G8 Nations Agree to reduce Carbon Emissions

U.S. President Barack Obama said at the group of eight summit conference that the World leaders have agreed to work together greatly to reduce carbon emissions by 2050. Speaking after the major economies forum meeting at the conference in L'Aquila, Italy, Obama called climate change as one of the defining challenges of our time.

The G8 members which includes the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Canada and Russia and other countries agreed to a target of reducing their carbon dioxide emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050 to try to keep the earth's atmosphere from warming by more than 2 degrees Celsius. Participants in the forum also agreed to work toward a harmony on greenhouse gas emissions. He further continues to say that, no particular nation was eminently responsible for the cause of global warming, so no nations could fight each other. Active participation by all countries is a mandatory for a better solution. Still to be developed are measurable, recordable and verifiable standards by which countries efforts to reduce their carbon effect could be reported.

Leaders also agreed to provide financial support for developing countries to help them meet their emission-reduction goals. And conference participants founded a global partnership to drive new clean-energy technologies, such as solar, smart grids and advanced vehicles. So that, we made a good start, said Obama. But progress will not be easy particularly because of the global recession. We can either shape our future or we can let events shape it for us, Obama said. Urging global cooperation, he affirm that the world is facing the choice of either shaping its own future or letting events shape it for us. We know that the problems we face are made by human beings. That means it’s within our capacity to solve them,” he said

Black Carbon incline to Global Warming

It is an frightening circumstances that the black carbon is becoming a Supreme contributor to global

Warming. Carbon dioxide is the most widely cited convict when it comes to greenhouse-gas emissions and global warming. But black carbon which is otherwise known as ‘soot’ is also being seen as the second-leading cause for airborne pollution and climate change after carbon dioxide, and it’s totally preventable. Black carbon has a warming effect in the atmosphere three to four times greater than the usual estimates. Black carbon produces particulates, a serious form of pollution.

Black carbon pollution is a major player in global warming. Home cooking fires, and also burning wood and coal are the originator of black carbon emission. This problem is also created in developing countries from cooking and rudimentary heating systems like people burning coal in their homes and there is no real way to stop that without a replacement form of energy. Between 25 and 35 percent of black carbon in the global atmosphere comes from china and India, emitted from the burning of wood and cow dung in household cooking and through the use of coal to heat homes. Countries in Europe and elsewhere that rely heavily on diesel fuel for transportation also contribute large amounts.

Around 400,000 people are supposed to die each year due to inhaling soot particles, mainly because of indoor cooking on wood and dung stoves in developing countries. These deaths are mainly among women and children. Breathing black carbon causes serious respiratory illness responsible for 1.6 million deaths a year, and when it falls on ice or snow in the arctic, it causes it to melt faster. Since black carbon stays in the atmosphere only for a short while, fast action to control it will buy time for addressing the larger issue of carbon dioxide, the chief cause of global warming.

Vehicles from fossil fuel to electric, plug-in-hybrid, or hydrogen fuel cell vehicles helps to reduce black carbon emission because the electricity or hydrogen is produced by a renewable energy source such as wind, solar, hydroelectric, wave, or tidal power. Such a conversion would eliminate fossil-fuel and reduce soot and co2 emissions by 1.63 gtco2–eq. per year. That the elimination of hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides would also eliminate some cooling particles, reducing the net benefit by at most, half, but improving human health. Control of black carbon, particularly from fossil-fuel sources, is very likely to be the fastest method of slowing global warming