Global Warming Global Warming

GLOBAL GLOBAL WARMING WARMING Its IMPACT and SOLUTIONS

UNDERSTANDING GLOBAL WARMING To fully understand what is meant by global warming and climate change the greenhouse effect must first be understood. The greenhouse effect is the process where solar radiation (short wavelength radiation) from the sun reaches the earth’s surface where it’s converted to heat energy (long wavelength radiation). The majority of sunlight is absorbed by the earth’s surface (landmass and water) and warms it, whilst the rest is reflected by the earth back into space. Polar ice reflects 90% of solar radiation back into space, whereas water absorbs 90% of the energy it receives. In addition, the warm surface of the earth emits long wavelength radiation (infrared) and this is absorbed by the greenhouse gases (a natural as well as manmade part of the earth’s atmosphere which have the ability

IPACTS OF THE WARMING • GLOBAL TEMPERATURES WILL INCREASE FROM 1.1 TO 6.4 DEGREES IN NEXT 100 YEARS • Rise by 0.8 degrees- ocean warming, arctic ice cap melting, species extinction , extreme weather events. • 1 degree rise- coral reefs destroyed, island nations under water. • 2 degree rise- Greenland melts, polar bears extinct, water supply affected.

Increasing temperatures • 3 degree rise-

environmental refugees, food shortage, amazon collapses

• 4 degree rise- millions of refugees, 1/3 rd of bangladesh under water, permafrost melts releasing gases • 5 degree rise- most of the world uninhabitable, earth hotter than in 55 million years • 6 degree rise- mass extinction

SAVE OUR PLANET !!

We are not passive spectators, but active contestants in the drama of our existence. We need to take responsibility for the kind of life we create for ourselves - Nathaniel Branden, Ph.D.

GLOBAL WARMING COULD BE WORSE THAN… • • • •

WAR FAMINE PLAGUE GLOBAL NUCLEAR WAR

TECHNOLOGIES AVAILABLE TO CURB GLOBAL WARMING • • • • • • • • •

SOLAR ENERGY WIND ENERGY VERTICAL FARMING CLOUD SEEDING BLACKLE BIO-FUELS CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE ENHANCING CARBON SINKS MODIFYING AGRICULTURAL PRACTICES

The Solar Power • Solar Towers can be constructed to power an entire city. • The tower has photosensitive cells on all sides • The tower is surrounded by mirrors • The cost of such towers is too steep, hence it has become a challenge for engineers.

The only technology comparable in efficiency of conversion of sunlight is the solar engine running on high-temperature heat, produced by a solar concentrator (a focusing trough or dish). This technology was commercialized for a brief time not very long ago with the help of subsidies and will probably return.

Portable Solar Chargers • These small size chargers are handy and portable • They can fit into your pocket and charge everything from mobile phones to ipods

Wind Energy Wind power—growing globally for the past decade at about 30 percent per year—is playing a substantial role in several countries, notably Germany and Denmark. • The spaces between turbines on land can be used in many ways, including for agriculture and grazing. • To be practical for large-scale use in electrical grids, intermittent renewable energy sources are best combined with energy storage technologies as well as energy supply technologies that can fluctuate in output yet can also operate a large fraction of the time.

Land between turbines can be used for agriculture, grazing, and other purposes.

Vertical Farms • With increase in urbanization arable land is decreasing quickly • A Feasible solution for the future is construction of vertical farms which will solve the problem of food scarcity for under developed nations and provide clean air at the same time • The construction of such farms will be a civil engineering challenge but its results will be • phenomenal

Cloud seeding • A fleet of unmanned , self propelled vessels crossing the world’s oceans and seeding clouds by misting sea water high into the air has been proposed to reduce sunlight and hence global warming. • Just a thousand ships like these (called the albedo yachts by the designers) will check temperature rise due to global CO2 doubling . • Scientists still have to determine the side effects on the rain cycle due to excess clouds

BLACKLE  Blackle is a custom Google search whose screen is predominantly black.  Saves fair bit of energy due to its popularity, 750 Megawatt to be precise.  According to the website the site has saved around 413,523.067 watt hours till date.

‘BLACKLE’ Homepage

CO2 gobbling Plankton • By adding nutrients like iron or urea ,or by pumping deepsea water to the ocean surface ,ocean fertilizers could stimulate CO 2 – gobbling plankton blooms ,like the natural red tides in New Zealand

Bio-fuels • The extra plankton produced by artificial means can be put to good use due to a new development in the technology used for producing bio-fuels from algae

Carbon capture and storage • Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a plan to mitigate climate change by capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) from large point sources such as power plants and subsequently storing it away safely instead of releasing it into the atmosphere. Technology for capturing of CO2 is already commercially available for large CO2 emitters, such as power plants. Storage of CO2, on the other hand is a relatively untried concept and as yet (2007) no powerplant operates with a full carbon capture and storage system.

Carbon storage Acid – gas injections in Alberta, Canada, As a sulfur disposal strategy co-store hydrogen sulphide & carbondioxide.

Studying cement seals in old wells clarifies risks of CO2 leakage underground.

Advantages of carbon storage • CCS applied to a modern conventional power plant could reduce CO2 emissions to the atmosphere by approximately 80-90% compared to a plant without CCS. • Storage of the CO2 is envisaged either in deep geological formations, deep oceans, or in the form of mineral carbonates. Geological formations are currently considered the most promising, and these are estimated to have a storage capacity of at least 2000 Gt CO2. IPCC (Inter governmental Panel on Climate Change) estimates that the economic potential of CCS could be between 10% and 55% of the total carbon mitigation effort until year 2100.

Carbon storage facility

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At this facility in Algeria, excess CO2 is removed

from natural gas for injection underground.

ENHANCED NATURAL SINKS • Enhancing natural sinks entails fostering the biological absorption of carbon and increasing its storage above and below the ground by, for example, reducing deforestation, creating new forest plantations on nonforested land, or expanding conservation tillage. • Conversion of natural vegetation annually tilled cropland has resulted in the loss of more than 50 billion tons of carbon from the world’s soils over historical time

Natural carbon sinks can be enhanced by creating forest plantations, such as this pine stand in Angus, Scotland.

Modifying agricultural practices The world could take some pressure off the energy system by modifying the agricultural practices on nearly one-fifth of all cropland to bring about conservation tillage. It could create 60 million hectares of sustainable plantations on nonforested land and set a new course to eliminate tropical deforestation within 50 years.

Replacing burnt-out incandescent bulbs with fluorescent ones could be one of a handful of significant beginning steps toward reduced CO2 emissions.

CONCLUSION Today we are senselessly exploiting our resources and enjoying ourselves. This has to stop. All we have to do is cut down on our exploitation in all possible ways, live a simple lifestyle, revert to what Gandhiji told us almost a hundred years ago, be sensitive to nature’s needs and remove from our lives ,everything that is unnecessary.

Made By: ASHWINI ZOMAN QUAID VOHRA NEPOLIAN WAGHMARE HRISHIKESH WAYKER MECHANICAL DEPPT.

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