Climate change Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Climate change - Essay Example This paper focuses specifically on the Gulf region in the United States, an area in which environment and living creatures have grown inter-dependent on adequate precipitation to effectively sustain lifestyle and longevity. The problem in this region, specifically, is the current water level in the Mississippi River which is significantly reduced due to climate change. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (2002) identifies that the Mississippi River region provides shelter and breeding grounds for migrating birds in the winter. Many different species of birds move away from colder regions to reproduce before returning to these regions to assist in pollination of plants and insect management in the food chain. The adequate waters near the Mississippi River in this region, historically, have provided quality shelter and water sources, thus providing other areas of the country with beneficial species regeneration. Today, however, climate change has shifted the volume of precipitation norm ally distributed within this region, inundating the Northern regions of the U.S. with these much-needed rains. Climatescience.gov (2007) further offers that when trees are exposed to higher carbon dioxide, rather than the highly oxygenated precipitation usually found in the Gulf region, trees alter their wood producing output. Instead of thickening trunks, the trees tend to establish more ground-level roots and smaller twig-like branches. Less oxygen replenishment through precipitation alters the scope of the environment, impacting the availability of building materials and thus impacting human lifestyles and economy. Nonliving dependencies associated with this problem include the infrastructures in this area created for predictable precipitation patterns. Walton (2012) indicates that a group of scientists and the Army Corps of Engineers will be rebuilding levees that were previously destroyed by humans to accommodate for rising water levels in a particular area just a year previous ly. This represents significant costs to destroy and rebuild infrastructure as well as causing problems with the homes and businesses that cannot predict their fluctuating dependency on barrier placement depending on water levels. The lack of predictability in climate change continues to disrupt levee longevity which considerable risks to the community due to depleting precipitation volumes. The human effects in this situation are largely negative, as most scientists and engineers are running on previous assumptions about precipitation predictability and infrastructure development without considering long-term sustainability. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is ever-diligent to attempt to sustain this environment for species migration and breeding, however using age-old sustainability plans that are no longer relevant in the face of dramatic shifts in precipitation distribution. An effective sustainability plan would include dredging of the Mississippi River so as to maintain more control over depth and to tap the underlying water table in this region to feed during periods of drought. Pumping stations designed to draw water from under the soil would be a long-term strategy to combat climate change. At the same time, it would ensure water is