An Expert Opinion

Global warming has grown in to an issue that extends beyond the horizons of ignorance. And earth is calling for help. Therefore the environmental experts are giving us an opportunity to be awakened by their expertise and knowledge to tackle the issue of global warming. On 30^th January three distinguished speakers from National University of Singapore shared their views, addressing a crowd of engineering undergraduate students, on the issues of global warming, its causes and effects and solutions to the ongoing crisis.

 

Prof. Andrew Palmer shared his views and knowledge on, “Carbon Dioxide storage technology and politics”. He brought up certain ways of solving the issues regarding the climate change, i.e. fuel efficiency, mitigation, adaptation and storage of carbon dioxide. One of which he emphasized was storage of carbon dioxide, at depleted oil or gas fields or ocean beds. According to the latest discoveries from the experiments, scientists suggest to put liquid carbon dioxide in a membrane and store it at a depth of more than 2750m below the sea level. Another solution that Prof. Palmer mentioned was to manage the incoming radiation level of the atmosphere by installing mirrors in space or releasing of sulphate particles into the atmosphere. Though all these solutions show a high effectiveness to solve the issue, the high cost involved in continuing such a project discourages many countries who are still under development.

 

Second speaker Dr. Benjamin K. Sovacool, brought up two case studies in his lecture titled “Using STS to address Energy Problems”. Renewable Power was one of it. Due to economical, political, cultural and behavioral factors such as market failures & barriers, varying governmental standards, public unawareness the chances of making it a solution is lesser. Even though that the renewable energy are not perfect, it’s always a better choice than of fossil fuel. Second stand study was regarding the Electric vehicles which were an ongoing project before the economic downturn. Technological, economic, political challenges will still pull this being a solution for many countries.

 

Professor Rajasekhar Bala, the third speaker, shared his views on Climate Change addressing the steps that have been taken up by the governmental bodies. Supporting with the evidences linked to global warming Prof. Bala explained the rise in the average global surface temperature. According to 2007 IPCC report he further explained that 13 warmest years in the record occurred since 1990. He even pointed out that certain other natural phenomena caused by the global warming such as changes in glaciers, changes in rainfall patterns and recent hurricanes might cause major effects to the global weather patterns. Suggestion were made as contributions by the community in order to lessen the global warming crisis by being energy efficient, relying more on renewable energy and reducing the greenhouse gases. Prof. Bala also revealed that Singapore’s National Environmental Authority is going to build a ‘Singapore Green Plant’ in 2012 which could be a next biggest step made by the Singapore government to help to save the environment and make it conducive for a healthier living in the world.

 

With these words of wisdom by the three renowned professors, we can conclude that the world has already embarked on the mission to save the earth and its people from the global warming crisis. Tangible solutions are within our reach. Thus, we must act fast before it’s too late.