What exactly causes global climate change?
The earth’s atmosphere has a natural ‘greenhouse effect’. That is, heat from the sun radiates down to earth, and much of this heat is re-emitted from the earth’s surface back into the air, toward outer space. Certain molecules, or gases, in the air absorb and trap this heat. This is fundamentally a good thing, because it prevents all of the sun’s heat from escaping back into space, and keeps our air warm enough to promote all kinds of life. Without the greenhouse effect, our air would be extremely cold. One of the gases that absorbs the sun’s heat and traps it in the air is CO2. Scientists agree that global climate change is, by most measures, caused by too much CO2 and other greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.
