By: Jaikeshan TAKCHANDRA

Reg #: 13/0933/1323

Assignment No. 002

April 8, 2015

Department of Civil Engineering

Faculty of Technology

EMN 3201: Literature Review Lecturer: Mr. M. Kanhai

The Burning Of Fossil Fuels Is Not the

Main Reason for Global Warming

UNIVERSITY OF GUYANA

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1.0 Literature review

1.1 Background
During the day, the earth is warmed by incoming radiation from the sun and cooled at night by
outgoing radiation. Ideally, this effectively corresponds to the earth being neither warmed up nor
cooled down, in respect of equilibrium. However, while incoming radiation is able to penetrate the
earths atmosphere (mainly nitrogen and oxygen), outgoing radiation is trapped by a blanket of
gas in the atmosphere (specifically the stratosphere). This property of the gases allow them to act
like a greenhouse and they are thus referred to as greenhouse gases (GHGs). Without this
greenhouse effect, the earth will be 33C cooler than its current average temperature rendering
earth uninhabitable (Waugh, 2005).
During the last two centuries, there has been an increase in global temperatures that can be argued
as being related to the greenhouse effect i.e. the earth is being able to trap more energy from the
sun thus heating up.
1.2 Rationale
Scientists have spent a great deal of time over the last decades trying to determine what is causing
global warming. They have examined influences from natural events that promote these climatic
conditions and have concluded that the amount and pattern of global warming cannot be explained
by these factors alone. One way, and perhaps the only, is to consider anthropogenic activities that
propagate global warming. These include the burning of fossil fuels and release of aerosols,
increase in world population and business activities and the growth of the agricultural and
industrial sectors. Many scientists argue that the burning of fossil fuels and release of carbon
dioxide (CO2) is the main cause for global warming. But, is this true?
The following chapters examine an alternative route to explain global warming, based on other
natural and manmade activities. They are perhaps contributing factors that add up to the total effect
of global warming, and the incidence of one provides for the development of another.
1.3 The warming paradox
The earth, in its 4.6 billion years of revolving around the sun, has experienced an ever
evolving diversification in life forms and physical nature. It is thought, with archeological
and carbon dating proofs, that the earth was once frozen and completely covered in ice
about 650 million years ago. Compared to its present state of thermal diversity, the
evidence suggests that the earth has been warming up for millions of years in the past
(Richard et al., 2007). The National Aeronautics and Space Association (NASA) has
conducted studies that explain the earth being frozen and thawed before in the past, and its
current thermal state is perhaps another cycle of the freeze-thaw system. This implies that
there exists a thermal imbalance in the earths equilibrium, as ironic as it sounds. Based on
the theory of evolution, which forms the basis for greenhouse effect, the earth is cooling
down from its surface inwards from the time it was merely gas and dust at the dawn of its
formation. Therefore the melting of a vast majority of the ice 650 million years ago can be
thought of as being caused by the warming up of the surface of the earth i.e. global
warming. This warming effect can be dated back to 650 million years ago and beyond, and
who is it to say that now, the earth has reached a state of thermal equilibrium, where the
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heat it loses from its core is equally balanced by the heat developed from global warming
and the greenhouse effect? Newtowns Law of Thermal Cooling can scientifically illustrate
that the exponential rate of thermal increase on the earth does not correlate to the modern
human era, and suggests to a reasonable extent that earth is still warming up.
The flaw in this finding is that the theories do not cater for the higher than predicted rates
of warming since it would cause incongruence with the original hypothesis. It is worthy to
note that perhaps human activities, as will be seen in the coming topics, are speeding up
the warming up of the earth (Peterson & Rohrer, 2015).
1.4 Other GHGs
Similar research on this topic has revealed is that there are several GHGs that are capable
of heat trapping and global warming. Some of these are water vapour, methane (from
animal and solid waste), nitrous oxide (from agriculture farmlands and fertilizers) and
chlorofluorocarbons, CFCs (from air conditioning, aerosols and foams). The
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), through the National Geographics
environmental forums have identified that these gases have different heat trapping abilities
and is found in a collective amount totalling almost a quarter of the total world atmospheric
GHGs concentration. This means that more than 20% by volume of the GHGs are CFCs,
methane and nitrous oxide all together. The IPCC also describes methane as producing
twenty times more warming than CO2, nitrous oxide as being three hundred times more
powerful than CO2 and CFCs (which have been banned in many parts of the world) as
being on the magnitude of a thousand times more powerful at trapping heat than CO2. CO2
is calculated as being 72% by composition of all greenhouse gases (Waugh, 2005), but the
power of the other GHGs can collectively add up to be significantly more than expected.
While the large volume of CO2 might be an overriding factor when considering the total
amounts of GHGs in the atmosphere, present day conditions are leading to an increase in
the amounts of nitrous oxide and methane to fulfill the demands of an exponentially
growing population and highly stressed demands for food from the agriculture markets.
Moreover, large cities such and Mexico and Rio de Jinero disposing colossal amounts of
garbage every minute adding to methane release, and the ever expanding need to provide
more air conditioning and cool cities in response to rising global temperatures is adding
more CFCs to the atmosphere.
1.5 Urbanisation and albedo
In the early twentieth century, the developed nations of the world experienced large
construction booms that have continued to flourish until the present day as population
continues to expand. In response, the need to construct new housing, commercial offices
and large skyscrapers for trade and business, large and complex networks for road, parking
lots and tarmacs, and parks for recreational purposes have become utmost importance. This
has largely interfered with the reflective and absorptive nature of the ground by allowing
more incoming sunlight to be reflected back into the atmosphere (albedo ratio) and by
allowing greater retention of heat that remains even after sunset. The causes cites to be well
over 3C -5C hotter than normal areas and has become a work prohibitive factor in some
cities such as Sao Paulo, Brazil. When all the albedo surfaces are added up globally, a large
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area to reflect massive amount of sunlight is revealed which aids in the amount of heat
being trapped. Minus these surfaces, the heat will be directly absorbed into the earth
lithosphere leading to cooler cities (Pickering & Owen, 1994).
1.6 Deforestation
Many scientist who believe that CO2 release as a result of the burning of fossil fuels, think
that it can be conquered by recycling this CO2 especially since the world solely depends
of fossil fuels for energy source. The only system that provides large scale recycling of
CO2 is photosynthesis, via forest and ecosystems of plants and trees. A tree can recycle
one ton of CO2 throughout its lifetime (Evans, 2014) multiply this by the millions of
trees nationally, the fifty tons ((et.al)Canadell, 2007) of excess CO2 release each year can
be significantly combatted. Sadly, thousands of trees are being but down each day for use
in lumber, paper, medicinal and agricultural productions, without being replaced. There are
a number of protocols that have been developed globally to reduce the amount of trees
being cut down but the destruction is beyond repair in an effective timeframe.
As a result, the rate at which CO2 can be recycled into oxygen is drastically reduced to the
point where sustainable management and reforestation of trees will only prevent the
remaining reserves from being depleted.
1.7 Synergistic approach to global warming activities
Synergism is a concept that describes the combined effects of a phenomenon or system as
being greater than the sum of their separate effects. An approach to explain the greenhouse
effect on global warming is to consider the combined effects of the aforementioned
activities in relation to human activities. The postulation that human activities has a large
influence on the propagation of global warming effects is seen in the works of Peterson and
Rohrer - the increase in population and industrialization activities are fuelling global
warming, or rather speeding it up. Urbanization is largely increasing the amount of albedo,
making cities hotter and is providing more cloud formation that traps heat. Large amounts
of solid waste from these cities, in dump sites and garbage disposal systems are producing
more and more methane gas. The need to provide proper ventilation and sanitation aerosols
is increasing the usage of CFCs and other powerful greenhouse gases in air conditioning
units in order to stay cool. The growing demand for food is increasing the use of fertilizers
and livestock rearing that in turn increases nitrous oxide and methane contents on a large
scale. Deforestation is slowly depleting the recycling rate of CO2 in the atmosphere, and
altogether, the depletion of the ozone layer by the same is allowing more sunlight in the
form of high energy radio wave to penetrate out atmosphere effectively heating up the earth
more. This, coupled with the devastating greenhouse effects of the burning of fossil fuels
to produce energy, is releasing large amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere thus proliferating
the effects of global warming.

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References
(Style: Harvard Anglia 1st Edition)

I.

(ET.AL)CANADELL, 2007. PNAS. NY: UCS.

II.

EPA, 2014. Causes of Climate Change. [Online] Available at:

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/causes.html [Accessed 31 March 2015].

III.

EVANS, E., 2014. Trees. [Online] Available at:

http://www.ncsu.edu/project/treesofstrength/treefact.htm [Accessed 1 April 2015].

IV.

JENKINS, A., SHAFTEL , H. & JACKSON , , 2015. A blanket around Earth. [Online] Available
at: http://climate.nasa.gov/causes/ [Accessed 29 March 2015].

V.

VI.

VII.

VIII.
IX.

X.

KUMAR, R., 2011. Research Methodology - a step-by-step guide for beginners. 3rd ed. New
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Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change. IPCC Fourth
Assessment Report: Climate Change 2007. Geneva, Switzerland: IPCC.
PETERSON, A.-K. & ROHRER, J., 2015. The main cause of global warming. [Online] Available
at: http://timeforchange.org/main-cause-of-global-warming-solutions [Accessed 31 March
2015].

PICKERING, C. & OWEN, L., 1994. Global Environmental Issues. NY: Routledge.
RICHARD, B., LENTON, T. & WILLIAMS, H., 2007. Neoproterzoic 'snowball Earth'
glaciations and the evolution of altruism. UK: Univesity of East Anglia Uni. of East Anglia.
WAUGH, D., 2005. Geography: An Integrated Approach. Thirds ed. London: Nelson Thornes.