Climate Education
Continue to read all about the climate crisis. In Global Crisis and Regional Issues, you can learn about the science behind global warming and about how the changing climate will impact New Jersey and the rest of the world. Luckily, we know what we need to do to stop this. See our Mitigation and Adaptation pages to read about the steps we need to take to prevent catastrophe, and discover what you can do to help.
Our climate is in crisis. For more than 200 years, human beings have been burning fossil fuels and dumping carbon dioxide and other planet-heating gases into our atmosphere. Greenhouse gases have now reached double pre-industrial levels — levels that have not been seen for tens of thousands of years. The result has been rapidly rising global temperatures and spreading climate chaos in our world.
The greenhouse effect is the biggest cause of global warming, showing how the gasses that we release from modern processes translate to a warming atmosphere. At normal levels, carbon dioxide emitted is reabsorbed by Earth’s natural carbon sinks: forests and the ocean. However, as factories, vehicles, and agriculture emit greenhouse gasses like CO2 and methane, these gasses build up in our atmosphere, trapping heat that would otherwise escape into space. Evidence for this includes direct temperature measurements, shrinking ice sheets, and changing animal migration patterns. The science is clear; climate change is real, it is caused by humans, and it is happening right now.
The Global Crisis
Our climate is in crisis. For more than 200 years, human beings have been burning fossil fuels and dumping carbon dioxide and other planet-heating gases into our atmosphere. Greenhouse gases have now reached double pre-industrial levels — levels that have not been seen for tens of thousands of years. The result has been rapidly rising global temperatures and spreading climate chaos in our world.
Click through the pages below to read all about the climate crisis. In Global Crisis and Regional Issues, you can learn about the science behind global warming and about how the changing climate will impact New Jersey and the rest of the world. Luckily, we know what we need to do to stop this. See our Mitigation and Adaptation pages to read about the steps we need to take to prevent catastrophe, and discover what you can do to help.