The winter has been warmer and rainy, could this be due to global warming? Most likely not, it could just be the natural temperature fluctuation of earth. but we still had some questions about global warming:  is it still an issue, should we care, and what could change? We started this knowing very little about global warming and its effects.

 In the media it seems people have virtually forgotten about the giant issue that is us heating up the earth. But have there been any changes made in our society related to global warming? 

Un.org has an article talking about 10 actions that you as an individual can take to try and slow down the rate of global warming. Saving energy in your home means switching to LED lights, improving your heating/cooling systems, and using an electric heat pump instead of oil or gas. Being less wasteful and being aware of the things you do everyday that can have a negative effect on the environment can also help.

Companies are big sources of  pollution due to size. A single company can make 1.3% of the entire emissions from America, that’s the equivalent of tens of millions of tons of CO2 emissions, says the political economy research institute. But companies like Alphabet (the owners of google) have taken steps to become carbon neutral, which means somehow offsetting the amount of carbon they emit or have emitted; this being different from net 0 meaning 0 emissions from the beginning. 

There are a couple ways they can offset carbon emissions. Companies must first figure out how much carbon they have emitted, they must also figure out how to cut back on emissions. For each metric ton emitted, carbon credits are used to fund activities to prevent a tonne or reduce a tonne from being emitted somewhere else. We are far from a carbon free world. 

We still rely on natural gasses to power most of our transportation. But if we do what has been written above, we will be taking the right steps to correct our past misuse of our planet.