Effects of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Everywhere you go, you could often hear people talking about going green, or becoming more eco-friendly. While not everyone has become fans of going green, there is still a large portion of the population who clearly believes that going green is the way to go. For some, it is just a fad that they try to be a part of, but there are actually various reasons why going green has become very popular.

Today, more and more people are becoming aware of the environmental impact of the ways of man. A majority of the health and environmental problems that humans suffer from, stem from the un-green ways of man, one of which is the emission of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Coal-fired power plants are hailed as the biggest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere. In fact, this accounts for 20% of the total greenhouse gas emissions. In the United States alone, roughly 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide is produced every year just from burning coal at power plants. This figure does not include the greenhouse gas emissions that vehicles on the road emit. Add this up to the 2 billion tons of CO2 and you will get really plenty of gases to contend with in the atmosphere.

These emissions have been the leading cause of respiratory problems that humans suffer from at present. Children, who have sensitive body systems, are more prone to the dangers posed by these emissions. Hence, various governmental agencies have been created in different countries to help in protecting the degrading environment. One such agency is the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the United States.

At present, people are going green by getting their power from green sources. Aside from coal-fired power plants, there are now clean energy sources like wind energy, solar energy, wave energy, tidal energy, geothermal energy, and hydropower.

Car manufacturers have now implemented measures to minimize the greenhouse gas emissions that vehicles produce. There are even hybrid cars that do not rely entirely on gasoline or fuel to run, but has an alternative power source in the form of an electric motor. To lessen the environmental impact further, there are now newer types of vehicles that run on biofuel instead of using fossil fuels like gasoline.

Air pollution caused by greenhouse gas emissions is only one of the reasons why more people are going green. There are a host more reasons around you, and all you need to do is to open your eyes, and you will see the need why you must go green.