Imagine your home and land denigrating. Imagine all your food gone before your eyes and going from predator to prey because of the acts of others. That is what the human race is doing to the many animals in the polar ice caps through global warming. The ice that was once a great land mass is now being destroyed melting nine percent of its land every decade because of the greenhouse effect heating up the earth (NRDC). For years and years our earth has been in balance with the Carbon Dioxide emitted always being used up by oceans and plants, not heating up out earth. Now with the rapid burning of fossil fuels and destruction of trees the chemicals increase and stay in our atmosphere.
   The greenhouse effect is the major cause for global warming. In a planet without a greenhouse effect the sun’s ray enters the atmosphere and is either absorbed or bounces of the planet and out into the sun again. On a planet like Earth with the greenhouse effect, the sun’s rays bounce up from the earth and into the atmosphere. Once in the atmosphere many rays hit the chemicals such as carbon dioxide and again go towards earth. The nonstop repetition of rays bouncing creates a hotter environment. The greenhouse effect is a great thing if it is in moderation. Without the greenhouse effect the world would be freezing at all times making the earth almost inhabitable. There are also times when the greenhouse effect is much too strong in places. On the planet Venus the average temperature is nine hundred degrees Fahrenheit due to its many gasses within the planet (Fridell 26).
Some people wonder why we should care if the earth is increasing by a slight amount of .9 degrees Fahrenheit in the past two hundred years (Fridell 35). In the 1800’s people started utilizing fossil fuels for industrial and home purposes, now 4.4 billion tons of carbon dioxide are being released into the atmosphere per year and will remain there for the next one hundred years (Fridell 35). These gases will add on to the .9 degrees with the greenhouse effect and many scientists believe in a 1-2 degrees Fahrenheit with extremists saying 5-10 degrees Fahrenheit in just the next 100 years (Fridell 39). Not only has the earth increased by .9 degrees Fahrenheit, half of the .9 degree increase has happened in the past 45 years alone (Fridell 35). Also before 1990 the six warmest years in history where in the 1980s with 1988 the warmest, then in 1990 there were six years hotter than the 1988 record with 1998 the hottest and 1999 in second. 
The emissions of carbon dioxide aren’t the only thing humans can do to stop global warming. There are many other gases being released such as methane and nitrous oxide, but gases aren’t the only cause. The destruction of forests also plays a big cause in the heating of our earth. Trees and plants work like sponges for carbon dioxide, and as long as there are enough trees the earth can be balanced. Sadly, we humans are destroying these natural carbon dioxide sponges. It is like to take a sponge and trying to take all of the water from a bucket, but the sponge keeps getting smaller and the water keeps increasing. We keep destroying the sponge (Trees) and keep emitting more water (gasses). If we let the bucket overflow the damage will have been done and we can do nothing about it, the earth will overheat.
We cannot stop global warming without everyone’s help. Everyone must come together and emit fewer gases, destroy fewer trees, and save the environment. Save the earth while we still have it, we are not far from the point of no return. The end of Earth.