index > Today's Earth, Our Future > 4. The earth as a greenhouse > How to Reduce CO2 in the Air

How to Reduce CO2 in the Air

Some people may say, "Any effort to prevent global warming is useless because it's impossible for us to return to the old lifestyle without electricity, gas or automobiles." This way of thinking is "all or nothing," meaning that if you cannot do something 100 percent properly, it's better to leave it as is. Nothing will change if we think like this, but global warming will continue. Even if we cannot make carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions zero all at once, we still can reduce them gradually from 100 to 90, then to 80, and so on. This way we will be better off than we would be with ever-increasing CO2, won't we?

How can we solve the problem that human activities which produce CO2 are the main cause of global warming?

Remember that you can tackle any problem in two different ways: you can approach a problem either by "treating the symptoms" or by "treating the cause" (getting rid of the root cause of the problem so the problem does not arise again). For example, when you catch a cold, you can take medicine to "treat the symptoms," or you can try to make your body stronger by exercising and eating a lot of vegetables so that you won't catch a cold easily. This is called "treating the cause."

So, to reduce CO2 emissions, we could perhaps collect the emitted CO2 and seal it up somewhere. This would be treating the symptom. Instead, to treat the cause, we could try to change our society so that it doesn't produce so much CO2.

Once CO2 is emitted, it is very difficult to collect and seal it somewhere. Some researchers are studying the idea of collecting and sealing CO2 deep under the bottom of the sea. This might seem like a good idea, but there are some things we have to consider. For example, "Would it create new problems if the CO2 increases in the sea?", and "Would more and more CO2 be emitted from the energy used to seal it under the sea?"

However, we have good news. We have a magical vacuum cleaner that absorbs lots of CO2 with great suction power, but it doesn't make any noise. Can you guess what it is? Right, "Plants." They absorb CO2 and store it in their bodies. Big trees store a vast amount of CO2. So, forests are special cleaners which absorb and store CO2. Naturally, we must protect and increase them with care.

Now let's talk about a "lifestyle that emits no CO2" which is "treating the cause." Almost all of the CO2 emitted in our daily lives comes from using electricity, gas and gasoline. So, one thing we can do is to use these energy resources as little as possible. We don't need to return to a lifestyle of the primitive era. Even with our present lifestyle, we can stop wasting energy resources that people have long taken for granted.

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