Diamond Davis

Environmental Issue Paper

10/16/11

Earth has been warming since the 1800s, before that it was cooling. Earth has been going
through these cycles for 100s of millions of years (EPA, 2011). Global warming is the hypothesis
that human interaction with nature and the burning of fossil fuels have greatly added to the past
century's warming and if this continues warming the results would be disastrous (EPA, 2011).
But the hard evidence for this doesn't exists; what is considered hard evidence is almost
meaningless. Based on atmospheric composition, tropical storms, and glacier retreats they all
show that global warming is not valid.

Many believe that in time there will be too much carbon dioxide in the air. In actuality
nitrogen makes up 71.8% of the atmosphere's gases and oxygen makes 20.9%. Those two
combined make up 99% of the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide only makes up .035% of it (FSU,
2011). So a small amount like that will not greatly affect the biosphere.

There is no evidence that shows the correlation between hurricanes and global warming.
Back in 2006 a large number of severe Atlantic hurricanes added to the debate to whether global
warming was to blame. The University of Virginia climatologists conducted a study that
examined the water temperatures along the path of storms. In the study they found that the
strength of a hurricane was not directly related to water temperatures. Storms are not increasing
because of global warming.

Diamond Davis
Environmental Issue Paper
10/16/11

Almost every person that believes global warming is real uses glacier retreats as an
example. There are more than 150,000 glaciers and only 200 have mass data available on them.
Glaciers shrink because the rate of water loss is greater than the rate of water addition (Pearlman,
2011). Those that believe glacier retreating is a problem explain this evidence as a result of
global warming, this is not a valid argument because this data is coming from data based on 42
glaciers that have at least 10 years of data (Dears, 2006). That is not enough glaciers or time to
make a conclusion on glacier retreats being caused by global warming.

The scientific argument in this paper is rather straightforward. Based on atmospheric

composition, hurricanes, and glaciers retreating there is not enough evidence to suffice global
warming is happening.

Diamond Davis
Environmental Issue Paper
10/16/11

Works Cited Page

Florida State University Meteorology. 2011. Atmospheric Composition.
http://www.met.fsu.edu/orgs/explores/atmcomp.html Oct. 16 2011.
Pearlman, H. 2011. Science for Changing a World http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthglacier.html
Oct. 16 2011.
Dears, D. 2006. TS August.
http://www.tsaugust.org/Global_Warming_Articles_Pg2.htm#Warming Oct. 16 2011.
Samarrai, F. 2011. UVA Today.http://www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/newsRelease.php?id=275 Oct.
16 2011.
Environmental Protection Agency. 2011.
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/downloads/Climate_Basics.pdf Oct. 16 2011.