How are humans causing global warming?
The main human activity which is thought to be a cause of global warming is the burning of fossil fuels, which includes coal, petroleum (a.k.a. oil), and natural gas (methane). When these are burned, they release carbon dioxide, which is a greenhouse gas, meaning that it tends to trap heat, because it is transparent to visible light but opaque to infrared radiation, so heat gets in during the day and has difficulty being radiated back into space at night. But it is worth noting that animal husbandry also plays a big part. All the cattle that people raise also emit a greenhouse gas, methane, which is a by-product of the cattle’s digestive process. This may play as large a role or even larger, than the role of burning fossil fuels. There is still a considerable amount of controversy about how serious the human role in global warming really is. Some people argue that global warming is a natural process that would be happening anyway, even if people did nothing. It remains to be seen just
