Linda Dwi Arini

General Chemistry II (CHM 1046)

Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Climate Change

Climate Change is one of the biggest environmental problems that all people around the world

face today. It is a phenomenon where the average temperature of the earth surface is increasing.

Means that our earth surface is getting warmer. To know better about climate change, including

how we can conclude that climate really happens, what is causing it to happens, and what is the

impact of the climate change, there are hundreds research done by the experts around the world.

Climate change is caused by the increasing concentration of greenhouse gasses in the

atmosphere. One of the gasses is Carbon dioxide (CO2). Due to the industrial revolution and the

development of transportation uses, the source of CO2 is increasing. In factories, they burn fossil

fuels to run the machine. Same goes with the vehicle, they use fossil fuels in order to operate the

vehicle. These activities emit a lot of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Moreover, other human

activity such as deforestation also takes place in causing the climate change. Forest or plants are

the CO2 absorbers. When deforestation happens, then no one will absorb the CO2 from the

atmosphere. When human come up with industrial revolution and transportation development,

with most of them are using fossil fuels, human also did deforestation. Therefore, the

concentration of CO2 remains increasing in the atmosphere.

There is nothing wrong to have CO2 in the earth atmosphere. Because there is a natural process

that helps human and other living creatures to keep earth surface warm involving this gas. This

process called the greenhouse effect. It happens every day. When the sun’s energy (heat) is
coming to earth, then it will be reflected back to the outer space. However, because of the

existence of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere, some amount of this sun’s

energy is trapped on earth. By this process, then the earth surface remains warm. The problem

comes when the concentration of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere is increasing and it keeps

increasing over time. It means that the sun’s energy trapped on earth also increasing and the

earth surface temperature also increases. And this is what happens now, Climate Change.

To lessen the environmental impact of industrial processes especially the CO2, the scientists

have figured out some ideas about how to reuse or recycle the CO2. One of them is by changing

the CO2 into ethylene. Ethylene is the component of making plastic. Even though, plastic is not

something that good for environmental. But the idea is we can reduce the amount of CO2 waste

that produce by industrial processes. It also a fascinating idea that we can produce plastic from

CO2 waste. Another idea is CCS (Carbon Capturing and Storage). CCS is a technology of

capturing carbon dioxide that mostly coming from industrial processes and power plant. This

technology prevents the CO2 waste to enter our atmosphere. CCS consists of three processes, the

first one is capture the CO2 then transport it and store it to underground where oil and gas are

depleted.
Scientific method Map

Question :
Research about the concept:
1. How is the process of climate change?
1. Reading about what is Climate
2. What is the effect of carbon dioxide
change and how does it
emission?
happens.
3. How to use waste carbon dioxide to
2. Reading about the effect of
lessen the environmental impact of
CO2 and its contribution to
industrial processes?
climate change
3. Reading about some ideas that
use waste carbon dioxide to
lessen the environmental
impact of industrial processes.

Hypothesis:

1. CO2 is having big impact on

Conduct Experiment to the occurring of Climate
prove the hypothesis. change
2. There are ideas or things that
we can do in order to lessen
the impact of CO2 waste
from industrial processes.

Conclusion:
1. The hypothesis was correct that CO2 is
having big impact on the occurring of Climate
change. This proven by the data from the
experiment.
Create Report
2. The second hypothesis was correct. We found
that there are some ways to lessen the impact
of CO2 waste from industrial processes such as
by using technology of CCS and also by
changing CO2 to ethylene.
Resources:

1. Department of the Environment and Energy. (2018). Greenhouse Effect. [online]

Available at: http://www.environment.gov.au/climate-change/climate-science-

data/climate-science/greenhouse-effect [Accessed 2 Dec. 2018].

2. NASA. (2018). What Is Climate Change?. [online] Available at:

https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/k-4/stories/nasa-knows/what-is-climate-

change-k4.html [Accessed 2 Dec. 2018].

3. Epa.ie. (2018). What is climate change ? :: Environmental Protection Agency, Ireland.

[online] Available at:

http://www.epa.ie/climate/communicatingclimatescience/whatisclimatechange/

[Accessed 2 Dec. 2018].

4. Ccsassociation.org. (2018). What is CCS? – The Carbon Capture & Storage Association

(CCSA). [online] Available at: http://www.ccsassociation.org/what-is-ccs/ [Accessed 2

Dec. 2018].

5. Frankhouser, A. (2018). Direct Hydrogenation of CO2 to Ethylene. [online] NASA.

Available at:

https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/strg/nstrf_2017/hydrogenation_of_CO2_to_

ethylene [Accessed 2 Dec. 2018].

Part 2

From this assignment, now I get a better understanding about climate change and global

warming. Especially about how the process of climate change or global warming occur. I read

many resources about climate change and global warming starting from the causes, the process,

and the impact of this phenomenon. From this reading, I found that human is the one who

contributes the most on the happening of both climate change and global warming.

As the industrial revolution and development in transportation that using fossil fuel

happen, the source of CO2 increase. As part of “human”, I think I also contribute on the

happening of climate change. Therefore, from now on I will try to minimize the uses of anything

that emit carbon dioxide.

Moreover, from this assignment I also find new things regarding to the management of

CO2 waste. I find that CO2 can be recycle into plastic, which is good. Because it is no longer

CO2 but hydrocarbon. Another thing is CCS, I think it is a good because by this technology, we

prevent the CO2 waste to enter the atmosphere. I hope that in the future we can find other

technology that can help us to reduce the amount of CO2 waste and apply them to industries and

power plants. Because those two is the most CO2 contributors in our atmosphere.