Curious Questions and Answers About... Saving the Earth
Why is our planet in peril Our beautiful planet is in peril because we haven’t been taking good care of it Earth is a precious home for all of us and for the plants and animals that live here too People make so much stinky garbage Vehicles and factories make dirty gases That dirty air smells bad and it’s bad for our lungs and our brains People have taken or destroyed my home I need help There’s no time to lose so let’s get started The place where we live is called an environment My natural environment is a bamboo forest 4
How many people are on the planet There are more than 7 7 billion people That’s 7,700,000,000 humans Every one of us has an important job to do Let’s work together to save Earth Who’s going green We all are Going green means learning how to keep Earth happy and healthy and then doing something about it Something has to change 5
What is air The air is made up of gases and it’s wrapped around Earth like a snug blanket It’s called the atmosphere 21 oxygen 78 nitrogen Humans breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide 1 other gases carbon dioxide including A gas called nitrogen makes up most of the atmosphere Which gas makes up the next biggest part of the atmosphere Plants leaves take in carbon dioxide to make food They give off oxygen 6
Why does Earth need a blanket A blanket of air keeps our planet the perfect temperature 1 As the sun’s energy reaches Earth’s atmosphere some of it travels through and warms the surface 2 Earth’s surface releases heat and some of it escapes back into space The gases in the atmosphere that trap the heat such as carbon dioxide and methane are called greenhouse gases Atmosphere Gases in the atmosphere trap 3 some of the heat and reflect it back to Earth keeping our planet a lovely warm place to live This is called the greenhouse effect The world’s oceans are warming up and melting my icy Arctic home Is Earth getting hotter Yes Things humans do are creating more greenhouse gases This means that more heat is trapped so Earth is getting too warm This is called global warming Our weather is being affected we call that climate change 7
