As a high school student in Miami Beach, Florida I have seen the effects of climate change first hand in my city and it is not good. Climate Change as a whole is a very controversial topic in the world and it’s been debated countless times. In my opinion climate change has to be the biggest future problem the world will see and we have to act now. For about a century now the average global temperature has increases by 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit and this number is still rising. Now what you’re thinking is 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit is a very small increase, but if the degree still keeps on rising it could cause ice sheets to decline at a fast rate and ocean levels to rise. We are also seeing in 2019 that the CO2 ppm is at 411 ppm the highest its every been and its being projected to pass 450 ppm by 2050.

Now as you see all this data is bad news for the planet and we have to act now before it is too late. A big argument in the climate change debate is that 200 thousand years ago the global temperature was 2 degrees hotter than it is today, so this has to be a cycle. The answer to that is false and scientific data has shown that the reason why the Earth was hotter back then was because of rapid volcano eruptions. This was causing the Earth to get hotter and overall heat up the surface. This period was called the Eemian Period and it lasted about 15 thousand years. Now cycles do effect the climate, but the main factor we are seeing changes in the environment is due to manmade machines.

We see the problem and now have to find a solution, the problem breeds from the big governments of the world and big companies. I am a Republican and do not support putting regulations on companies but at the same time we have to make them accountable. First off USA and China need to reduce the amount of CO2 emissions they are putting in the atmosphere. Also these countries have to cut coal as a source of energy and use other forms. So for my solution, we need to start using nuclear energy and natural gases as a source of energy. In 2016 30 percent of energy came from coal, 33.8 percent came from natural gas and 19.7 percent came from nuclear and the rest was minimal energy sources. The coal industry is dying out and companies need to start switching to new forms of energy. The United States needs to start investing in nuclear power plants and natural gas so we can use this as a source of energy. We have to act now because when the coal industry is gone we have to have other forms of energy to run the country.

So the second thing is that we have to increase our current budget for the environment. Right now the Federal government is spending less than 1 percent of the budget on the environment and this is a big problem. What we have to do is first balance the budget in the government and give more funding to the EPA. We have to reduce the military budget by 10 percent, in that 10 percent we would take it from defensive spending. This would be 95 billion dollars and we would put that into the EPA budget. Also we would have to start decreasing foreign aid spending which we give 55 billion dollars a year. By cutting the foreign aid budget by half we can also use that money to contribute to the problem. We also need to have a better tax rate system in America, I support a standard flat tax which would be 25%. With this money we would start building more natural gas factories and Nuclear power plants.

By having these new energy systems in the country we can create jobs from these sources and people can work. The economy will slow down and might now grow as fast but in the overall term the country will be in better hands. We would have to increase the nuclear power generation capacity from 396 to 930 gigawatts by 2050. With 930 gigawatts we can power more than 651 million homes and as of 2018 there were 127 million homes in America. With nuclear energy we can power buildings and factories as well. Next we have to draw attention to the electric car movement, it has been proven that when electric cars are made from nuclear and natural the car is overall safer for the environment. By moving to electric cars we would help the environment in a huge way because we wouldn’t be emitting CO2 into the atmosphere. Even though to make an electric car you are burning fossil fuels and CO2, it is going to be overall better for the environment. This is true because when you make an electric car you are only emitting CO2 one time. Rather with a gas car you are constantly emitting CO2 into the atmosphere until you stop using the car.  

Next is that we need to stop the biggest trade transport polluters in the world, these are cargo ships and airplanes. Now both of these types are very important for countries to exchange goods and items, we cannot get rid of them. What we can do is to invest in new ways of powering these machines so it is safer and healthier for the overall environment. Recently in 2018 cargo ship manufactures have started to create batteries for the ships instead of burning coal. This is a positive idea but we still have thousands of ships that burn coal. So by investing in making more batteries for the cargo ships we can make our atmosphere cleaner. With airplanes this is a huge market for the United States and contributes billions of dollars to the GDP. Instead of making airplanes being powered by gas and the plane burning this in the sky, we can also try to create a type of battery for the plane. Also for experimental purposes we can try solar panels. Now I understand this is going to be hard and difficult but if scientist predictions are right in 2050 we are going to have serious problems.

Now I understand if the United States does all of this the country would be in amazing shape, but we still have the biggest polluter China and India across the ocean from us. How are we going to stop them from polluting and following our way? Well there is no correct answer, China is its own country and doesn’t have to follow by what we do. So we have to act now in our country and try to benefit the environment as best as we can before it is too late.