Sandra McIntire
ENC 1101
11/1/2014
Mr. Anthony Nappi Global warming, one of the biggest challenges our planet faces is slowly on the rise. Year after year our bad habits along with other significant factors are bringing about more and more challenges. There are several current trends that demonstrate that global warming is impacting sea levels, melting of ice caps and world climate changes. Global warming is a fundamental threat to all live things. The main causes of global warming is split up into two groups, man-made and natural causes.
Man-made causes are probably one of leading factors of global warming. There are many man-made causes like, pollution and population. Pollution, because it comes in many different shapes and sizes it is one the biggest threats to global warming. Another man-made cause is the burning of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are fuels that are made up of organic matter, coal and oil. Burning fossil fuels give off a greenhouse gas that is called CO2. Mining coal and oil also allows methane to escape. Methane is already naturally in the ground so when coal and oil is mined you have to dig up a little earth. In doing this methane is being dug up as well. There is also population. A bigger population means a higher demand of food and transportation, which means more methane because there will be more burning of fossil fuels. Agriculture plays another part in global warming. What’s agriculture? Have you ever been in a barn filled with animals and you get a whiff of something terrible? Guess what your smelling methane. Manure is another source of methane, and since more population means more cows for food it also means more methane in the air.
The next factor of global warming is natural causes. One of few natural causes is a release of methane gas from the arctic tundra and wetlands. Methane is a greenhouse gas which is a gas that traps heat in the