Causes of Climate Change

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by

James Walters
in
Causes of Climate Change

Here we look at; Fossil Fuels; Deforestation; Farming; and the other causes of climate change from human activities. This is part of our series on helping climate change by Growing, Eating, and Living in a Way That Could Be Sustained Forever.

Welcome to part 2 of our mini series on climate change.

In this mini series, we’ll cover everything from what is climate change, the causes, the effects, and how you can help to stop climate change.

If you already know that it’s important to do something about climate change, here are the things that you can do:

  1. Check out #VoteWithOurMoney with 6 Steps to Help Stop Climate Change
  2. Try the Sustainability Roadmap with 40+ Solutions to Climate Change
  3. Use the Company Directory to Help You Grow, Eat, and Live Sustainably

If you want some more facts before making any decisions, let’s get into the details:

In part 1 we covered What Is Climate Change?

For part 2, we’ll look at the causes of climate change.

We’ll focus on climate change caused by human activity, which is the cause for the current climate crisis.

Fossil Fuels Are the Main Cause of Climate Change

Burning fossil fuels is the main cause of the climate change that we’re experiencing today.

In just the last 200 years, since the start of the industrial revolution, we’ve burnt so much fossil fuels that there’s more CO2 in the atmosphere now than there has ever been in the past 2,000,000 years!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UatUDnFmNTY

Fossil fuels aren’t only used for oil, gas, coal, petrol, and diesel, they’re also used to produce plastics. Plastics pollute our planet and take 1,000s of years to degrade.

Fossil fuels are a relatively new cause of climate change. There are others that have been around for longer.

Deforestation Causes Climate Change

Humans have been cutting down trees for 1,000s of years.

We cut down over 50 billion trees each year. In total, we’ve cut down around 3 trillion trees across the World.

Trees are built from carbon dioxide (CO2), which means they store a LOT of carbon.

Trees also help to create stable environments that allow soil to lock away carbon, in the form of humus.

Half of the world’s rainforests have been cleared, often to make space for monocultures like palm oil.

Deforestation is then linked closely with agriculture as another form of climate change from human activities.

Conventional Farming Has Also Caused Climate Change

For the last 10,000 years, since the dawn of modern agriculture, humans have been ploughing the land.

Ploughing the land might seem like the best way to farm, but it’s actually part of degenerating the land and destroying topsoil.

Every time we plough, we destroy the stable form of soil that locks away carbon, called humus.

Modern science is also showing us that soil is full of life. Every teaspoon of healthy soil is full of billions of microorganisms that work with plants to store carbon in the soil.

This amazing video from NASA is a great example of the huge spike in CO2 levels, around the time that ploughing happens each year, then the reduction in CO2 levels, around the time that plants grow each year:

https://youtu.be/x1SgmFa0r04

Conventional farming also uses artificial fertilisers, which release nitrous oxide that’s 300 times more potent than CO2, and dangerous chemicals such as pesticides. These help to destroy the microorganisms in soil, which means the soil stores less carbon.

We need topsoil to grow food. We also need to avoid disturbing the soil because soil is a bigger carbon pool than the atmosphere and biosphere (plants) combined.

There’s also industrially farmed livestock that release methane, which is 30 times more potent than CO2.

Based on the latest UK Greenhouse Gas Emissions report, agriculture accounts for 10% of emissions, which means there’s a lot of potential to reduce emissions by farming in a different way. Luckily, there’s a proven solution.

Biodynamic Farming and Regenerative Agriculture are methods of farming, without artificial fertilisers and dangerous chemicals, and with minimal ploughing, where livestock and crops work together to create healthy ecosystems that capture carbon, improve soil, and produce highly nutritious food.

Others Causes of Climate Change

Unfortunately, there are plenty of other human activities that cause climate change.

If we look around ourselves, we see products, machines, buildings. For example, the production of cement accounts for 2% of global CO2 emissions.

Based on the latest UK Greenhouse Gas Emissions report:

  1. Transport accounts for 27% of emissions
  2. Energy supply, 21%
  3. Business, 17%
  4. Residential, 15%
  5. Waste management, 4%

Lots of opportunities to reduce emissions by growing, eating, and living in a different way. We’ll be covering those opportunities as part of this mini series.

That’s it for part 2 of our mini series on climate change. In part 3 we’ll look at the effects of climate change.

The most important event in the history of climate change is happening in November 2021, the UN Climate Change Conference Glasgow. What I, you, everyone of us do has an impact on climate change and the decisions that governments make. We don’t need to wait for governments to tell us what to do. We can all make changes to the way we live and how we spend our money, showing that we prioritise people and planet, and those changes will encourage or force businesses and governments to change too.

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Here Is What You Can Do

Want to Continue Your Journey?

Where Next?

There is so much inspiring information to give you ideas of how to help climate change by growing, eating, and living sustainably, you can:

  1. Read Our Articles
  2. Sign-Up to Our Free Email Newsletter
  3. Get Started and Vote with Your Money
  4. Try the Sustainability Roadmap
  5. Use the Company Directory
  6. Support Nafford Junction

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If you are passionate about helping climate change, please consider supporting Nafford Junction, you can:

  1. Become a Patron to Give Regular Contributions
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Sources Used to Create This

  1. Climate change
  2. Detail | 2015 International Year of Soils
  3. How To Sustain Life On Our Planet
  4. Liquid carbon pathway
  5. Final UK greenhouse gas emissions national statistics

Production Notes

This was produced by me, James Walters, as a personal project to help stop climate change by inspiring others to grow, eat, and live sustainably.

Any advice given is the opinion of those involved and does not constitute medical, financial, or legal advice.

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