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The Science and Politics of Global Warming
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20299 |
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Section : |
SPECIAL SECTION
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| Issue
Date : |
7 / 1992 |
3,117 Words |
| Author
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Michael H. Glantz
Michael H. Glantz is head of the Environmental and
Societal Impacts Group at the National Center for Atmospheric
Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado. |
In reassessing the social currents of the past few decades, one could effectively argue that people around the world have entered an age of environmental enlightenment. Indeed, it is somewhat brash to make such a statement, for certainly no one, centuries ago, proclaimed, "we are now entering the Renaissance" or the age of exploration. People did what they felt compelled to do and, later, historians anointed those periods with descriptive labels.
Nevertheless, concern about the state of local, national, and global environments has become widespread: People, from the very young to the elderly, are becoming sensitized to environmental issues. Government leaders, too, are taking environmental issues more seriously, as evidenced by the largest environmental convention ever, at what the Brazilians call ECO '92, the Earth Summit.
Popular attention has focused primarily on three key environmental issues of global concern: global warming of the atmosphere, depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer, and tropical deforestation. These issues are connected to each other. Deforestation and fire have been integrally linked to increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide. The chemicals that deplete stratospheric ozone, called chlorofluorocarbons or CFCs, are also efficient greenhouse gases.
People have become interested in the global warming issue because of its potential impacts on ecosystems and economies. For most of the 1980s, the possible consequences of global warming that were reported in the media could be classified as worst-case possibilities. In the late 1980s, however, there was a backlash against the speculation that global warming was
... (1992 of 20112 Characters)
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