What you can do to slow global warming

"WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING?"

Hi, my name is Susanne Schulmeister. I am a scientist and I am worried about global warming. There is a lot of information in the internet about whether global warming is real, how it is caused, and how it might affect life on this planet in the future (links below). But when I was looking for a webpage with suggestions on what each of us can do to slow global warming, I did not find one that had a fairly exhaustive list in a comprehensive format on a single page. Therefore, I assembled a list of all the suggestions that I found on several websites (links below) and put them all on this page.

Global warming is caused by burning fossil fuels (oil, coal, and natural gas) which releases carbon dioxide into the air, which thickens the heat-trapping blanket of greenhouse gases that surrounds our planet, which then traps more heat in the atmosphere than is desirable. In order to curb global warming, we need to burn less fossil fuels.

If you are wondering whether global warming is for real or whether it is going to be a problem, please scroll down and read the text under the heading "research on global warming".

If you are already concerned about global warming, but think you can't do anything about it, I have good news for you. There is a lot you can do. In fact, there are so many things you can do, you might be a bit overwhelmed by the list below. Don't worry, you don't have to do everything.

If you already are making efforts to save energy, keep your carbon emissions low, and reduce global warming, you might find additional ideas below.

Save energy in your home and office
• use heaters and airconditioners only if absolutely necessary. When the outside temperature is between 15 deg C (60 deg F) and 25 deg C (77 deg F), you probably don't need them. Switch the airconditioner off if you leave for more than an hour. Lower the thermostat of your heating system when you are on vacation.
• when you do use heaters and airconditioners, don't crank them up more than necessary. You can save a lot of energy by heating your home to no more than 22 deg C (72 deg F) (the less, the better) during the day and no more than 68 deg F at night. If you're cold, wear a sweater. In the summer, do not cool it down below 22 deg C (72 deg F) (if you are somewhere where you can wear a tank top or T-shirt, 75 deg F should be fine).
• in the winter, let sunshine through the windows, but in the summer, keep it out.
• don't set your refridgerator's temperature lower than necessary, don't keep its door open longer than necessary and make sure it's not near a heater or in the sunlight. Clean the condenser coil and turn on the "energy saver" switch near the thermostat.
• switch your TV, computer, and other appliances off when you are not using them (do not use sleep mode / standby)
• run your washing machine and your dish washer only when you have a full load.
• dry your clothes the old-fashioned way, on the clothesline. If you do use the dryer, clean the lint filter every time and don't run the dryer longer than necessary.
• use energy-efficient appliances. When purchasing new appliances, look for the Energy Star label or visit the Energy Star website.
• replace incandescent (conventional) light bulbs with compact fluorescent (energy-saving) bulbs, especially those bulbs that burn the longest each day. Compact fluorescent bulbs produce the same amount of light as normal bulbs, but use 75% less energy and last ten times as long.
• turn off unnecessary lights. Always turn off the lights when you leave.
• don't waste paper. The production of paper costs a lot of energy. Use cloth rags instead of paper towels. Use both sides of paper whenever possible. Put used paper in recycling bins. Stop unwanted junk mail -- to see how, go to www.newdream.org/junkmail or www.dmaconsumers.org/offmailinglist.html).
• telecommute from home. For more info, visit the Telework Coalition
• use weatherstripping to seal drafts from your doorways and windows. Remove airconditioners during the winter or cover them.
• turn your water heater down to 120 deg F to save as much as 50% energy.
• insulate your water heater, especially if it's located in an unheated part of the house.
• install low-flow showerheads and faucets to use only half the water without decreasing performance.
• give your used paper, glass, metal, and plastic materials to recycling.
• wash clothes in warm or cold water, not hot.
• unplug your chargers (for cell phones, toothbrushes etc) when you are not using them.

Fly less
When I mention to people that they should fly less, they often tell me that that wouldn't make a difference, since the airplane is flying anyway. This is wrong. Flying less is one of the most important things you can do. First of all, every passenger, every suitcase adds to the total weight of the airplane and makes it burn more kerosene. But more importantly, when people buy fewer tickets, less airplanes are flying. In the months after September 11, 2001, it was clearly shown how quickly flights get cancelled when the demand isn't there. The more people decide to take the train instead of the airplane from New York to Boston one year, the fewer flights from New York to Boston will be flying the following year.
Think about which flights you can do without.
• Instead of flying from New York to Boston, Philadelphia, or D.C., take the train or the bus.
• Do you really need to have your wedding in a place far away? Do you really need to have that bachelor party in Las Vegas? When planning such an event, do it in a location that's close to where the majority of your guests live.
• My biggest peeve are people who take a flight for the sole purpose of getting or keeping elite status for an airline. I can understand if poor people in Brazil burn down the rainforest to feed their children; but contributing to climate change in order to keep elite status for an airline?????
• Instead of meeting colleagues from other cities in person, do a video conference.
• Do you really need to fly home on christmas AND thanksgiving? Come on, they are only a month apart!

Use less gasoline
The less you use your car, the better.
• get your engine tuned up and keep the tires of your car properly inflated.
• if you have two cars, chose the one with better gas mileage whenever possible.
• when buying or renting a car, chose the one with the best gas mileage or chose a hybrid car or electric car.
• combine errands into one trip.
• carpool
• use subways or buses instead of your car or a cab.
• for short trips, use a bicycle or walk. It's much better for your health, too.
• avoid unnessary trips.
• use the car's airconditioner sparingly. According to the EPA, your gas consumption increases by 20% whenever your airconditioner is running.
• observe speed limits
• if you can't take public transport to work, telecommute as often as you can. See Telework Coalition.

Shop consciously and don't waste things
• buy fewer things. Every thing you buy needed energy to be produced and used energy to be transported to you.
• buy second-hand.
• choose durable items over disposable ones and if something does break, try to repair it rather than throwing it away.
• give things that you don't want anymore to someone who can use them. For example, give it to a goodwill store or offer it on Freecycle.
• buy energy-efficient appliances (see above).
• buy local produce.
• eat less meat to reduce methane emmisions (methane is one of the greenhouse gases).
• prefer companies that make efforts to reduce their emissions. See www.responsibleshopper.org
• pre-cycle. For more information, see Environmental Defense.

Raise awareness
• Get informed. The more you know about what global warming is, what problems it causes, and what we can do to slow it down, the more you will be able to convince others to make their contribution.
• Talk to others about global warming and what they can do to curb it.
• If it is still playing at a theater near you, watch the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth". Ask others to see it.
• Set a good example with your actions.

Make your voice heard
• vote for the candidate who is more likely to implement measures for the protection of our environment
• support an environmental group, for example the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense, and the Vote Solar Initiative.
• write to your political leaders to urge them to raise fuel economy standards to 40 miles per gallon. Taking this step would save nearly 4 million barrels of oil a day.
• write to your representatives to support measures that accelerate the use of clean, renewable energy sources such as solar and wind
• Join the STOP GLOBAL WARMING VIRTUAL MARCH and Renew US.
• make your city a cool city.

Donate and invest your money
• purchase carbon offsets to neutralize your emissions, for example from WindBuilders.
• support the preservation of forests around the world. Trees remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
• donate money to an environmental organization (see above).
• invest your money into alternative energy. See New Alternatives Fund.

If you have a house or want to buy or build one
• generate your own electricity by using solar panels. Creating energy with solar panels creates no carbon dioxide.
• if you can't or don't want to have solar panels on your roof, switch to an energy provider that generates at least half of its power from wind, solar energy, or other clean sources. Even if you can't chose your energy provider, you may still be able to support green power through an option on your electricity bill. See Green-E,
• plant shade trees around your house -- they will absorb carbon dioxide and reduce the usage of your airconditioners in the summer.
• make sure your house is insulated well.
• install new windows that meet or exceed the EnergyStar specifications. Look for a U-factor of 0.35 or lower and a Solar Heat Gain Coefficient of 0.35 or lower.

If you own a business
• check out ClimateBiz to learn what your company can do to protect the climate and why it should do that.
• also have a look at Clean Air - Cool Planet, and the GHG Protocol Initiative.

Websites about global warming (a small selection)

One Degree Climate Change – website on climate change by the Weather Channel

www.read-the-truth.com

Climate Crisis

Natural Resources Defense Council

Clean Air - Cool Planet

Co-op America

Environmental Defense

Fight Global Warming (Environmental Defense)

Union of Concerned Scientists

StopGlobalWarming.org

EPA's global warming website for children

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Research on global warming
Philip Boffey wrote a very good review of the research on global warming and its impact on the climate and environment. It was published in July 2006 on the New York Times website. Below is an excerpt from the article. You can get the full text here, if you are subscriber to TimesSelect.

Excerpt from: THE EVIDENCE ON GLOBAL WARMING (by Philip Boffey)
While the debate over what to do about global warming heats up even faster than the environment, scientists have made substantial progress in recent years in defining the threat and estimating its likely impacts. The picture they paint is worrisome. The evidence suggests that humans are altering the atmosphere in ways never before seen. The only question is how damaging the consequences might be, and what can be done to head off or adapt to the worst.
The research requires great sophistication and care because of the complexity of the Earth's climatic system. The world has been in a warming phase since the end of the Little Ice Age, a prolonged cooling period, in the mid-19th century. Scientists have to try to disentangle this natural trend from the additional warming that man is creating by burning fossil fuels that emit heat-trapping greenhouse gases or by cutting down trees that would otherwise remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Scientists used to think it might take decades before we had a clear signal of man-made global warming. Even then, they thought it would probably be hidden in esoteric data that few laymen could understand. Yet now all sorts of things seem to be happening right in front of our eyes — shrinking glaciers, thinning sea ice at the North Pole, huge chunks breaking off the Antarctic ice sheets, intense hurricanes, and scorching heat waves in Europe, to name a few. Are these signs that the adverse impacts of human-caused warming have arrived sooner than once expected?
Skeptics say these things are most likely part of the natural variation of Earth's climate, unrelated to man-made warming. And no definitive answer is yet possible for many of these dramatic events that symbolize the global warming threat in popular discourse. Given the dreadful possibilities that perfectly legitimate worst-case scenarios imply, there would be no excuse for failing to act under any circumstances. But given the huge potential consequence of the debate, it's important to examine all the evidence carefully. So let's look at the various pieces of the global warming debate one at a time.

The Consensus
The biggest question is the one on which there is least dispute. The leading scientific organizations with relevant expertise have overwhelmingly adopted the view that human-induced global warming is a serious problem. The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has mobilized hundreds of scientists to analyze the evidence, has gotten progressively more concerned; it now holds humans responsible for most of the warming observed over the past 50 years. The science academies of the United States and 10 other industrial nations issued a joint statement last year citing "strong evidence that significant global warming is occurring" and calling for "prompt action" to combat it. The American Meteorological Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Geophysical Union have all chimed in with similar statements. Only the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, with deep ties to the fossil fuel industry, has demurred.
Meanwhile, the vast majority of research reports in leading scientific journals tend to support the prevailing view that human activities are mostly responsible for driving up temperatures. [.....] Still, there is plenty of disagreement over how fast the climate will change and how dire the consequences might be. [.....].

Scary Scenarios
Analyses of the gases trapped in ancient ice cores from Antarctica have revealed that important greenhouse gases have reached their highest atmospheric concentrations in at least 650,000 years. The concentrations will only get worse as cars, power plants and other burners of fossil fuels continue to pump carbon dioxide into the air and deforestation and other changes in land use slow the rate at which these gases are withdrawn from the atmosphere. Other things being equal, the rise in these gases will cause temperatures to rise. That's simple physics, agreed to by all sides. What's not agreed to is how worrisome the temperature increase will be. The global average surface temperature rose about 1 degree Fahrenheit over the 20th century. The change hardly seemed noticeable, except in polar regions where the increases were larger. Yet even that seemingly small increase is affecting the global environment by thawing the frozen tundra, melting mountain glaciers, adding to stress on coral reefs, causing some species to change habitats, and increasing the number of hot days while decreasing the number of cold days, to cite a few examples. And the warming trend may be picking up speed. The last few decades of the 20th century were probably the warmest in a thousand years.
Skeptics have an answer for this. They say surface temperatures were probably as high or higher during the Medieval Warm Period that ushered in the last millennium, well before humans emitted vast amounts of greenhouse gases. That suggests to them that today's warming might simply be a continuation of long-term natural cycles. But the magnitude and geographic extent of the warmth back then is uncertain. The high temperatures may have been regional and may not have permeated the whole globe.
And for the rest of this century, temperatures will almost certainly keep rising. The Earth has been storing heat in its oceans, which means there is about 1 degree Fahrenheit more warming in the pipeline that will occur during this century even without any additional greenhouse emissions. All major components of the climate system are warming — the lower atmosphere, the surface, and the seas — so the heating cannot readily be attributed to natural mechanisms that transfer heat from one part of the globe to another. The projections for the future also get far more worrisome than that 1 degree. Various scenarios used by climate modelers suggest that average surface temperatures could easily rise another 4 to 8 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century, based on mid-range projections. That is a level that many experts deem dangerous.
If the warmer climate increases the destructive power of hurricanes and typhoons, as two studies indicate it already has, the storm devastation could get worse on coasts that lie along their traditional paths. If the massive ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica melt faster than long estimated — a trend that some recent studies suggest has already started — the added water could drive up sea levels by several feet in this century, inundating some low-lying coastal areas. If mountain glaciers around the world continue to shrink rapidly, as seems likely, areas that rely on them to store water and release it slowly may face shortages of drinking water. If high temperatures allow disease-carrying insects and plant pests to invade new areas, as some studies show is beginning to happen, or if higher temperatures increase the frequency of heat waves and heavy rainfall, as the world's science academies deem likely, then the health and environmental consequences could be significant. [.....]

Rising Sea Levels: Clear Risk, Uncertain Magnitude
Sea levels have already been rising steadily in a warming world — roughly half a foot over the past century — partly because heat causes water to expand and partly because the water from melting glaciers ultimately finds it way to the sea. There is some evidence that the rate of the rise may be accelerating, but whether this is a trend or a temporary natural fluctuation is not yet clear. Either way, future sea levels are sure to be higher than they are today.
One plausible, middle-of-the-road scenario suggests that, by the end of this century, thermal expansion and glacier water may cause the globe's average sea level to have risen roughly half a foot to a foot and a half. That would cause hardship in low-lying areas, but it would probably be manageable for most of the world.
Some plausible scenarios suggest that sea levels could easily rise by three feet or so by the end of the century. [.....] Then there's a worse-case possibility. The big threat would come if the ice sheets in Greenland or Antarctica were to dump a large portion of their contents into the sea, driving sea levels far higher in centuries to come. That is the nightmare that would bury a huge chunk of Florida under water, force the evacuation of low-lying cities in Asia, and submerge stretches of lower Manhattan — but probably not until some distant era.

Greenland: A Potential Disaster
[.....].

Antarctica: Another Long-Range Danger
The continent at the South Pole is so vast and so frigid it is hard to think of it being endangered by rising temperatures. But worrisome things are happening on the far western fringes of the continent. [.....] It will take time to determine what the long-range future for Antarctic ice will be. Climate models suggest that the continent could actually gain a little ice in this century, through increased snowfall, thereby reducing sea levels slightly. But that projection could change if the current migration of Antarctic ice to the sea continues or accelerates. The worst-case nightmare has long been that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, which is partly grounded on land below sea level, might disintegrate entirely under the combined pressures of higher air temperatures above and warming seas below. If it did, it could release enough ice to raise sea levels by roughly 15 to 18 feet some hundreds of years in the future.

Melting in the Arctic: The Threat Is Here
When it comes to melting ice, the Arctic is getting the most popular attention. Surface temperatures have risen for the past several decades, the sea ice that covers the Arctic Ocean has been thinning and shrinking, and some of the permafrost on land has been thawing. Some scientists predict that, by the end of the century, the Arctic may be completely ice-free in the summer, though not in the winter.
Once again, skeptics argue that there is less than meets the eye. [.....] What has clearly changed is the size and thickness of the floating ice cap. The area covered by sea ice has expanded and contracted over the last century, but in the mid-1970's it started a steep decline toward a record low last year. [.....] The biggest worry is that "feedback processes" may take hold and drive the Arctic into deeper trouble. Ice reflects sunlight back into space but open water absorbs most of the sun's energy. As the water warms up, it melts more ice and exposes more sea to absorb more heat in a cascading process that could become self-sustaining.
The Arctic is subject to so much natural turbulence that some experts believe it may well go through periods in the next few decades when the region cools again and its ice pack grows. But in the long run, computer simulations show, greenhouse gases will dominate over natural causes and will drive the region toward higher temperatures and less ice.

Thawing Permafrost: An Iffy Prognosis
Huge stretches of tundra in the Arctic consists of "permafrost" that is frozen solid for some or all of the year. But over the past several decades, some of the permafrost has thawed, making once-hard roads less usable, damaging buildings, railroads and airport runways in northern Russia, and causing trees and telephone poles to tilt drunkenly in the suddenly soft terrain. This is causing practical problems in areas reliant on more solid footing. [.....] Only a small percentage of the permafrost has degraded so far, but the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment suggested that 10 to 20 per cent of the current permafrost area might degrade over the next hundred years. What impact that would have on the release of greenhouse gases won't be clear until we have more evidence. This is a much more iffy situation than is presented by Greenland and Antarctica, where there is clear reason for concern.

Mountain Glaciers: The Best Evidence
Mountain glaciers are probably the single best indicator of climate change because they are highly responsive to changes in temperature, precipitation and solar radiation. Glaciers are retreating rapidly almost everywhere, including the Himalayas, Alps, Canadian Rockies, Andes, not to mention our own Glacier National Park, the Washington Cascades, and the coast of Alaska. The loss of ice in mid-latitude mountain ranges has been huge. [.....] Naysayers are right when they point out that glaciers have been retreating in an irregular pattern since the end of the Little Ice Age. But the melting seems to have accelerated in recent years and some leading glaciologists think the 20th-century retreat lies outside the range of normal climate variability. [.....]

Kilimanjaro: Dubious Evidence
Africa's tallest mountain, 19,000-foot-high Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, has become a favorite icon of those concerned about global warming. But this is one case in which the link is debatable. [.....] There is no doubt that the glaciers are disappearing. One expert who has studied the mountain closely calculates that the glaciers could be entirely gone in 10 to 15 years. He puts at least part of the blame on global warming. But other scientists have considerable doubt that rising temperatures have been the main culprit. [.....]

Hurricanes: An Unsettled Question
The ravages of Hurricane Katrina last year triggered an outpouring of popular speculation that global warming had already begun to wreak havoc in the form of extreme storms. Hurricanes and typhoons (the name used in the Pacific) draw their energy from warm surface waters, so it is only logical that as the waters warm up, hurricanes should become more powerful. Yet climate scientists on all sides of the global warming debate say it is a mistake to blame any one storm on global warming let alone carbon dioxide emissions. The debate now raging among experts is whether the intensity of hurricanes and of typhoons have increased beyond normal bounds in recent years, and if so, why. Is it global warming or other more traditional drivers, like vertical wind shears and rotational flows in the atmosphere? The issue is difficult to resolve because our understanding of hurricane formation is still rudimentary and historical data on hurricanes is sketchy. [.....] Two separate scientific papers last year shocked meteorologists by reporting an increase in the destructive power of the big storms over the past few decades, well before any such effect had been anticipated. [.....] Other specialists disagree. They see no sustained increase in hurricane intensity and attribute hurricane behavior mostly to cyclical changes in the atmospheric conditions that hatch hurricanes rather than global warming. This is very much an unsettled issue, with eminent leaders of the field staking out contrary positions.

Biological Impacts: A Clear and Present Danger
The United Nations assessments have already documented a wide range of impacts on living things and the ecosystems they inhabit. Various plants, insects, birds and fish in the northern hemisphere have shifted their ranges toward the north or to higher elevations as those areas become warmer and more welcoming to them. Some plants are flowering earlier, migratory birds are returning earlier, and the growing season is growing longer in higher latitudes.
There are spirited debates over how deleterious these changes are but some of the changes are clearly harmful to some forms of life. In the Netherlands, migratory birds and the caterpillars their chicks feed on have responded at different rates to rising temperatures, with the result that chick hatching is now out of sync with the peak caterpillar food supply. In Canada, the mountain pine beetle has moved northward into areas once too cold for it, where it has devastated the pines in a wide area of forest. And on the North Sea coast of Britain, tens of thousands of seabirds failed to raise any young in a massive breeding failure in 2004. The event, whose cause and extent is still being investigated, was likely due to rising water temperatures that, by reducing the abundance of plankton, also reduced the abundance of small fish that the seabirds feed upon.
The greater worry is that some species may be pushed toward extinction. Reputable scientists are predicting that extinctions may occur on a massive scale as species fail to adapt or move quickly enough to cope with rising temperatures. Skeptics, on the other hand, see signs that many species will move more rapidly into previously cold areas than they will retreat from warmer areas, with the result that they will actually extend their ranges and thus become more resistant to extinction.
Still, some birds and other creatures are clearly suffering adverse effects already. The fate of many species may depend on whether the rate of climate change accelerates, making it harder for them to adapt quickly.

Polar Bears in Peril: An Emerging Risk
[.....] The real concern is whether further warming and shrinkage of sea ice might drive the bears to extinction. Optimists note that polar bears have existed as a distinct species for some 200,000 to 250,000 years and have already made it through a comparably warm period in the distant past without disappearing entirely. But the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, conducted by nations with lands in the Arctic, concluded that polar bears are unlikely to survive as a species if there is an almost complete loss of summer sea ice, as some climate models predict may happen before the end of this century. [.....].

Staring Into the Future
With all of the most prestigious scientific organizations convinced that global warming is an increasing menace — and with the vast majority of research articles in leading scientific journals tending to support that consensus — it would seem wildly irresponsible not to believe it is important to curb emissions. These are the institutions with the most expertise, and they have been studying the issue in unparalleled depth and breadth. Their judgment deserves the utmost respect and attention. That doesn't make it necessary to accept every piece of evidence that's offered. It's possible that in looking so hard for patterns in the data, some experts might be overstating the importance of short-term changes in the environment.
We may not know for decades whether grave harm is on the way, but meanwhile we may be adding hundreds of new coal-fired power plants around the world to meet rising energy needs, locking ourselves into a vast carbon-emitting infrastructure that will last for many decades. The world keeps pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in what amounts to a huge uncontrolled experiment, and a gamble that all will turn out fine. But if even the more moderate projections of global warming turn out to be true, we will be gambling the well being of later generations for short-term advantage. And if the worst-case scenarios turn out to be accurate, we could be dooming much of the planet to a very unpleasant future.

Lela Moore contributed research for this article.

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