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Essay on The Negative Effects of Fossil Fuel Usage

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The Negative Effects of Fossil Fuel Usage

The health of the environment is our livelihood. When the environment is not in good health it could lead to health problems on a personal level. One of the major environmental problems is air pollution from the burning of fossil fuels.

Levels of carbon dioxide emitted by fossil fuels into the atmosphere in 1991 was an estimated “5.6 billion tons per year” (Tesar, 28). If we keep running down the path we are on using fossil fuels like no tomorrow there is some worry among scientists, “Some scientists estimate that the number will jump to as much as 30 billion tons per year within the next few decades” (28).

Concern for the environment is not a recent phenomena. Rachel …show more content…

However, this will not be an easy task, according to Coombs there is an estimated, “Eight trillion tons of coal in the world” (Coombs, 19). With that amount of coal it is reasonable to assume that we will have and inexpensive source of energy for many years to come. People are willing to jump on the environmental bandwagon because it is politically correct, but because we live in a capitalistic society that is driven by the almighty dollar people are resistant to change.

Solar power is the energy of the future. Gary Chandler and alternative energy advocate states, “Although the sun is 93 million miles from Earth, it provides a free and plentiful source of clean fuel for renewable energy production” (Chandler, 1). We must embrace it completely because as long as the sun shines we will exist. According to Stephen Hawking, professor at Cambridge University in England, estimates that, “Our sun probably has got enough fuel for another five thousand million years or so” (Hawking, 83). So with this knowledge and the current condition of our planet it is a mystery to me why we have not used solar panels to their maximum capability sooner, especially since the solar technology has been around for nearly 160 years. “In 1839, Edmund Becquerel, a French scientist, discovered the photovoltaic effect” (Timeline, 1).

The technology has been available for over one hundred

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