Open Lines; Global Warming

Hello everybody. I'm Dr. Glenn Walter and I'd like to introduce you to open lines. And tonight we're going to be talking about global warming and we did invite you to join our panel here and talking about what is a global warming what can we do about it. How's it affecting us and maybe what are you willing to sacrifice to help change some of this global warming after you get some of the information that we have. We've got toll free numbers for you to call. And if you go to open lines dot org. We've got a place where you can e-mail us and talk about what's on your mind. Everybody just I'm done. I'll be your host tonight and with me are the folks from the governor's school on science and mathematics right. Was that good. Yeah it's good OK. And I'm going to let them introduce themselves and if you would start.

I mean you know and I'm from West Columbia. All right. I'm sure Sam's in a row. I'm Allison English and I'm from Buford. I'm standing you know from Kingstree. I'm Hayley McLeod and I'm from Macon. I've been able and I'm from Saluda years and I'm from Buford and Alexander Zak and I'm from Charleston. My name is Douglas page and I'm from Bennett's Phil. And Amanda Allen I'm from Conway here there are. And we would invite you to be a part of our panel. So give us a call if you have a question about global warming or if you want to tell us what your school is doing with global warming feel free to do that. All right folks here we go. You ready. Let's talk about what is global warming if I'm sitting out there in my living room right now and I'm going one of these young people want to talk about. First

explain what global warming is all about what how would you define it. Global warming is exactly what it sounds like it's the world or the earth warming up because the atmosphere which traps heat from the sun rays coming in and not being able to get out is easy. There's greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that cause this. And they're building up specifically carbon dioxide which causes the temperature of the earth and its oceans to get warmer and warmer. And over the past we've seen a increase of between a half a degree and a degree average in the past 50 years or so. All right. So let me know. So what does that mean. What it. So it's going to be a degrees warmer every day. Well what does that mean. Throughout the earth's like history since it's been created. It goes through temperature changes I mean we have ice ages and the earth heats but this is a problem because it's heating up much much faster than it ever has before

largely because of human impact on the environment. So how many of you here think this is a big deal. I mean. You know but you know look there are folks out there and I want you to call who say you know this is this is all created by those liberals those those you know those yogurt eating Birkenstock wearing hippies who want us to drive mopeds that are battery operated. OK and now we're not really doing this this is just you know some some people are making a big to do about it. Yeah go ahead you're about ready to pop here. The earth's temperature does go in cycles like Haley said and we have seen a rise in temperature. Now this could be natural but I definitely believe in along with lots of scientists believe that our human impact with the greenhouse gases we are many are supplementing to the increasing global temperatures.

All right. Hey Trish Trish from Somerville. Hey Trish you there. Hi Trish how are you. I'm doing great. What do you have for us tonight about global warming. Well I have a question. OK. I'm a native northerner and I have two different conflicting information on global warming. Wyman says that with global warming the temperature is going to increase and become warmer. You know gradually. And now but up north it's going to happen. Now I have to have another one where it says that the northern climates actually are going to get colder. So which is it. I don't know. Good question. What do you think. What I think you're trying to get at is light different patterns of weather are going to change because of global warming. And when the

earth is he know it's going to impact different areas. There are going to be changing. Temperatures are going to happen all around the world we have air currents. And if the temperature is increasing in air currents it causes temperatures to fluctuate all over the world. So it could calls different temperature fluctuations across the planet which could have good and bad effects. But that's what I see. Well that makes sense and I hope that makes sense to Trish and Somerville folks OK so we're creating this greenhouse effect with these gases and are we already starting to see an effect of that. One of the biggest effects that I think is being brought to attention today by scientists are the polar icecaps. Yeah actually in an article and you can see the pictures just recently over time how chunks of these ice caps are just falling off. And one of the thing about global warming is that the effects are more

extreme on the poles of our planet because that is the way that the heat is. It's more the effects are more extreme on the poles and you can see the polar ice caps falling off and the greenhouse gases are trapping more so on the poles and I think that's one of the observable observable effect right now. And and also just statistics you can see in the chart that the trends now are more extreme than they were in the past. Well most of us are are have have lived through this hurricane season and it's been a disastrous one. What do you think is this is this greenhouse effect having effect on our weather. Is that something we know currently or is it an estimate or a guess go ahead.

Well I've read different things that have said they may not be as much of an effect but it definitely does have an effect on the hurricanes because with global warming the Earth is warming up and you have the oceans mean warmer. So they're going to be increased rainstorm rains and thunderstorms and that's going to trigger the hurricane. All right we've got another phone call Bob from LBL. Bob hello there how are you doing. Reasonable for me to do except I'm with these lovely people right here. What do you have for us tonight. Well I'm a meteorologist and climatologists. Oh all right. One other cooling that is taking place in some areas depends on how salty the water is around them. Sea surface sea salt water freezes at 28 degrees. Ice water freezes at 32 degrees. So that difference makes a difference because if you melt the salt waters of fresh water it will be precipitated out in fall of snow across North Country and it could

produce an increase in. That's one possibility of the stand now the other thing though is this year is very significant. We've always had a certain amount of CO2 released into the atmosphere. Some was absorbed by the oceans somewhat. The bottom of the oceans and the solidified are stored down there and as the temperature rose that was released you had these areas where you had gases suddenly coming out of mountain lakes and telling people that was part of that phenomenon. Now this year it's been determined that the permafrost has thawed or is thawing and there's a permafrost thaws it releases more. House gas in the CO2. So when you have the CO2 being released by warming and the CO2 contributes to warming. You have come

very close to reaching an irreversible process. Oh so it's basically a situation where we have to get the ACT have access and there are a lot of things that could be done but of course we can't go I can't go into all that I have in my head here just simply changing the laws that using our current products would help. Would you would you keep with us all hour and if we say something that's not right would you call us back. Well I really can't do that I'm going out. Jazz concert. Oh I'm 76 years old so I'm not going to be around to see the worst of it you're probably right behind you. So not to the jazz concert but I'm going to stick here for now. We're going to cover all the things that these young people think that their generation and the generations that follow can do to help with this. But thank you for call in

and have fun at the jazz concert. All right so this is what's happening. All right so what can we do about it. One of the things there are several things that we can do but one of the biggest things that I think scientists agree on is the first one would be. Putting caps especially in America on the amount of carbon dioxide emissions from factories that are allowed because right now in America there's no real significant caps on it like there are in other European countries or in other nations. So America is kind of it's the number one producer of CO2 I think we produced a fifth of it completely of the worldwide in 1900 something was a huge amount compared to the world. So the big step would be placing caps on the carbon dioxide that comes out of the factories. Another step would be to increase funding for research and development. So for hybrid cars you know researching better ways to make them more efficient than they already are cheaper so that more people can buy them. For those of you who don't know hybrid cars are just simply cars that run off of a

combination of a battery electricity and very small amount of fuel so that all that submitted is water vapor which is much better and prefer to the carbon dioxide. All right. In your classes maybe not now but when you were in elementary school. And the teacher said who did that. And everybody pointed at everybody else. It seems to me that that's what we're doing with this greenhouse effect. Everybody is saying well this is what you should do and this is why you should this is what industry should do this is what their auto industry should do this is. But what you know instead of pointing fingers what can we do to slow this down to get this into a place where we feel more comfortable with. Well that's a good point is also easy to say well I know that I should go out and buy a hybrid car not everybody can go out and do that. And it might sound kind of like Warren court

Kurrajong everybody to become a hippie by saying go out and plant trees but it really could help and another thing is pay attention to your appliances. A lot of them are energy savers. And that's where a lot of the chlorofluorocarbons come from that are depleting the ozone layer and things like that so there are things in your everyday life that actually are affecting. This issue is not just the big corporations who are contributing to smog and things like that and people have the money to go out and buy hybrid cars and trade in their gas car and we're going to come back to that because you know that we like our cars the way they are you know so we're going to come back to that whatever I can do I think we got the Bill and Bill I'm not sure where you're from Mt. Pleasant. Thank you for joining us Bill. Thank you for taking my call. Yeah. I understand the greenhouse effect trapping heat. But we've heard a lot about the hole in the ozone. It almost seems like a contradiction that that part of the shield of the atmosphere is

prepping but yet it is deteriorating. I want to hang up and let you guys speak to that issue and I think they got the answer for it. Who put the hole in the well in in our atmosphere there's several levels of the atmosphere and in the stratosphere that's where the ozone is located and that's where oxygen is converted to a zone. And one of the greenhouse gases which Allison mentioned earlier was chlorofluorocarbons and what happens is in the troposphere where the greenhouse gases are located chlorofluorocarbons will actually migrate to the stratosphere and deplete the ozone causing holes in the stratosphere. And when ultraviolet light comes in and strikes the earth holes in the ozone layer mean more ultraviolet light hits the earth and is reflected and thus trapped in the upper part of the atmosphere. So if you have holes that allow more ultraviolet light to come in you're going to have more heat that can be trapped. So that's the relationship between holes in the ozone

and greenhouse gas. You get an A and you get an A for that one. I think we got another caller. Yes. Dave from Charleston. Hey how you doing I'm doing good David what do you got farce. Well I have a question I'd like to ask if we were to reduce emissions. What effect that would have on the economy realistically and jobs and people standard of living is a good question. Well thank you very much. Discussion thanks. Because we Americans want to know what the bottom line How's it going to affect stubborn group of people. And we're all for this until it costs me 400 more dollars a month to help the greenhouse effect go ahead when affecting the economy. Fossil oil companies and companies that produce a lot of fossil fuels.

Complain that by putting caps on the environment that we're going to hurt them because they're going to pay for these restrictions like putting filters on their smoke stacks so to speak to try to collate this carbon dioxide. But as I'm sure we've all seen on the news that a lot of these big fossil fuel and oil companies have really increased in their profits and they're really getting lots of money. 100 million Exxon made a hundred million last quarter. Yeah and their profits have like tripled over the past two years so I think it would be appropriate for them to start participating in trying to decrease these greenhouse gases because they are the main contributors. All right well what are we going to do. And I'm going to going to ask for the young people out there. If you're watching what is your school doing and if your school has a recycling center are if your school is going out and planting trees. Call in and let us know because I bet there are a lot of good ideas that the school systems could get in to. I know

the school that I met just last week we started recycling paper and it's kind of silly and I'm kind of embarrassed. But you know what. Once a week all the paper gets recycled. So what's happening out there and let us know. What are some other practical things you said. Buying energy efficient appliances and how do you know they're energy efficient. There's a sticker on the car. Yes this sticker there is a sticker that says this is energy efficient. There's also when you're building a house it would be when you're building a house you put in windows and sliding glass doors are also energy efficient glass which also helps with heating your home and stuff like that so that you're not paying as much for air conditioning and heating. And then in the short run it may be a little bit more expensive. But if you plan on staying in that house for any length of time those windows those appliances those light bulbs those fluorescent energy efficient light

bulbs will pay for themselves. Exactly. All right so you put a little bit up front but you get it back in the long run. What else are you doing. Well basically anything that you can do to save energy whether it's turning off your lights or buying fluorescent bulbs anything that you can do will help save energy which forces us to burn less fossil fuels which is when the CO2 carbon dioxide into the air. So anything they can do to save energy will in turn affect global warming. All right. And it will save you and save your money. Hey Max you see you there. Yeah. Hey Max what do you got for us tonight. Two things I don't. Recycle a lot but I do buy cycle a lot. I thought you were going to be frank I might have given you everything is happening.

Then explain the expansion of the polar ice cap. I think they're saying they're shrinking. Last I heard it was going the other way it is moving. OK last and now these guys are the experts. I'm just a bald headed guy here. But last I heard you are shrinking right. From everything that I've read on the research that I've done for this program the most glaciers and ice caps are shrinking now there's going to be localized You know weather patterns in which maybe something freezes a little bit more and it fluctuates from year of year but overall they are definitely shrinking and you can see pictures from 50 years ago and then from today and how much smaller it is. You can also if you talk to people on cruise lines and cruise line directors they'll see you know it will be like a chunk of ice floating in the water and it's broken off from a glacier or an iceberg polar icecap and it's just floated that far because they are shrinking it is depleting. All right. What. Well let's let's get back to what you can do. What are

some very practical every day that we can all can do if even if you don't believe in the greenhouse effect and global warming and all that sort of stuff how can you save some money work. What are some things especially with rising gas prices. You can always maybe hwat if there is. I know it's hard with the whole separation between houses and jobs. You know different parts of the city and stuff. You know if if you're walking down to see your neighbor don't drive your car I mean gas prices are high enough as it is. You can get some exercise. Experience a day and still. Not admit you where Bergen stuff you get outta my head. But that's a good idea and you know with gas prices going you know the part of the oil companies making so much money and charging so much for gas is that people are starting to rethink what

they're going to buy at this sale of S U S S S. YEAH OUR are way down. Yeah not only just walking in stuff but you can also like carpool. I know at our school we do that very often because we go home on the weekends so that's more gas efficient and that's less carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere. And if you don't want to go home on a weekend and your parents are pressing you just say Mom and Dad I want to save the economy and I want to save the greenhouse I'm not going home this weekend. And if you live in a large city where I guess walking isn't that convenient. There's always public transportation buses and I guess you have mostly buses and trans and different things like that. They're relatively cheap and they're definitely. Helpful to the environment less gas and man it's been real patient with us Matt from Greenville. Hey Matt. How you doing. I'm doing good. What do you got for us.

Well I've got two questions for a one for the student. One would be what kind of experiments have the students tried to conclude on their global warming and the second question would be are the effects of volcanic on volcano eruptions worse to the environment or manmade gas. Oh is it manmade gas and there are less. Are the volcanoes here. If there is an eruption let's say Mount St. Helens. Was that more destructive to the environment or manmade. Yeah that's a good question and I got two people raised to go oh yeah thank you for calling. Well I'm not too good with the second question but with the first question as to experiments where we've I can say about concluding about global warming but some research I did this summer. On aqua culture had to do with AI. I measured a lot of the aspects

of the aquatic environment and I saw how much the surrounding temperature affected every every part of the water ecosystem. I saw that salinity and temperature are very connected and even things like algal photosynthesis in the water that also has to do with temperature and so as the temperature is increasing around us and which also magnifies the effects of pollution that's killing the algae in our water which is decreasing the photosynthesis which as we all know is definitely something that is fighting against global warming photosynthesis and as the algae is being killed then that also in turn magnifying the effects of global warming and things like that. All right and you got the second one.

Yeah. On the second question. You know I had mentioned earlier that the United States is the biggest contributor to global warming warming but also I believe that 20 percent of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is believed to be from cars. Cars are a fairly recent development volcanoes have been around for you know long before we haven't the environmentalists existed you know and it's state perfectly fine it's been warming but over millennia not you know a century which is why we believe that we've had the impact and that we've increased it so much and that cars among factories in burning of fossil fuels has increased the global warming so much. Well what do you think it's going to take especially. We live in America who are kind of stubborn and we like our gas guzzling pick up trucks and all sorts of stuff. What is it what do you think it's going to take for us to kind of get the big click and say wait

what we're doing here isn't working. And we really need to make some changes. What do you think it's going to take. I think when it really comes down to it when we actually run out and it starts when the supplies really start dropping that's when it's really going to hit us. And I think at the rate that we're going now with trying to move to renewable resources and hybrid cars I think scientists predict within the next hundred years the lack of fossil fuels is going to hit the human race and hit it pretty hard and I think that when it happens it's going to really hurt us cus we're not prepared. Yeah you know and I stood in line when Katrina came through in the pipeline the gas pipeline through the Carolinas got kind of shut down. And I tell you that really got me because I thought what am I doing on you know the car I've got it's 20 miles a gallon but that's not so good.

You know and and so I think we have to realize with different areas like Africa where you have river basins drying up in a lot of those places that have they get a lot of the inland areas that's how they get their water to get to their crops. So when you realize you have I mean we already have problems with hunger. When you realize you have even more problems attribute to global warming because they can't get water for their crops and irrigation is basically impossible for in lean areas if all the refrigeration. Yes we have Louis Louis Louis are you with us. Yes I thank you for holding. What do you have for. Well first of all I've got to say it's interesting you should say that I'm I'm originally from from Michigan which just means you're a land of great waters and almost by half. And this is very very it's a very very important you know concern of the impact of industrialization and development the global

environment the global commons what is called the United Nations global commons. Got to say that here in South Carolina I have encountered a speed that is so naturally so environmentally conscious and aware. I mean I don't because I have lived in several states. I would have ever lived in a state where people are as natural and as environmentally conscious or aware and aware except they are Bush supporters. If. You don't hear criticism of the rejection of the Kyoto protocol you'll hear criticism of Bush. And if you are isolated it's more of a concern for not only for the natural beauty and. You know we helped her along. Even the flag represents that. How how is it that this young South Carolina you're

not supposed to translate this natural environmental consciousness into political activism and ultimately the change in legislation would do that have you shaking your head there scratching your head wondering what's going on with that sort of yeah. OK. Hey thank you for calling. You're welcome you know I think that I don't know about the political opinions that teach their own person obviously but I think the education as to the importance of global warming specially to people our age and younger who say this is our lifetime that's going to impact like this is our problem primarily because we're the people they're going to live through it. So I think that especially emphasis in the schools with classes like environmental science so much global warming is obviously going to be a big topic so that when we get out of school and become doctors and legislators and so on and so forth we know what we're talking about and we know that what needs to be done and we can work to change what's happening.

Yeah I think I think 20 30 years ago or so when people had just started talking about it it was considered a liberal platform and I think over the years it has changed. It's no longer just a liberal versus conservative platform. It everyone is starting to realize hey whoa we've got some potential for a real disaster here. And and I think like you said the more you're informed and that's why I want to hear from schools out there because I want to I want to make sure that the schools are putting things in place so that their students are educated on this. But we have Richard from Atlanta Richard. Hello good evening how are you. I'm doing great house. How are things in Atlanta. This is a way into South Carolina and I thought you were on a satellite you know on local TV.

I have an observation and a question. All right. OK of course they're saying that the greenhouse gas. Is water blocking heat being radiated into space which is a part of how our planet maintains itself. But I believe there is another factor that has not been considered or at least I've never heard it discussed back before the Industrial Revolution the only heat sources on the face of the planet were cooking fires and things like that. How many to use have been produced since the beginning of the industrial revolution. That's the amount of heat we've generated on our surface of our planet that is added to the amount of sunlight coming in and the amount of energy radiated from her radioactive core and is this a real significant factor. Have we set the surface of our planet on fire. How many be used as one car release into that mysterious it goes down the road and then multiply that out by

air conditioning. All the numbers of cars jet planes factories and so forth. Air conditioned houses don't you know they remove the heat from you know inside the outside of the electricity and is generated in the plan is done by heat. This would be a significant amount of heat and they have we over crowded the ability of even an atmosphere without greenhouse gas. To radiate this kind of heat that is a good question and I thank you. No matter where you're watching us from. Thank you for watching us go ahead. It's a distinct possibility that even if somehow we've managed to produce all this heat without producing any more carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that we would still be overheating our planet. But I'm not quite familiar with the unit be to you but I have heard it and so this heat automatically goes hand in hand with the production of other greenhouse gases and when you put the two of them together we've kind of created a vicious cycle because we can't really cool the planet down any

so what we have to do right now is worry about the amount of greenhouse gases still in the atmosphere. All right. Very good. Hey we got Tony from Charlotte. Tony hello. I'm here. Are you from Charlotte North Carolina are all Charlotte South Carolina Charlotte North. OK. I'd like to see a show of hands of the students that actually rode in cars today to get to the show. Oh they came in a bus. All that what. Did they say we we walk the walk. I mean my kids are into it. My concern is when when the Chinese and Indian country. Well what we get which is we live in the greatest country in the world and everybody's got two three cars in their driveway. Now what's going to happen when China India some of these other countries in Europe if they decide that they want

what we've got and they start for China as one of the major consumers of petroleum fuel it's easy to point fingers at the big Olcott me and say You guys are the ones that are polluting everything but we're actually buying those old products. Yeah aren't we. Bottles the gasoline and you know the stuff that goes in your home. All my current problems are we drive in the companies who sell us that buy what we buy and we don't. Yeah. So are you willing to to get a hybrid car. No. OK that's a good one of the worst consumers of fuel in the world I'd like to drive fast and nobody Charlotte is slowed down a bit. Oh except in the traffic jams on 485. I guarantee you this place is not even a gas price. Same thing. Well thank you for calling. Thank you. How many of you I mean this is calling for sacrifice. If you really believe what's going on are you willing to drive slower.

Are you willing to say instead a 70 mile an hour speed limit we're going to go back to 55. How many of you say yes. Nobody will write it but see this is what what what are you willing to sacrifice. Are you willing to say I will unplug all my appliances every night or unplug and plug them in when I use them and unplug them. Because what I heard on Oprah was that even leaving your appliances plugged Dan causes some sort of power to be used. And one of the very simple things you can do is when you're done with your appliance unplug it. Are you willing to do that. OK. Are you willing to do without a hair dryer. Yes I am. What are you willing to sacrifice. What are you willing to give up.

And that seems to be the question. Personally I would be willing to get a hybrid car definitely because it's using a combination of the technologies that we have an internal combustion engine and electricity so therefore we still can go fast enough like I've heard some of these hybrid cars may not be able to go like 140. But do we really need to cars that can go that fast or go one hundred twenty like you know the limits of our speedometer. If a car can only go 80 or 100 I think you know will end up being OK. So hybrids are good. All right so you're willing to go the hybrid route. All right. OK. I think like you mentioned if everyone in India and everyone in China wanted what we have then prices on gasoline petroleum that type of thing would become so expensive that people would eventually just not be able to afford it and it would drive itself out of existence pretty much.

If you go to cheaper more fuel efficient. Options means appearance risk. Or maybe what we could say by what we model is folks in the world. What we're doing isn't working. It's not right and it's not working. So here's what we're choosing to do. We're go and we're choosing to go with different modes of transportation. We're choosing to carpool. We're choosing to slow down and walk someplace. You know Bergen stocks where we're willing to here's what we're willing to do. Will you follow us on that. Well obviously you know we're not going to be able to get everybody to slow down. But there are obviously more countries in the world that are willing to do stuff about I mean countries did sign the Kyoto agreement agreement there are other entire nations out there willing to make some sacrifices and willing to cap the output on their factories and willing to set up emission standards on their

cars that you know I mean America is a problem. But there are other countries that set examples and not only you know China and India and other countries may you know want American cars or whatever but most foreign cars are much smaller than the average American cars European you know are much more aware of what they need. So and not only that but there's not space enough for every family in China to have three cars in their driveway. Yeah yeah yeah. Hey we got Charles from Hartsville Charles Charles how you doing tonight. I'm going. Well thank you. First off I want to thank heavey for sharing this discussion and the folks from the governor's school for potential plating. But my question was around number one what you said is what part of our society uses more energy. Let's say North America is industry or is it the private sector and then secondly

the primary renewable raw material sources of natural gas. You've got coal which of these sources would the panel short advocate pursuing most aggressively. Mostly nuclear I guess is an option. Thank you and thanks for all. As far as the question as far as which more is in the industry or the private sector. One of the statistics that I read that seem to occur the most often was that cars emit 20 percent of the carbon dioxide and factories emit 25 percent. I don't know if there's more you know other than cars in addition to what that percent would total out. I'm not quite sure on that statistic. As for the fuels I think that personally there should be a lot more money put into research into the element as to cleaner fuels I know that British Petroleum BP has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in to create cleaner fuels and it's done well because of that

and that I think that it would be a good idea if the government could actually get involved and set up maybe grants for research and development for better options than what we currently have. Do you think would you say is the United States serious about this or not. I mean I would say yes I mean of you out there would say well what is this. It's kind of OK I want to. Well I think I know I might be stepping on some toes here down the NASCAR country but I know you know we can talk about how we want. You know a clean environment not been willing to go so far but can we give up our Sunday afternoons in front of the TV watching guys race around the circle burning fuel for no reason. And. This comes from Birkenstock lady here. OK I'm sorry but what are you what are you again what are you willing to give up and you are

willing to give up NASCAR right. But are you willing to give up your hairdryer. Yeah I know I don't right. Again what are you willing to sacrifice and teachers out there please if you're watching this program. Talk to your students talk to them about what is a class you can do or maybe what is a school that you can do. Folks there are not only appliances symbols for for energy efficient but there are symbols on recyclable products that you buy. This product is recyclable so you can you make at least a little conscious effort to say oh right I can get this because it recycles. So what are you willing to do and how far are you willing to go. Most of you would say no the United States is not really serious about this is that the consensus.

I'd say that but one of the problems is it's mostly our generation. I'm speaking for my classmates but mostly our generation who's going to have to deal with the effects of global warming and environmental conservation and things like that. And so it's easy for our parents and the generations beyond them to to make this sort of half hearted gesture towards making a difference because it's really not going to affect them I'm sure it. And it doesn't really seem real to all of us but it's kind of when I know I felt that this really wasn't a very real issue until I started doing research on it and then I realized that this is going to impact me in my lifetime. And so I feel like when's our generation realizes that this is us this is our future that America will start to get serious about hey we've got a first female caller I do believe Bridget. Yes you can Glad No our first caller was female wasn't it. Yeah. Bridget you're our second female caller.

What do you have for us. How you doing I'm doing good. BLOCK So the boy devices you say gives money value. Thing like stuff like that you have to pay money to know an accident. You might as well let him learn I guess. Oh no that's a good question I think he's ready for an answer here he looks like he's he's really go thank you for calling. Well if I guess we as a whole everybody were to cut down on their driving and use public transportation taxes would be less for everyone because everybody would be paying a little bit of the pie to pay for the buses and such and to ride a bus. I used to do public transportation when I lived in Montana and it was

maybe like a dollar or something like that to ride for an entire day or something so I mean it's relatively cheap compared to if you want to ride 17 miles or 20 miles on a gallon it's four bucks. So I guess as a whole it would be better to do public transportation. We have this love affair with our car stowing. I mean not just in the south I mean everywhere our country loves their cars. And that would be a real stretch for some to do that. We have another caller and hello. Hey how are you good could you tell me where you're calling from. Oh yeah. Well Grant what do you have for us tonight. I have a thing out on Oprah he had a big thing on this today with the staff because she just beat us to it. She had at last fully. Yeah and they were OK. Oh boy they would do they would melt away. They would go into the

ocean and I reply to our DVD's now because the water's got to get down there and get trying I was but that was their wake up call it should have been. But you know our corner and if you have heard anything about watch out playing. All right thank you for calling. Thank you. I mean there is no doubt the polar ice caps melt there will be more water in our oceans and that some of our you know beachfront property that everybody loves to go to the beach house but. It's going to it's definitely going to erode away at our beaches and you know as these melt there's just going to be less speech on Katrina. Isn't the best example because I mean while there was you know ocean water coming in and it was caused by a storm and B blew the city in Louisiana it was destroyed it was already under sea level. The only reason it was kept dry was by levees and pumps.

But right now I was in say another comment to it some scientists do believe that the increased hurricane activity is because of global warming. Some of it has to do because you know the ice caps are melting and the water is increasing. And since the water is also at a warmer temperature with global warming increases stronger hurricanes and more frequent hurricanes as the water cycle chains and wind pattern changes. So you know the this record hurricane season that we've seen and Christina and Rita and these strong hurricanes are also. Believed to be part of global warming and as far as I comment on the beachfront property being washed away this is also going to affect your sea turtles and your other creatures and animals that depend on this environment and then once they are you know become extinct or endangered that's going to affect the entire life cycle on down all the way of the entire world. That's another big effect that's going to have. All right. C'mon your you folks are from the governor School of Science and Mathematics right here we go. Tell tell the teachers in the schools around the state. What are some of the things

that they can do to help with this what what what is a good school project what's a good classroom project. Let's just fire it out What do you get what are some good projects. Recycle all your paper that's why recycling is really good. We recycle our Jeanne you're sitting in this as a recycling program. All right thing we do. What else. Also you could plant a tree as a class. I mean that would also be a great thing to do because of trees decrease CO2 by turning it into oxygen that helps us too. What else. I would say that one of the most useful things you could do is to assign projects where students learn about what global warming is because I think awareness is one of the biggest problems not a lot of people know exactly what global warming is what its effects are and how what we're doing is. And there are great websites out there. My producer Dean Davis got me all sorts of wonderful things from websites that she just ran off and got it and we got it.

All right. Following us. Tomorrow is PBS is going to do global warming signs and the science and Linus Moore said it's going to be the host. And so we've got a little clip on what they're going to show tomorrow. So let's take a look and see what follows us tomorrow night. In a New York City suburbs 16 year old player Lechner and her father closer working on an experiment meet one family whose goal is to undo the damage of the great warming on the basic idea was just to use different chemicals maybe to collect carbon dioxide and then also just how the basic system works like we used a fish pump just a pump because we had it has to be air through the solution. And now I'm looking at this tower that he's designed that is basically the same idea just a lot bigger. All my life has been coming home and telling us about what he's doing at work. And it's just me. How much you

can do for the whole world especially in Moore in physics I think. And then another fare boy you can do for other people. With Science. So far we have put out about 300 billion tonnes of carbon. At current rate it will take us 50 years to do that again. If we keep growing like we did over the last century by the end of the century we will talk about a thousand 2000 3000 billion tonnes of carbon close like news logic is bluntly simple. If we're going to keep pumping CO2 into the air somebody is going to find a way to suck it right back out. It is very critical that we have energy for the 10 billion people who in 50 years really live on this earth. And if you want to economic growth in the developing nations you will need to have energy and you have to make sure that that energy is affordable. Close is dream is a landscape of what look like giant angels harps on

stands but instead of making music the strings on this one would be coated with a chemical like calcium hydroxide. It reacts with carbon dioxide in the air to form calcium carbonate the same stuff that sea shells are made of. The calcium carbonate would be collected and it's captured CO2 harvested for safe disposal underground or for conversion into stable substances. The chemistry seems like a can't miss but the towers will have to be big. If you want to put that in perspective if you look at the skyline it would be comparable to these buildings you see over there on the water. You might think a 50 by 60 meters if the area on which we collect and this whole thing stands on a pedestal maybe another 50 meters tall. So they've been collecting areas on the order of 160 by 200 feet. Just one tower would collect the continuous excess CO2 emitted by 4000 people or 15000 cars to handle all of today's excess CO2

we need only 250000 towers which could be built anywhere because CO2 is everywhere. One of the things I would like to demonstrate is that one can use the fossil energy and we have hundreds of years of it left. We can use that energy in an environmentally responsible fashion. Close calls them synthetic trees and the goodbye is the time we need to shift from the fossil fuel age into a more sustainable future. Woah that was terrific and we want you guys to tonight and tomorrow night. Give me a response because we were watching that here as well that you guys seem pretty impressed with. Yeah. I see that this video will tomorrow night will show a lot of things that we need to do in our society get things done to one of the biggest things that we can do is win in our democratic process we can vote for people who

are going to make legislation to make things better we can vote for people who are going to do things about greenhouse gas emissions and try to get things done and what we all should do is we should contact all our representatives and state senators. We are you know state House and U.S. Senate. Ask them what their opinions are and then see if you know if they want to. They're progressive and want to go for decreasing greenhouse gas and the phrase great ideas for social studies teachers political science teachers. Hey we've got John it's been hanging on for about 15 minutes there. Hey John. Yes I'm sorry we didn't get to you sooner. You go far as well. This has been a great talk. But some of the information is somewhat debatable. OK. Yeah. Now you mention the Kyoto Protocol but you didn't mention the one of the main spokespeople Tony Blair has recently renounced his position on global warming and the Kyoto

Protocol. Additionally you didn't talk about the point brought up by the United Nations council on this. That was if the Kyoto Protocol was not implemented that the temperature change penalty I guess you'd call it imposed would be less than the degree Celsius that the FAA. Act of implementing the Kyoto Protocol was going to be less than two degrees reduction in temperature. This is a lot of penalty for very little improvement. Well we got about two minutes. What you're saying is that there is still to be a lot of debate on the effects and what we need to do with this is that right. Oh yeah. All right great. Thank you. Thank you for holding. We got two minutes left folks. What else can we do in our schools what do you know

what I think that there's you can do something in just about every class with your school. I know you know English class you might not think to connect global warming because global warming is more of a science field but you could do pamphlets or when you're doing a research project to write a paper or you are making flyers or information you know you have a good idea for man. Right. I mean a statistics class at my school and we have do lots of projects. And so I was thinking one that would help the environment would just be to expose the students to these statistics. Deal with global warming just make them more aware of what's going on in the environment. Like Allison said I wasn't aware how quickly things were changing in the world until I had to learn about global warming. All right great. We have one minute left and I want to give you guys a chance for a shout out. I want to thank all of you. Thank you for coming thank you for your expertise. Thank you for folks who are watching. I used to go for it they do first shout I

like to give a shout out to my life and to my three kids and to all of my buddies out there go ahead shout out real quick. I say my mom my dad my two brothers and all of my classmates as well as my very large family. Thirty seconds let's go here we go. Going to give a shout to my mom and dad and it's still. I like to say hi to my mom and dad and say cheers to wall. All right. Quickly I want to say hi to my big cat Griffin kwek kwek kwek kwek arcology Lab. for keeping me open minded and papa and mama granddaddy to hand in my grandma made my family you know she know who are my family. Tennessee would a been a great show thank you for joining us. God bless. Take care bye.