Climate Change takes tough on the Ecosystem
Matthew Emberga-Biem
Climate change may be described as the global phenomenon of climate transformation characterized by the changes in the usual climate of the planet (regarding temperature, precipitation, and wind) that are especially caused by human activities. According to the USA, National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA), climate change is a broad phenomena created predominately by burning fossil fuels by humans, which add heat-trapping gases to the Earth’s atmosphere. These phenomena include the increased temperature trends typified by global warming but also encompass changes such as sea-level rise; melting of polar ice caps, mountain glaciers worldwide; shifts in flower/plant blooming; unpredictable rainfall patterns; as well as other extreme weather events.
Climate change may be in terms of the increase in global temperatures linked to industrial activities, and in particular –the greenhouse effect.
The consequences of climate change on the ecosystem are too numerous to mention. Hence, an increase in temperature due to global warming is not only about a heat increase that can be felt by humans or glacial ice melting- it has the potential to affect the entire planet’s ecosystem. For instance, in recent memory we have watched in awe in different countries- from India to South Africa, to USA (California) to the Amazon rainforest of South America, how the weather is increasingly becoming disruptive with increased flooding, forest fires, and drought that effectively wipes out endangered species leading to permanent species loss from the earth’s surface.
Extreme weather events are more regular and their patterns are changing-they are more intensive, aggressive, and with more energy. This means more storms, floods, cyclones, and droughts will take place over the next years. At the same time, the regulating capacity of seas, oceans, rivers, and streams is also being adversely affected by increase in temperature. If global temperatures increase dramatically, ocean and sea levels will not only increase, but they will also be facing the ecological challenges of water deoxygenation and acidification. At the same time, the forest areas (Amazon rainforest, and the Congo tropical rainforest basin); fragile ecosystems (e.g. Coral reefs; bogs; marshes and others), and general biodiversity (aquatic life, insects, plants and mammals) are also increasingly under the threat of extinction or sudden abrupt habitat change, accompanied by devastating effects like total and irreversible habitat loss and species migration and/or extinction.
Conclusively, climate change and its effects on the ecosystem will be adversely and severely felt by all living things on earth, if we humans do not take drastic and effective measures to reverse the phenomenon.
