Why Should We Care?

Although climate change isn't drastically affecting individuals today, on the path of greenhouse gas emissions, climate change could have more concerning effects. Rising sea levels as a result of the greenhouse gas effect increasing surface temperatures can degrade the quality of life and chances of survival for individuals in the future.

For example, Chelsea Harvey of the Business Insider wrote on Feb. 17, 2015, "...as the rising sea crawls farther and farther up the shore, in many places it will seep into the freshwater sources in the ground that many coastal areas rely on for their drinking water.". Desalination is an extremely expensive and demanding process, developing technologies capable of desalinating large amounts of waters, such as lakes, that have been affected by sea levels rising, would be very hard.

Furthermore, this could lead to fewer people having access to drinking water, making it harder for disadvantaged populations to survive. To add on to that as well, it could destroy ecosystems and agricultural practices cultivating resources. Even worse, on this rate of temperature increase, in a half centuries time, areas of the world could become inhabitable to humans.

Union of concerned students