Anahi Perez, Ana Perez & Alexus Mojica

Mr. Duncan

AP Environmental Science

12 June 2017

Climate Change

Climate change has been a topic of discussion in our recent years. Some of the main

topics of discussions that are included in the climate change topic are greenhouse gases, health

effects on humans, effects on animals, effects on oceans and polar regions,and effects on

agriculture. All of these topics end up coming back and affecting the way our daily resource

consumption works.

The effects climate change has on the earth’s surface has a huge impact on humans. Some

of these effects are heat waves and precipitation. Heat waves are defined as abnormally hot

weather that occurs for a couple days at a time. They cause areas that are surrounded by trees to

be more likely to catch fire and spread quicker. As heat continue to spread it could cause a

drought and cause forest fires, but also put residents and firefighters at risk. When heat waves

occur humans can get a very bad heat related illness, for example heat rashes, heat strokes, etc.

Another effect that occurs on earth is precipitation, which is a change in the amount of

rain, snow, sleet, or hail that falls to the ground. With more precipitation there may be more

moisture in the air, which means heavier downpours and stronger storms. Stronger storms will

then impact areas with people, which could ultimately lead to deaths, homelessness, and

movement of homes.

Many animals have been and will be affected from climate change. At the poles, areas are

warming two or three times the global average. This has a negative effect because even a half a

degree rise in the temperature has an effect on how the weather and planet works. It's noted by

the U.S Environmental Protection Agency that sea levels have risen from 15 to 20 cm in the last

100 years. When these temperatures are high the effect it causes is that floating icebergs melt and

it affects the ice caps. Because the melting of icecaps would increase water levels, the habitats of

animals could be destroyed. This could also affect the polar bear population. If these ice caps

melt this would cause the populations of polar bears to decrease because of lack of support they

need to come back to the surface. Temperatures increasing due to global change would also

affect the population for fish that depend on cold water to survive like trout, salmon, etc and their

population would decline.

Another problem climate change causes on animals is droughts. Droughts kill and stress

plants, and if an animal or insect depends on it for food and shelter that population would

decline. All of this could also affect humans. The loss of animal species will create a change in

which their ecosystem works. This change will then affect their population because of the lack of

a certain species as food. When us humans need that specie for food, specially if in high demand,

the cost of the foods that contain that species will increase. Prices will then continue to increase

faster than we can make money.

The ocean and polar regions have been negatively affected over the past few years due to

the fact that climate change is a thing. As the sun rays reflect off of the ice glaciers the heat will

cause them to melt. Once they melt the sun rays go deep into the water and heats it up. If the

water continues to heat up many of the glaciers will continue to melt at an average pace. They

won’t melt at a crazy fast rate, but if the heat continues to increase it will happen sooner. This

also connects back to us humans in the end. When the water is heated up it will expand and

eventually rise. In this case the expansion of water will affect the coastal regions. The coasts will

receive many floods which will destroy their homes and the surrounding area. If floods continue

to happen the city will spend a great amount of money to repair the area and home. Basically, If

we do not help and try to stop this climate change from happening then the earth as we know it

will not exist for future generations, everything little thing will change.

Over the years it is obvious that our climate has been changing and will always be

changing just not at the rate in which it currently is. Because of climate some of our agriculture

has had declines in crop production and also livestock there has been a decrease in the actual

production of resources. Some of the things that stress our agriculture are weeds, diseases, insect

pests, etc. Although certain agricultural areas can adapt to the climate in that moment, an

increase in the speed at which the climate changes could affect the rate at which it adapts.

Precipitation patterns also affect the way in which agriculture works. A component connected to

precipitation patterns is erosion. If erosion becomes a big problem, agriculture won’t be able to

maintain itself and work to its best ability.

Overall, we believe that climate change is the most important environmental issue of our

time. The reason for this is because over the past few years climate change has caused an

increase in the amount of destruction around the world. As we discussed before, it has caused

issues to our health; animal well being and their habitats; our oceans and polar regions; and

finally our agriculture. Climate change has made major appearances in life today and most are

negative.