Use the worldwide Web to go green

Kids, want to learn how you can have a blast on the Internet and help curb global warming at the same time? Read on.

By Alison Snyder

from the October 9, 2007 edition

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C'mon, admit it: You love playing games and talking to friends on the Internet.

You're on Club Penguin, and you have your own Webkinz. Your little sister complains that she never gets a turn at the game, and it always seems that Mom kicks you off just when you have almost enough virtual money to buy clothes or deck out your igloo.

Here's a good excuse for next time: I'm learning how to fight global warming!

There are many ways you can use your love of playing games on the Web to find out how to make a real difference in the world. Kids around the United States and in other countries are having a blast online as they learn about ways they may be able to help slow global warming.

Climate change, a shift in global temperatures, happens naturally. But in the past few decades, humans have been speeding up this process by increasing the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere. We add CO2 to the air when we use electricity or go places in cars.

Carbon dioxide is called a "greenhouse gas" because it traps heat in the atmosphere – much like a greenhouse captures warmth inside it. The higher levels of CO2 are slowly but surely raising earth's average surface temperatures. This temperature increase is also known as global warming, and the consequences of the phenomenon will alter the world as we know it.

"We now know that by changing the atmosphere in that way, we're going to change the whole climate system of the whole earth, and that's going to affect billions of people," says G. Michael Purdy, who is the director of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University in New York City.

Scientists predict that global warming could affect the planet in several ways, including:

•Oceans could become more acidic because when CO2 dissolves in seawater, it forms carbonic acid. The extra acidity would have an impact on most ocean life.

•Sea levels are likely to rise as ice in polar regions melts. The added water could, over several centuries, swamp coastal cities.

•Droughts, floods, hurricanes, and other storms may occur more often and could last longer or be stronger, some scientists say.

•Some of the habitats where animals live will change, and because of this, some species might become extinct.

If these changes occur, they won't be things we just watch on TV. They will affect everyone in ways we'll all notice.

"[Kids are] going to start seeing the impact on [their] own neighborhoods as weather patterns change," says Jorian Clarke, who is founder and president of the website KidsCom.com. "We've already seen in just the past two years floods and forest fires that impact kids [whose homes and neighborhoods were damaged]."

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