Global Warming Reports
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Executive Summary
The
early effects of global warming are already evident across the United
States and worldwide. The year 2005 was the
warmest on record. Left unchecked, temperatures will continue to rise, and the
effects of global warming will become more severe. This report examines trends
in U.S. global warming pollution nationally and by state and concludes that the
failure to limit emissions from burning oil, coal, and natural gas has allowed
global warming pollution to grow out of control.
Human
activities over the last century –primarily burning fossil fuels – have changed
the composition of the atmosphere in ways that threaten to dramatically alter
the climate in the years to come. In a December 2005 speech, James Hansen,
director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, stated, “The Earth’s
climate is nearing, but has not passed, a tipping point, beyond which it will
be impossible to avoid climate change with far ranging undesirable
consequences.” These consequences, he said, would “constitute practically a different
planet” and include sea level rise, heat waves, drought, more intense
hurricanes, decreased crop yields, water scarcity, and the spread of infectious
diseases.
The
United States is by far the largest worldwide contributor to global warming,
releasing a quarter of the world’s carbon dioxide, the primary global warming
pollutant. Power plants, cars, and light trucks are the largest U.S.
sources of carbon dioxide. Existing technology could substantially reduce
global warming pollution by making power plants and factories more efficient,
making cars go farther on a gallon of gasoline, and shifting the country to
clean, renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar, geothermal, and
biomass.
These
solutions also would reduce our dependence on oil, reduce air pollution,
protect pristine places from oil drilling and mining, and save consumers money.
Unfortunately, the United States
has rejected mandatory limits on global warming pollution, opting instead to
allow global warming pollution to increase unabated. As a result, carbon
dioxide emissions have skyrocketed nationally and in most states.
Using
data compiled by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, this report examines trends
in carbon dioxide emissions and fossil fuel combustion nationally and by state
for the four decades spanning 1960 to 2001.
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