Global Warming/Climate Change

Global Warming/Climate Change
Before we get into the specifics, lets define the terms global warming and climate change. Global warming or the greenhouse effect is a more specific term that refers to a gradual increase in planet-wide temperatures which is now well documented and accepted by scientists as fact. It is the warming of the lower atmosphere which is a result of the increase of a number of gases that have been classified as greenhouse gases. It is a specific type of climate change. Climate change is a broader term that refers to the long-term change in the average climate of the planet, Changes in regional climate characteristics, including temperature, humidity, rainfall, wind, and severe weather events (differencebetween.net).
The average person in America first heard about the threat of global warming through Al Gore’s “an inconvenient truth” documentary. The tragic part about that situation was that there were so many people that were going to disagree with him just because he was a member of certain political party. To this day, no matter how far or how thoroughly the issue has been researched, there are still some people out there that choose to ignore it just because of Al Gore bringing that issue to mainstream.
According to the website solar-center.stanford, “A panel convened by the U.S National Research Council, the nation's premier science policy body, in June 2006 voiced a "high level of confidence" that Earth is the hottest it has been in at least 400 years, and possibly even the last 2,000 years. It is believed that over 7 billion tons of carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere yearly by human activity. That is a tremendous amount of CO2. Studies indicate that the average global surface temperature has increased by approximately 0.5-1.0°F (0.3-0.6°C) over the last century. This is the largest increase in surface temperature in the last 1,000 years and scientists are predicting an even greater increase over this century.”...