ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE AND ITS EFFECTS
ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE AND ITS EFFECTS

Summary/Abstract: Environmental protection is an area of major worldwide concern. The fight against global warming is one of the basic tools of environmental policies and legislation. Climate change is considered to be one of the most important environmental issues. This concern reflects the reality: that so much of human activity is sensitive to climate change, and that adapting to current and projected rates of climate change could be very challenging. It also shows that human perturbation of the climate system is essentially irreversible. As we know, climate change is occurring and the climate system is warming. The conclusive evidence leading to this conclusion includes not only the noticeable increases in average global air and ocean temperatures, but also the widespread melting of snow and ice and the overall rise of the global sea level. Climate change deeply impacts nature and population, and represents a long-term shift in weather conditions, identified by changes in temperature, precipitation, winds and many other indicators. Also, climate change can involve both changes in environmental conditions and changes in variability, including extreme events. Both categories of triggering factors – the ones related to natural processes and the ones related to human activity – cause constant climate change, operate on different time scales and are responsible for overall changes in the earth’s climate. In addition to the natural causes of climate change, changes specific to the climate system, such as variations in ocean currents or atmospheric circulation, can also influence the climate. Climate change has brought about severe and possibly permanent alterations to our planet’s geological, biological and ecological systems. All these changes have led to the emergence of large-scale environmental hazards to the health of humans, such as extreme weather, ozone depletion, loss of biodiversity and stresses to food-producing systems

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