Carbon Dioxide of Human Origin: Can It Contribute to the Greenhouse Effect?

Even though it is responsible for the production of these greenhouse gases (about 30 times more than the gases produced by man), particularly carbon dioxide, the nature cannot be blamed for the abnormal occurrences happening in the atmosphere of Earth. The record was set straight: The greenhouse effect is actually a normal occurrence in the atmosphere of Earth. In fact, this makes the planet a liveable place since the so-called “greenhouse gases” are composed of the organic gases such as carbon dioxide, oxygen, nitrous oxide, methane and several more. Without them, the Earth’s temperature could have been cooler, or even freezing.

Changes in gas concentrations have increased significantly since the period of industrialization because of the various human and industrial activities that caused an increase in the emission of carbon dioxide, as well as other greenhouse gases. This caused what is now known as the “anthropogenic greenhouse effect” or the abnormal increase in temperature in Earth’s atmosphere. Some of the activities that cause the over-emission of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are deforestation, coal-mining, burning, etc. All in all, about 1,200 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide was emitted during this period.

Today, humans produce about 48,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide in every 60 seconds, totalling to about 25 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide annually. Quite sadly, studies show that only 2,500 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide are needed to increase the pre-industrial atmospheric gas concentration by 100%. Therefore, the amount of concentration of the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will double up in no less than 100 years if man continues his annual carbon dioxide production.