The role of CO2 in global warming

Lê Lan Lam – USTH BI3-044
Writing project 2: The role of CO2 in global warming
Nowaday, climate change and global warming are very urgent problems of the world. There are many mixed opinions about the role of CO2 in those processes. Most of people – such as Rosanne Skirble write in “Scientists 95% Certain Climate Change Is Man-made”, or GPWayne with the article “Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming” – believe that CO2 is the main factor and human – who release majority of greenhouse gases – are the culprits. But some argue that it just it contributes only a small fraction and current climate predicting models just hype things up – like Lewis Page proposed the NASA researcher’s proof.
The amount of CO2 and the other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are raising, it is a truism. Both Wayne and Page gave the data of NOAA about the concentration of CO2 and claimed that it has increased by half since mid-19th century due to human activities. Everyone agrees that human is the main source of greenhouse gases. Skirble cited from Brenda Ekwurzel, a senior climate scientist, that the warming happened since 1951, and more than half of its causes are due to human activities: “the burning of fossil fuels in factories, buildings and cars, are emitting heat-trapping gasses”.
Some researchs indicated in articles of Skirble and Wayne also pointed out the closed relationship between the disasters, climate change, global warming and the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere and accuse the CO2 as the critical element and human are blamed to cause the warming up of The Earth. Wayne talked about the spectroscopy to show that CO2 is the main perpetrators causing the increases in temperature on the planet by trapping energy at very specific wavelengths, while othergreenhouse gases trap different wavelengths.
In the other hand, Page mentioned an experiment of NASA to prove the opposite opinion. Lahouari Bounoua of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Cente acquainted CO2 participates in photosynthesis process of the plants, means that it can not stay in the atmosphere long enough to make our planet warm up as much as people thought. All of the current climate models did not simulative enough and gave the hasty conclusions. The NASA and NOAA scientist used an more accurate method to calculate the change of the temperature if the amount of CO2 comes up 780 ppm, and the result is quite supprising. The temperature of this assuming world just rise 1.64oC. But with the involvement of photosynthesis in plants, the access is just 1.34oC. Bounoua and her colleagues pointed out that the target of UN to keep the raise of temperature at maximum 2°C does not mean holding CO2 rate to 450 ppm, because CO2 rate does not play a critical role as they thought. She also said that it is impossible to keep the number less than 450 ppm.
To sum up, we have an agreement about the increase of CO2 but there is argument in the role of CO2 in global warming. Rosanne Skirble and GPWayne said that CO2 is the main culprit, while Lewis Page protest that.