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Learn more about our climate and what we can do to change it.

Show Transcript

famous Allen has they  what is the alliance for climate education  my teammates and I are going to play storms all across the United States that work out of Boston Sarah  climate change do about it audience is high school student so do we have any high school students in the audience today Make some noise of your high school students arrive all right do we have any teachers in the audience grub parents are there any parents in the audience  okay alright so we typically do this presentation in about 45 minutes so we're going to down to like 15 so if you want to see the whole show you go to bring us to your school okay alright so we're going to break down the science of climate change in a way that you probably haven't heard before even if some of you might be familiar with it already and we're going to look at some of the consequences and then we're going to talk about what we can do about it I all ready to get started  hi I'm ready my buddy Brian is backstage he's going to help me with the visual cue so here's the deal a while back scientist discovered that the Earth has a sort of giant thermostat that controls the temperature on the planet these days that thermostats being jacked up way up but why is that happening but when you really get down to it it's all about the choices we make and one very big choice that only this patient in make how will in 2014 we've inherited a country that's all about living large right that's how we all got here just making it rain all the way here now okay people are living large and don't even realize it what I mean is that we each take up a ton of space and that's not so easy to see you cuz we each cover a little bit of grout your room in your stuff you cover a little more occluder home and you take up some space but then there's all that stays that we're using that we never see like place an Iowa takes to grow our food or the space in Brazil and in China to get the materials to make up stuff or the states in the Middle East it takes to get fuel to drive around forget about all that space it takes the dump our stuff once it turns into garbage because you see everything that we by using eventually throw away has to end up wax face too so now let's be clear not everyone who lives in the u.s. is taking up the same amount of space folks who are really living large take up a lot more all that space this means resources and on average we in the US use about three times more than the rest of the world but that's not really your fault because you're born into a world that was made by previous generations so you kind of got stuck with it and then you added that the fact every day since you were like one-year-old advertisers everywhere you look I've been telling you that in order to be cool all you needed to do was buy more and buy more and buy more and buy and buy more making you want to live as large as you can but here's a problem living large is pushing that giant planetary thermostat quickly two words way too hot how come will because it takes a ton of energy to live so large think about it can make all of our stuff to move ourselves around to heat and cool our homes and buildings electricity we need energy we don't really have a choice about that our modern lives require energy but we do have a choice about where that energy comes from sea people of the stuff many ways to provide the energy we need energy can come from hydropower nuclear power they can come from renewable sources like wind solar geothermal or biofuel but today the fuel of choice is fossil fuels about 80% of all the energy that we use right now comes from fossil fuels so what are fossil fuels well fossil fuels are made when living things die and decompose in over hundreds of millions of years under heat and pressure they be some coal oil and natural gas now these deals have been pretty important back in the 1800 they powered the Industrial Revolution they let the countless innovations that have improved our loaded life at first everyone thought that they were a great choice but over the years we've learned that there are some serious downsides to using these fuels like they're underground and people Great Lengths to get them blowing up mountains to get coal  drilling deep below the ocean's to get oil polluting drinking water to get Natural Gas and sometimes even going to war to get their hands on plus these fuels are non-renewable meaning that they will all eventually but the biggest problem is that when we burn them everyday and our cars and trucks to produce electricity and make our stuff we are jacking up that planetary thermostat and serious way how come well now we have to understand how that thermostat works so the Earth's thermostat can be turned up or down by changing the Bal the gases in the air that's all around us and our atmosphere less than 1% of our atmosphere is made up of special gases called the greenhouse gases that keep the planet warm here's how sunlight shines down on the earth sun gets reflected by clouds and Ice the rest is absorbed by the Earth and then released as heat greenhouse gases trap this year holding warm surface that otherwise would have escaped into space well that's the greenhouse effect so you've got to love those greenhouse gases because without them this place would be real cold like ice cold no life but when we have just the right mix of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere are planets temperature stays just right for Life as We Know It adjust right means that the ice caps stay frozen keeping sea levels from rising so you can choose to live near the coast like half the people on Earth just right means that pattern stay consistent keeping extreme storms droughts and wildfires in check just right means that well folks in Georgia can grow peaches Californians can grow olives in New Chris can make maple syrup it means that while Colorado get snow for their skin distri Texas gets ran for their crops just right means that climate stays stable sing us the choice to live where we live in do what we do but make a sudden change in climate and just wright could just disappear now the earth's climate change naturally but this usually happens slowly over thousands of years huge sudden changes will only things like volcanoes and meteors can do that Owen human's us how well it turns out the most important greenhouse gas for controlling that giant thermostat is O2 a carbon dioxide the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere in PPM that stands for parts per million now one part in a million may sound small but small changes to CO2 can make a huge difference as we'll see by taking a closer look at that planetary thermostat so by Looking Back In Time scientist of showing CO2 levels are lower around 180 PPM temperatures are cold like 20,000 years ago when the planet was in an ice age and that would CO2 levels are around 280 PPM the world's pretty comfortable and climate stays stable like over the past few thousand years when our civilization developed that's no coincidence so guess what we make a ton of when we burn all those fossil fuels that's right we burn fossil fuels we made MIT CO2 when we burn fossil fuels everyday and our cars are trucks to produce electricity and make our stuff we're taking all this carbon that has been buried underground as ancient plants and algae we released into the atmosphere as CO2 literally humans release about 35 billion tons of this stuff and because it's a greenhouse gas it's trapping in all this for heat and that is what's jacking up the dial on that planetary thermostat now  we're going to skip a couple Key signs Concepts here like carbon call methane CO2 over time and all that stuff is really important so can bring us to school or do research on your own and we're going to ahead to  all the stuff is really important Elvis is very important for climate change and I have to know about that alright so all this comes back to this one big Choi the choice to keep power in our lives the same old way with fossil fuels this choice is changing our planet's climate and it is not a matter of opinion so take it what percentage of climate scientists do you think believe that climate change is real and caused by people what percentage  I really you guys are very well informed about this there is a 97% consensus amongst climate scientists in every single call Academy of Science on the planet agrees that the longer we wait to act the worst consequences will be but even so there are some folks out there who choose to ignore evidence and say that all these extra greenhouse gases being dumped into the atmosphere won't lead to problems in this small group has been loud enough to make it easier for grants for corporations and for regular people to remain unsure about something that scientists are pretty darn sure of and in the meantime all these extra greenhouse gases are jacking up the dial on that planetary thermostat in fact the 10 hottest years ever recorded in human history have all been in the last and this is melting ice caps this is affecting natural weather patterns in this is starting to life on Earth for billions of people and if we don't do something about it it will change life on Earth for all of us but then there you are your speed a normal American Teenager right you're driving now getting a ride maybe charging the phone eating a burger made from a gas leak our two and then suddenly Wham you're in the middle of a planetary emergency did you did not start that you don't want but it's up to you to make the choice to stop it and stopping it is not going to be easy but you have what you need to get started in that snow you're the first generation that's ready to face the facts that there's a choice to be made that living large means lots of energy and lots of energy from fossil fuels means lots of CO2 lots of CO2 means climate change that is quickly getting out of control  okay so that's the situation that we find ourselves in here today and it's pretty heavy so we're going to take a quick look at some of the consequences that are happening as a result of all these extra greenhouse gases being dumped into the atmosphere seriously we're going to look at it  what's going to happen any minute okay a warmer world is a risky world  climate change is loading the dice increasing the odds that we'll have more extreme weather human activity is already raised average temperature by about a degree and a half Fahrenheit degree and a half seem small but climate change like the temperature when I put the green and a half to 100° you be stuck at home sick back in the last ice age who's only about 80 degrees colder than it is now that put a mile of ice over much of North America same to see if you do nothing would likely to raise Global temperature 7 degrees in this century because CO2 stays in the air for 100 years what we do now she bought world for generations to come  without action we will commit ourselves a hot temperatures sea level rise and routes that will make climate change Buffet each one of these impacts of climate change there's a storm it's not just a story about polar bears it's a story about us so that's right this is a story about us I think a lot of times when we hear about climate change or global warming it's really easy to imagine something that's far away we think about polar bears off of the north polar we think about future Generations but the truth is that climate change is a story about you it's about me it's about our family start our communities climate change is very much about the people who are alive right now okay so when we're facing a problem that's this big we basically have two choice we can either close our eyes and pretend it doesn't exist or we can choose to do something about it now at Ace we have the great privilege of working with many young people who are not waiting for anybody to hand them a sustainable future cuz they're busy creating it at the people's climate March in New York City which gather done incredible yeah that's right buddy there was anybody at the people's climate March oh my gosh it's the best audience ever over 400,000 people in the including many High School Planet leaders working with high school students in Massachusetts that are doing things like signing up their teachers to join a Statewide divestment campaign to divest their pension when's from fossil fuels high school students high school students that are signing up their parents and their neighbors for home Energy Efficiency Audits and lowering the emissions of communities and we're working with high school students that are doing all sorts of amazing things but if you are wondering how to get started at Ace we say it starts picking a. And I. Stands for do one thing now. Can be anything is something that you do to take action on climate change and now all these things might seem small and of themselves but when you take action and start taking responsibility for your impact and you share that with somebody else talk to somebody else about that action that can cause a chain reaction okay and so  one way that you can share your. And pick a. Right now is to join the ace Network so on our website we have a counter of thousands of young people who are taking these actions if you want to join that Network share your. You can do it right now through texting okay so that means that you can take out your phone if you want and you can text the word dot to the number 306 for 4 and you'll get a text back that asked you what's the action that you're going to take okay no not your mom you need to text Ace right now alright I'm so you can do that now you can take 30 seconds if you want we will send you other updates maybe like once or twice a month about awesome events like this that are coming up in the future we're also doing a contest year that one student who sent in their diet is going to win an iPad Mini so if you want you can take 30 seconds and you can text. To 30644 Costas aim as it cost next anyone of your friends and you can stop receiving these text anytime but text me back stop so if you get a text back somebody hold up your phone and let me know that this is working  yes yes I love it okay  alright so you picked it up right you've done one bang but what if you're ready to step up and do more  we all know that the real change happens when you connect with other people who are taking action and that's when we make tell change okay if you want to bring us to your school if you want to talk to us more about this we have a table outside so you can come over and talk to us and attend outside but before I go I have one last question for you all which is who's going to solve this problem  are you sure we're not just going to wait for Obama to hand us a sustainable future or no  that's right is that we are going to solve this problem together and right now there are already used all over the world that are leading this change and this is some of what they have to say some say we're too young the problem it's too big they say leave it to the scientist the corporation the politicians them to say no  we are too busy making history to focus on the future to get stuck in the thinking of the past youth created we always have and always will be the change the world newbeats and breakthroughs we are now and now we Face a challenge is bigger than anything we've faced before crisis every single one of us climate change climate change starting small now we're neighborhood schools I was backyard ala solution studying Solutions smart and shut that will break through and scale up all that's needed now is for the to wake up and decide the time for change is now we need enough of us to say enough is enough calling all leaders inventor makers Hammer's dancers Class Clown storytellers Engineers musicians and mathematicians if you are looking for an invitation this is it the choice is yours will it be this for that nobody shoes for you the next move is yours alright  thank you all so that's right the next move is yours  and for you high school students in the audience you do not need to wait until you grow up to start having an impact on this do you not wait to wait until you grow up to lead on this issue you have an incredible amount of influence right now you have influence over your peers and your friends you create the culture you have influence over your parents in your family is at home and because young people have the most at stake you have you have  your voice has moral Authority when it comes to climate change so if you want to learn more about what we do you can come talk to us at the table outside bring us to your school pick a. Respond to those texts and do offer listening to BJ's in pleasure

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