Climate Change and the Nuclear Option

Berkeley Scientific: the journal of young scientists

article

Matt Lundy

关键词: nuclear power;    anthropogenic global warming;    nuclear fission;    renewable energy;   

DOI  :  10.5070/BS3231042197

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: University of California, Berkeley

【 摘 要 】

Unlike the theoretical dangers of nuclear holocaust or worldwide pandemic, climate change is a real threat thatmight soon cause irreversible devastationto humanity. Climate change is happeningnow, and if we wait for its more overt effects to be revealed before we act, it mightbe too late to avoid disaster. As such, it is ofvital importance that policymakers and thegeneral public alike understand the urgentthreat it poses and how best to tackle it.There is an overwhelming amount ofevidence to suggest that current climatechange is being caused by human activity.For roughly the last 150 years, the Earthhas been rapidly getting hotter (Fig.1).1This temperature increase lines up withthe huge amounts of carbon dioxide thatfossil fuel consumption—as a byproductof burning coal, oil, and natural gas—anddeforestation—resulting from decreasedcarbon absorption—have released into theatmosphere over the same time period. Asa greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide in theatmosphere absorbs and re-emits infraredradiation, which causes warming. With noother likely candidate as a plausible causeof the huge increase in temperature (Earth’sorbit, the sun, volcanoes, ozone and aerosolpollution all fail to fit the bill), human-produced carbon dioxide has taken the mantle of responsibility for the recent globalwarming.

【 授权许可】

Unknown