their geographic ranges as the climate is warming up, they’re moving to cooler habitats. A new study by Professor John J. Wiens from the University of Arizona has used ranged-shift studies that are showing local extinctions have happened in the warmest parts of the ranges. This has happened to more than 450 animal and plant species. These extinction will become more widespread over time. The temperature is being predicted to increase additionally 1 to 5 degrees during the next several decades. The local extinctions might even extend to species that humans depend of for resources and food. This is another reason we need to take care of your planet, climate affects everything.
Even more concern comes from the un-seasonal warm winter temperatures that’s occurring around the world. In the United States, temperatures have been 15 to 20 degrees higher than normal. During the month of November, the Arctic temperatures have spiked 36 degrees Fahrenheit above normal. This has caused low levels of Arctic sea ice during the time of year when it’s suppose to be expanding in the freezing nights, but last week there was another burst of Arctic warmth. North Pole temperatures have been reported close to 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 Celsius). This is 10 degrees warmer than it should be this time of year. We could be in for another period when sea ice either pauses the spread across the Arctic ocean, or reverses it’s course. If this continues, it will cause a consequential climate change that could unfold in the Northern Hemisphere winter and could change the world forever.
We need to pay attention to everything that is happening to our planet. If not, we’re going to loose our beautiful Earth, and our future descendants will have to suffer from our mistakes.
Originally published at medium.com